If the Google S-1 is accurately representative of their company, I fear for their shareholders. Not only does the filing lack useful information on growth and opportunity (which runs counter to the founders’ claims of a long-term focus), but the level of arrogance and hubris implicit—and explicit—in the document is truly astounding. The opening salvo […]
Scott S. Cohen
Posted inEthics & Culture
Editorial: There Is No Connection Between Education And Ethical Behavior
The week this print edition went to press, Bloomberg had run yet another story drawing a line between business schools and high-profile ethics failures. Focusing on former Enron chief executive Jeff Skilling, who—the reporter went out of her way to mention—had an MBA from Harvard, the article also touched on the higher education and honorary […]
Posted inEthics & Culture
Editorial: To Judge Tone At The Top, Follow PCAOB And Check Rank-And-File
At a lecture on ethics I attended a few years back, the speaker asked the parents in the audience to think honestly about an answer to this question: Would they rather have their kids cheat on a few tests in high school and get into Stanford, or not cheat and get into a lesser school. […]
Posted inEthics & Culture
Editorial: Driving Business Ethics: Regulations, Or A Higher Calling?
Last spring, at a conference on Nantucket I co-founded back in 1999, I had the pleasure of running a session on ethics with Harvard Business School research fellow Laura Nash. A noted author and commentator on business ethics, Nash has spent much of the last three decades training senior directors and officers at Fortune 100 […]