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Describes the factors AT&T Consumer Products managers considered in deciding whether to locate a new plant for telephone answering machines in the United States, Asia, or Mexico. Describes in depth the restructuring of AT&T during the 1980s, the competition facing its consumer products division, the division's overseas manufacturing strategy, the Mexican economy, and the country's macquilodora program. Encourages students to analyze where a company's and an executive's responsibilities lie in making a complex plant-siting decision involving overseas operations, and in making decisions about pay, benefits, bribery, gender-based hiring, waste disposal, and so forth in operating in developing countries.

Four minority employees at Inland Steel encourage their company to initiate more aggressive affirmative action and diversity efforts. The "gang of four," as they call themselves, challenge a white general manager to join them in promoting increased opportunities for minorities and women. This case focuses on diversity, strategies for social change in organizations, and how senior managers can respond to grassroots campaigns. It can be used in Organizational Behavior and Ethics courses

Supplements Inland Steel Industries (A).

Supplements Inland Steel Industries (A).

Supplements Inland Steel Industries (A).

A long-time community development worker creates hundreds of jobs for low-income women and minorities by forming a for-profit home health care cooperative, Cooperative Home Care Associates. May be used in Entrepreneurship, Strategic Management, Organizational Behavior, Human Resources Management, and Ethics courses to help students explore: 1) the motives of an entrepreneur starting a venture to meet a tangible social need--the "social entrepreneur;" 2) the concept of worker-ownership and its potential consequences; 3) how to simultaneously serve the needs of various groups in an economically deprived area; and 4) the creation of jobs for individuals many dismiss as "unemployable" (single mothers on welfare, etc.).

Supplements Rick Surpin (A).

Supplements Rick Surpin (A).

This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article. If you're negotiating to sell your business and you lie about its debts, that's illegal, right? But what if you begin negotiations with everything squarely on the table? The new quarterly reports come in and they're not as rosy as the previous ones. You don't disclose them to the prospective buyer. Illegal or just unethical? Surprisingly, business negotiations law is increasingly infused with ethical considerations. Outlines the basic elements of legal fraud, using numerous cases that illustrate when negotiators were penalized for what some consider merely unethical behavior. The author argues that when entering into negotiations, your conscience may be your best guide.

Presents a framework for resolving issues in which managers' responsibilities--to shareholders, employees, other stakeholder groups, and to their own values and commitments in life--conflict with each other. The framework analyzes these issues in terms of duties, consequences, personal values, and practicality. Provides an analytic framework for a course or module on business ethics, that brings together basic considerations in moral philosophy with practical pressures, perspectives, and concerns of business executives.

Explains what a company's ethical climate is, describes the forces that shape it, and ways managers can work to alter a firm's ethical climate.

Describes the role that issues of personal integrity play in managers' decisions. Defines personal integrity, the factors that influence it, the situations in which it becomes particularly relevant to company decisions, and ways of overcoming the blind spots that can create too personal a focus on decisions. Helps students understand the issues in the context of decision making and action planning.

This case focuses on the development of AZT, the first drug approved for the treatment of AIDS, and the issues faced by its U.K. producer, Wellcome PLC, as it decides how to set the drug's price. The case includes brief overviews of the disease itself, drugs in development to treat it, the pharmaceutical industry and its practices, and the history of Wellcome PLC and its U.S. subsidiary, Burroughs Wellcome. The A case concludes with analysts' predictions for the soon-to-be-announced price of AZT. See also the B case and the C case.

A government official in a developing country requests cash to purchase an air ticket to make a personal trip and to purchase the services of a prostitute in return for overlooking a safety and environmental violation.

Describes the reasons why the courts found in favor of Ann Hopkins in the sexual discrimination suit. Also explains why the courts concluded she was the victim of sexual stereotyping.

Intended to help students understand the many barriers organizations face as their members and their management ranks grow more diverse. As a case on business ethics, it encourages students to discuss what "fairness" and "diversity" mean when an organization is also trying to create a sense of teamwork and "fit." Based upon the open court records of Ann Hopkins versus Price Waterhouse, a sexual discrimination and sexual stereotyping suit brought by a woman who was denied partnership at Price Waterhouse. (The court found in her favor.) Includes lengthy exhibits drawn directly from Price Waterhouse.

Researchers at Merck & Co. believe that a drug they had developed for animals might be an effective treatment for human river blindness, a debilitating illness that affects hundreds of thousands of poor people in the Third World. The process of development and testing, however, will be enormously costly. Should the company devote critical resources to developing the drug, knowing that, even if it were medically successful, it would yield little financial return? The case presents background on economic and scientific constraints that shape the pharmaceutical industry. It provides a framework for discussing ethical aspects of product innovation and the risks and benefits of investments in research. It may be used in Strategic Management, Business and Society, and Ethics courses.

Supplements Merck & Co., Inc.: Addressing Third-World Needs (A).

Supplements Merck & Co., Inc.: Addressing Third-World Needs (A).

Supplements Merck & Co., Inc.: Addressing Third-World Needs (A).