When Brad Kenney graduated with his MBA from Kent State, he was the only member of his 2009 class to take the MBA Oath, a new code of ethical conduct for business professionals, similar to the Hippocratic Oath taken by physicians.
Harvard University students created the oath last year to publicly reject the business scandals that contributed to the global economic recession and to encourage business professionals to conduct themselves ethically. MBA graduates who take the oath promise to engage in ethical behavior by, for example, using their business skills to advance the social good and not placing their personal interests before those of their company and society.
The oath has sparked a dialogue among professors, students and business leaders as to whether business schools and secondary schools should require students to take ethics courses to prepare them for ethical challenges they will face in their careers.
About 3,500 MBA graduates from throughout the nation have taken the oath so far. Besides Kenney, five other MBA grads from regional schools John Carroll University, Lake Erie College and Case Western Reserve University have taken the oath.
“The oath is nothing more than pretty words, but I have found that the only way to influence our current systems of business is to model the ethical behavior that I would like other people to engage in,” Kenney says. “But it’s not enough just to say you will use your business skills to advance the social good; you have to go out and do it.” He put his words into action by establishing a Kent State University chapter of NetImpact, a group of MBA students and business professors who provides pro bono work for nonprofit organizations and social service agencies.
Ruben Garcia Jr., a 1999 Case Western Reserve University MBA graduate, took the oath to set an example for his 40 employees at Diagnostic Imaging Supplies and Services in Puerto Rico.
“As a business owner, it is my responsibility to instill ethics in all of my employees,” Garcia says. “We value doing business the right way. We believe there is a difference between doing business lawfully correct and ethically correct. We make sure we do it both ways. It helps us feel good about what we are doing even if it means cutting into our profits.”
Garcia believes his upbringing and what he learned in business school has helped him make ethical decisions for his business.
“Before we started our MBA course work, our class was required to complete a community project,” Garcia recalls. “While we were working on our community project, we discussed ethics as well as the obligations of businesses to give back to the community. Although we were not required at the time to take a business ethics class, we often discussed ethical issues and dilemmas during our course work. I was surrounded by a lot of quality people at Case, and I think that cemented my ethical beliefs.”