IP-WARS.NET || CIO: No ethics required?

CIO: No ethics required?

By sphealey, Section Diary
Posted on Tue Mar 15th, 2005 at 11:28:46 EST

Michael Schrage, "codirector of the MIT Media Lab's eMarkets Initiative", has an interesting essay in the current issue of CIO Magazine arguing that ethics are neither necessary nor desirable for a CIO:

I'm provoked into asking these questions by an accelerating and dangerous trend infecting boardroom and office suite discussions. That trend is the pea-brained "ethics-ification" of business decision making and implementation: CEOs are supposed to be Chief Ethics Officers; CIOs should be Chief Integrity Officers. How noble. How politically correct. How silly.
Ethics, Shmethics; Mar.15 2005 Issue of CIO Magazine

He goes on to give an example of a high-stress implementation project where operations will be outsourced at the end:

Suppose that once your major CRM system implementation is completed and rolled out in a year, your company plans to outsource maintenance and support. There's a better than 60 percent chance that you'll lay off two-thirds of the IT workers who were involved. Is it "unethical" for you not to fully disclose the details of their possible future (or lack thereof) as they work feverishly to make deadline? I don't think so; do you?

Interesting. Read the whole thing, including his conclusion - I would be curious to hear your viewpoint.

sPh

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CIO: No ethics required? | 12 comments (12 topical, 0 editorial, 6 hidden)

Re: CIO: No ethics required? (4.00 / 9) (#2)
by matesrates on Tue Mar 15th, 2005 at 13:15:23 EST
(User Info)

Suppose that once your major CRM system implementation is completed and rolled out in a year, your company plans to outsource maintenance and support. There's a better than 60 percent chance that you'll lay off two-thirds of the IT workers who were involved. Is it "unethical" for you not to fully disclose the details of their possible future (or lack thereof) as they work feverishly to make deadline? I don't think so; do you?

I've been in this situation, and in fact it's much more likely that your employees will work out the implications halfway through the implementation project and the results will be far more disruptive.

Staff are not mushrooms, and if you expect loyalty anbd trust, you have to treat people with respect.

In Europe, you'd be legally bound to tell your employees of your intentions. No wonder we're so uncompetitive :)

crash-happy virus magnet

Re: CIO: No ethics required? by stewart, 03/16/2005 17:17:11 EST (3.75 / 8)

Re: CIO: No ethics required? by matesrates, 03/16/2005 21:25:54 EST (3.50 / 8)

Re: CIO: No ethics required? (3.66 / 9) (#3)
by mikey (mikey at badpenguins dot com) on Wed Mar 16th, 2005 at 00:03:40 EST
(User Info) http://www.ip-wars.net

Hmm, so would it be unethical if I found out my CIO has this attitude and did everything I could to prevent him from succeeding?

I mean really, what kind of loyalty can you expect after treating employees this way? Gee, what a way to motivate your people.

These are the kind of people who wonder why the hell that worker just showed up with an AK and shot them.

It is psychology 101. You threaten people's security, they react defensively. Not a good way to run a business. Kind of sad to read something so stupid coming from a co-director of an MIT project. Maybe this is the mysterious MIT guy who advised Darl. The lack of ethics sounds familiar.

---
DISCLAIMER:
IANAL, may have no idea what the heck I am talking about, yadda yadda yadda.

Re: CIO: No ethics required? (1.30 / 13) (#1)
by Potential Recruit on Tue Mar 15th, 2005 at 12:52:36 EST

TV Science Fiction? Aliens? Ethics?

What has this got to do about IP?

This place is boring.

Bye bye spambot (none / 0) (#12)
by Potential Recruit on Tue Nov 28th, 2006 at 12:00:45 EST

This used to be a spambot post that is flooding the site. Due to volume, I had to resort to this while I work to block access by these bots. My apologies - thanks for your patience.

Jeff

CIO: No ethics required? | 12 comments (12 topical, 0 editorial, 6 hidden)

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