The Ethical Optimist

As a teenager, I started reading the newspaper every morning, and I always enjoyed Dear Abby. My mother and I would often debate the letters that came in, along with Abby’s response. I remember her as having a “no nonsense” approach to dispensing advice, and she always had terrific, well-researched resources to offer readers.

My daughter is now reading the newspaper in the morning, and she started reading Dear Abby. I hadn’t read it in years. Have you read it lately? I’m starting to think the newsroom cutbacks have affected my favorite column. Dear Abby is now written by Abigail Van Buren, also known as Jeanne Phillips, having been founded by her mother, Pauline Phillips.

I often wonder though, if an intern isn’t writing the columns these days. The answers are sloppy at best, with little in the way of research or credentialed experts behind them (as they used to be). The advice is lame to say the least. Take today’s column for instance…a woman complained that her husband’s dog continually bit her when they were intimate. When they locked the dog out of the room, it barked frantically. The woman asked her husband to get rid of the dog and Abby suggests a dog trainer.

Hulllloooo! A dog trainer? How about marriage counseling or a husband trainer? Any guy that says “If the dog goes, I go,” needs more than a better-behaved pooch. At the very least, give a link to a dog training website…

I think today’s column got under my skin for several reasons. As someone who’s worked in the media for over 25 years, I’ve seen a significant decline in the quality of reporting over the past ten years…with a very steep decline taking place over the past five years. Reporters (and apparently Abby) have little time to do proper research. Information has been replaced by lackluster infotainment, and few stories have any real meat on the bone.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying Abby is a “reporter,” but in years past, even columnists did a fair amount of research and gave credible advice.

Some days I find it’s tough to be an optimist in this business. I wonder if Abby has any advice on that…

You know, I try very hard to be optimistic. There are some days, however, that I feel as though I’m swimming upstream, against the current!

Take today for example. I sometimes have high hopes in government officials. As an optimist, I feel as though most folks who enter into public service truly have good motives. I’ve watched my own Governor Corzine make some tough choices and try to get NJ back on the fiscal tracks with both hope and trepidation.

I think that he, too, is swimming upstream. It’s hard to move a bureaucracy.

Just today, I received my application for this year’s Homestead Rebate program. It’s a program that returns a portion of a homeowner’s property tax here in NJ. I got a kick out of the cover letter, which stated, “Please carefully review this application and apply for the much-needed relief available through this program.” Signed by Governor Corzine no less. My own state government has acknowledged, in writing, that I’m overburdened and deserving of relief.

Okay, so does it strike anyone else as somewhat ridiculous that they’re probably spending a HUGE amount of money to develop and mail this multi-page application to homeowners throughout the state, staff it for execution, tracking, payments, etc. (wonder what THAT line item is in the budget) to return money they shouldn’t be taking in the first place?

Why not just properly assess and tax me? Instead, your using my tax dollars to staff and execute a program to return my tax dollars? Okay, maybe I’m a simpleton, but this strikes me as ironic at the very least. A total waste of time and money at most.

Why not put that time and money into properly adjusting the system instead of adding another layer to address the root problem?

Like many problems, this is not one of ethics, but of management. In fact, many ethical dilemmas stem from poor management/process issues. I recommend people not get hung up on the outcome, but rather focus on the root of an issue.

Perhaps Governor Corzine could use me as an advisor…

Why bother with ethics when being unethical is so much more fun?

After years of preaching ethics in the workplace, I’ve finally had it.  What’s the point?  Ethics makes no sense when considered logically.

Machiavelli’s “It’s better to be feared than loved” theory, an ideology I’ve always embraced, conflicts with my lifelong love affair with business ethics.  And, I’ve decided it’s finally time to choose one or the other.  Well, Machiavelli seems much more appealing to me.

Ethics, when compared with Machiavelli’s theory, just does not size up.  Why be nice and succeed when you can be ruthless and triumphant?  After all, some of the most famous figures in history have embraced Machiavelli over ethics and it turned out alright for them.  For example, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, and George W. Bush all put ethics aside and they wound up in charge.  Wouldn’t you agree?

One might say I’ve had an epiphany.  An awakening of sorts… But don’t be too congratulatory or I’ll construe it as a sign of weakness.

You can visit my new blog at www.RealisticPessimistBlog.com

By the way, Happy April Fools Day!

I was pleased to see the recent news by Masterfoods in which it will stop marketing its core products to children under the age of 12 by the end of the year. Yet the news reports I read quoted the company as saying, “we will not be advertising these products to children under 12 years of age.”

I wondered as I read it, if by advertising they include their public relations efforts. Very often, companies do not consider their public relations campaigns a form of advertising…yet both are governed by the same laws; just ask Mike Lasky over at Davis & Gilbert (www.dglaw.com).

Years ago, I remember an industry vendor that created in-school campaigns that were offered as supplemental lesson plans for teachers, but were often thinly disguised marketing campaigns. In fact, one involved using M&Ms to teach children how to count and do simple arithmetic.

Also, when these companies say they won’t “market” to children, do they take into account the sale of promotional items using branded characters? In a recent article by Nina Lentini in Media Post, she quotes Margo Wootan, director of nutrition policy at the Center for Science in the Public Interest as commenting on these issues. Wootan asked, “What do they mean by ads? What do they mean by kids under 12? Do they mean TV, do they mean all marketing or cartoon characters on packaging or in ads or online?”

These are great questions because they illustrate the “gray” area more and more marketers face when confronted with similar ethical dilemmas. As media channels converge and children have more access to information via home computers, cell phones and even PSPs, marketers need to review their existing media strategies, guidelines and standards to be sure they are keeping up with technology and social mores (i.e.: the campaign against childhood obesity).

As the public relations representatives of these organizations, we need to take the lead in helping them to identify potential problem areas, as well as marketing opportunities, so they can devise campaigns that are effective, yet do not cross ethical or legal boundaries.