Cheating rampant, Huntsman says
Billionaire's new book spotlights lack of ethics among businesses and lawyers
In fact, corporate malfeasance and dishonest acts are thriving, a result of forgotten values and rationalizations, according to Utah billionaire Jon M. Huntsman Sr., whose new book, "Winners Never Cheat" ($19.95, Wharton School Publishing), impeaches Wall Street and today's business leaders for a brutal "win at all costs" climate.
Last week's indictments of 15 New York Stock Exchange specialists for illegal trading add to a long list of past abuses. "I think we have little by little ground ourselves down to not know the difference between right and wrong," Huntsman said in an interview with the Deseret Morning News. "I think this is an evolutionary process that has gone on over the last 30 to 50 years, where lawyers have played a much more defining role in using the color gray in defining contracts instead of black and white."
Whatever the causes of the problem, Huntsman is not alone in raising the alarm.
David Callahan, author of "The Cheating Culture: Why More Americans Are Doing Wrong to Get Ahead," chronicles rising numbers of people — not just in business — willing to cheat on their taxes, embellish resumes or lie to their auto insurance company about a claim.
While Huntsman, founder and chairman of Salt Lake-based chemical company Huntsman Corp., believes the majority of executives and employees are not engaged in improper behavior, he acknowledges that in his 40 years of negotiating Wall Street deals he has encountered few completely honest individuals.
"You go into a business meeting today and you're on guard immediately," Huntsman said. "You go in with a spirit that, I'm not going to let somebody take away something that's mine. You go in with an attitude of being on guard today rather than an attitude of how do we build together and how do we figure out how to be a partner."
Compensation, Huntsman argues, has replaced ethics as a governing principle.
"It is more a matter of intellectual dishonesty and lack of personal ethics," Huntsman said. "Wall Street has but one objective and one value: How much money can be made?"
David Warren, an independent business consultant who once worked in Manhattan and Tokyo in the financial services industry and now lives in Heber City, shares Huntsman's analysis.
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