Business weak

MBA students do care about green issues, contrary to BusinessWeek article

Posted by Guest author (Guest Contributor) at 9:14 AM on 15 Feb 2008

Read more about: business | green jobs | greening biz operations

The following is a guest essay from Alex Roth, an MBA, attorney, and writer in Washington, D.C.

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Photo: iStockphoto

Do today's MBA students care about the environment? You'd answer "no" if you took seriously a January BusinessWeek article by Derek Thompson, which was based on a recently released study by the communications consulting firm Hill & Knowlton.

BusinessWeek is an authoritative publication, with the largest U.S. circulation of any business magazine. But even if you can't balance your checkbook and wouldn't recognize a cash flow statement if one bit you, there's no need to abandon common sense when reading the magazine.

The headline of Thompson's piece reports the finding that "A good environmental reputation doesn't make the grade when it comes to rating a company as a prospective new employer." This assertion is based on the fact that "only 34 percent" of MBA students participating in the Hill & Knowlton survey consider a prospective employer's "environmental or green policies" to be "'extremely' or 'very' important." But "only" 34 percent? Doesn't this figure support an opposite conclusion from the one the article trumpets?

Entrepreneurs and business managers are not like Buddhist monks, social workers, or diplomats. For businesspeople, profitability is always crucial to success. Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman famously argued that generating profits is the only social responsibility of business (other than obeying the law). Or, in the often-quoted phrase of Gordon Gekko from the movie Wall Street, "Greed is good." This may be an extreme formulation, but most corporate managers can still be sued by their shareholders if their operations show too much concern for public good over private gain. In this context, isn't the real news not that MBAs think greed is good, but that fully a third of those surveyed think green is better?

Other elements of the Hill & Knowlton study also suggest MBAs care about environmental practices. For instance, many respondents said they would hesitate to work in the chemical, oil, or gas industries. Perhaps most remarkably, fully 32 percent said they would turn down an otherwise-attractive job offer solely because the firm that wants to hire them "does not seek to reduce its environmental impact."

True, the MBAs surveyed generally rated a prospective employer's eco-friendliness as less important than more traditional factors when choosing among job offers. But that's no indication that their environmental views are tepid or insincere. Would you take a dead-end job, working for a boss who's a jerk, at a poorly managed company that makes crappy products -- just because the company's environmental policies are progressive? (If you answered "yes," consider writing a book called The Complete Idiot's Guide to Finding a Job in Green Business. You'd probably make a lot of money.)

Even if the Hill & Knowlton study had shown unequivocally that the MBAs interviewed care little about the environment, that would hardly support universal conclusions. The 527 survey respondents came from a total of 12 business schools in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. But the 200 participating students from American schools were drawn from just four U.S. universities -- leaving 402 accredited American MBA programs from which no students were interviewed.

Anyway, the information on students' environmental attitudes was only one component of the study. Its main focus was on how the career choices of top MBAs are affected by prospective employers' reputations -- as well as what factors influence those reputations. (Hill & Knowlton is a PR firm; one unspoken subtext of the study seems to be that if you care about your company's reputation, you might hire Hill & Knowlton to help improve it.)

The fact that the study asked specific, environmentally related questions at all may be a testament to the strong interest environmental issues actually have generated recently in the business community. The same widespread environmental interest may also explain BusinessWeek's decision to frame its article about this study as an environmental story.

If you ask a few MBAs, they'll likely tell you that much of the B-school curriculum is about applying common sense and adopting business jargon. Taking a lesson from Business 101, the next time you start reading a business article that spins data in a nonsensical fashion, you may want to reinvest your time more profitably. In some cases, the winning strategy may be to place the publication you're reading at the bottom of the pile and read instead about Britney Spears until the dentist is ready to see you.

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10 Comments | Post a Comment

"seem to care...."

There's a phrase that means nothing. Your average MBA would dump mercury on a kindergarten playground if a) he knew he could get away with it. and b) It would land him a seven figure bonus. In fact because the US business sphere is effectively fueled by coal burning on the East Coast of the US and even more coal burning in China that is exactly what happens. It's just the dose is a bit smaller here in the US. In China I wouldn't let a kid play outdoors without gloves.

The MBA's of the world were precisely the people who decided that funding a pirate raid on oil in Iraq was a better deal than backing CAFE standards in the US. They are precisely the people who make decisions that show that having 40 million people without any secure access to health care is more profitable than health care for every body; because you can't rape a socialized system without people getting upset. They are precisely the people who gave us big box superstores that closed down downtowns across america and zeroed out the living wage jobs those downtowns supported.

The western model of business has nothing to do with energy flows in reality and everything to do with crony capitalism, oligarchy and massive bribe-funded political fraud. l had this argument with an MBA the other day. She asked what socialist countries do better than capitalism. I answered that other than, health care, lower crime rates, housing all of their populations, and per-capita energy efficiency I didn't know. She said that none of those things "counted" because it was harder to get rich and stay rich in the EU. Come again?

"Business majors" don't give a crap about anything but their personal bottom line and screw the rest of the world. That's exactly how we got into the multi-fold disaster that we are in today. The rules allowed for widespread looting by upper-echelon corporate types at the expense of stockholders, the general public and the planet and loot they did.

The business worlds "concern" for the environment is exactly modeled by the story of the Pacific Lumber corporation. Purchased by a corporate takeover, the company looted the forest and destroyed the job base while touting "environmental responsibility the whole time." Now the trees are gone, the salmon is gone and the jobs are gone. The stockholders got zip and the CEO's and investment banks cleaned up.

Stumps don't lie.

Put the Carbon Back

by Pangolin at 2:56 PM on 15 Feb 2008

Of course they don't care...

...if the environment was their top priority, then most of 'em would be in an environment-related field.

People go into the field where they feel they'd be the best at and holds their interest. Athletes go into the athletic field, people who love math go into mathematics, people intersted in space go into astronomy, people interested in the environment go into environmental fields, and people who love money and business go into business fields.

That's not to say that they don't want a clean environment, but obviously it's not high on their priority list, and if it does (or they think it will) interferes with somethin' that is high on their list (like money), then of course they're not gonna try and support it.

It makes perfect sense...from their standpoint.

by Tasermons Partner at 3:54 PM on 15 Feb 2008

Not necessarily...

Whoa cowboy. "Business" embodies a wide range of professions - accountants, managers, financial, supply chain, human resources, international development, marketing etc. So anybody that works for a business is only interested in money? You make a very stretched linkage to ones profession and personal beliefs. That's the beauty of being green - people from all walks of life are finding ways to make a difference in their profession. The marketing profession for example set up this website - http://www.green-it-forward.com/

by starsky at 2:42 PM on 16 Feb 2008
[ Parent ]

Marketing? Is that an irony attempt?

Marketing, behind coal, is probably the single biggest enemy when it comes to battling climate change. They are the nice people that bring you the happy running lump of coal ads after all; no pictures of open pit mines there. These are the people that brought you "Fiji water" and Aquafina (tap water for only $1.50) as well as every big-ass SUV ever built. Have you ever once seen an ad that shows somebody trying to parallel park a Cadillac Escalade on a San Francisco hillside?

The basic message of marketing is "you are not ok" followed by "you would be happy and wonderful if you purchased our crap." That ad is followed by the ad for anti-depressants. Then the ad for the big-ass SUV and then the ad telling you how the green-coal company is making cheap fuel for said SUV. Next is the ad about how universal health care is a bad, bad idea followed by the ad for the hand soap that will protect you from the staph infections that are nurtured in that population with no access to health care.

Are we getting the idea?

The result is that people feel that they have to work more hours than they need to in order to buy the crap that they think will make them feel better because they were at WORK instead of spending time with their families. Wash, rinse, repeat. (a marketing phrase, shampooing once works just fine)

Somewhere there is a special level of hell for marketing people. A place where everything is promised but nothing promised is delivered. A place where the food tastes exactly like a newsprint image of the food, the drinks give you headaches and the headache medicine gives you the runs. A place where there is no sight of a living thing, the sky, running water or any other thing that they have destroyed but every grey alley is named "turtle creek" and the paved wastelands are called "lupine meadows."

Marketing is green? WTF?

Put the Carbon Back

by Pangolin at 3:38 PM on 16 Feb 2008
[ Parent ]

Generalizations are unfortunate...

It's too bad that there are these assumptions about who earns an MBA, and what those people value. Take me, for example. I am pro-environment, politically progressive, and as anti-Bush as anyone else I know. Yet I've decided to earn an MBA in the hopes that I can apply what I learn to further the causes that I believe in.

If you can't create your own paradigm in which to operate, then you had better learn how to "play the game".

by billysalt at 12:05 AM on 17 Feb 2008

"your own paradigm"

There you are, Billy Salt. You have to explain why you are comfortable with the paradigm that you have chosen.

It has been suggested that business majors and MBA-seekers, no matter how mightily they might protest their radical greenness and progressiveness, would gladly poison a playground with mercury if the price was right. So:

Why do you think your pro-business paradigm has got that kind of moral resistance, in certain circles?
Given that kind of moral resistance, why do you think the pro-business paradigm is at least as effective as any other?
If, in the pro-business paradigm, making a profit is the supreme value, how in the world can other values ever be recognized, and flourish, really?

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

by caniscandida at 12:27 AM on 17 Feb 2008

re: "your own paradigm"

Hey caniscandida,
Implict in your questions are points that I will mostly grant to you. It is unequivocally true that most of the students in my MBA program are as vile, selfish, and close-minded as they come. That being said, I can only speak for myself. I can assure you that I will be the last to soil the earth for a buck. And there are others out there like me, as the article above alludes to.

The almighty profit may be the end-all, be-all for business majors in theory, but as we know, practice and theory are two separate animals. After having spent some time discussing these ideas with my fellow students, I get the impression that many of them would choose their planet, their fellow-man, their ethics over their wallet.

by billysalt at 1:14 AM on 17 Feb 2008

Good for you, Billy Salt

I wish there were more intelligent progressives studying business administration and preparing to take a leadership role in that field. Goodness knows we need you.

Great name by the way.

The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.

by spaceshaper at 6:47 AM on 17 Feb 2008

Business can change the world for the better

After reading many of the posts here I would have to agree with a lot of what has been said by both sides of the issue. Many of the environmental issues that are present today were created by businesses of which are probably led by MBA's. However, as a MBA candidate at the top business school recently ranked by BusinessWeek I can attest to the fact that more and more mba students are applying to business schools not because they are capitalist pigs looking to make a lot of money, but because they see how business has the power to change the world for the better.

In today's global economy, most decisions are made through the influence of business whether one likes it or not. Rather than spending useless energy debating how business has failed in the past, it is heartening to know that there are current mba's focused on seeing how business has failed and looking for ways to bring sustainability to the forefront of business education. This is happening in a variety of ways. In my particular program students recently spoke up for the desire to see more courses focused on leadership and sustainability in business. Furthermore, non-profit student organizations such as Net Impact are leading change on business school campuses through the mission of using the power of business to change the world for the better. This is happening through curriculum change and campus greening initiatives as well as teaching students to take a more conscious leadership role in the business environment.

It is very easy to discredit business and look for ways to highlight the evil aspects of profitability, but in a world were the free-market dominates it is better to look for solutions to the environmental crisis in this context by turning to business rather than turning against it where in reality real change cannot occur. Currently there are mba's advocating for things such as natural capitalism and cradle to cradle design and these mba's are working in careers such as socially responsible investing and non-profit organizations as well as traditional companies and entrepreneurial start-up ventures in clean and renewable energy. The face of business is changing and as more and more young business professionals who value sustainability and the environment enter mba programs and demand courses and business theory focused on changing the world you will start to see dramatic shifts the way business is conducted both in this country and around the world.

It is my opinion that it is better to open our eyes and minds to the possibilities that business can bring to the world rather than constantly focusing on the historical negative aspects of business. At the end of the day, I would put more stock in a MBA student focused on changing the world using a solid business framework rather than someone focusing their time and attention on anti-business rhetoric. The environmental crisis is too important to ignore and too important to waste our time bantering about who or how solutions should be found. Our time would be better spent actively focusing on solutions which is what I believe many MBA students are currently engaged in.

by dpio at 9:12 AM on 17 Feb 2008

MBA's and Ethics

Since the concept of business was created, whenever that was, the idea has been to make as much money as possible at whatever costs to society/environment. Business ethics have never been important until recently and is why businessmen and corporations have bad reputations. Because the image of businesses is in the midst of changing, we are about to experience a revolution in the way raw materials and human labor are used to better protect the earth. As an prospective MBA student, I am very passionate about the environment and realize that being an entrepreneur is a great way to make change in society. I am using the power of an MBA to give me more power than a person who is handing out fliers or taking a more immediate approach to protecting this earth. By using this power, I feel i can best and most effectively contribute to the cause of saving what matters most, the earth. That is great that there are environmental lawyers and environmental scientists who are working their butts off to protect the environment but why not attack this problem as a team and from all sides? I constantly tell myself that nothing would be possible if we didn't have this earth. Although I am not materialistic at all, money talks and why not play "their" game to gain power, accomplish change, and do what is best for society and earth, save the earth.

by ajt46 at 1:42 PM on 19 Feb 2008
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