Quality Progress - American Society for Quality

possibly be greed or perhaps selfishness? If the hearts of those at the top of Enron and
WorldCom were selfish and greedy, a plan for CSR would have meant and done little, if
anything, for those companies. Their main stakeholders were ?me, myself and I.? The
Ten Commandments preceded the top quality philosophies by thousands of years. Two
thousand years ago Jesus summarized the Ten Commandments by saying that the greatest
commandment was ?love God? and the second greatest was ?love your neighbor as
yourself.? If the top dogs at Enron and WorldCom could ignore time-tested truths such as
these, what evidence is there that a CSR policy would have made them ?see the light?? It
is a matter of the heart. The second fundamental question is, ?Why would they think it
(greediness, selfishness) is OK?? The answer to this question is a matter of societal
values. Societal values, taught at school, seen on network news, viewed at the movie
theatre and learned in the home, are what shape the way we think. Let?s look at some of
the prevalent, societal values that are having an impact on people today.
? Value #1: Evolution is a scientific fact; we are mere products of blind chance. Survival
of the fittest is how life works.
? Human Response: I?ve got to look out for #1 because nobody else will. The
Enron/Worldcom guys were just making the most of evolutionary processes.
? Value #2: There are no absolutes. What is true for you may not be true for me.
? Human Response: Don?t try to push your moral values on me. ?Well, that depends on
what the meaning of is, is? begins to sound like a reasonable statement. Greed and
selfishness are bad? According to whom?
? Value #3: All forms of life are equal, but all stages of life are not. A fetus isn?t really a
baby and old people really don?t contribute much to society. They are expendable.
? Human Response: The executives are at a higher stage in their career development than
all those working Joe?s, so all those Joe?s are just expendable resources.
When our society proliferates values such as these, why should we be surprised when
some people care little, if at all, for others? Let?s face the facts: everyone has values of
some kind. Everyone implicitly understands the concepts of good and bad, right and
wrong. If you disagree with that, I suggest that you have fallen prey to Societal Value #2.
We can choose to embrace the good and fight the bad, or travel the road of
Enron/WorldCom. Therein lies the root cause, when that choice is made. Can quality
prevent corporate misconduct? No. There are values that transcend the philosophies of
Juran, Deming and CSR standards. Those values, and only those values, can begin to cure
the woeful ethical and moral problems in our corporate culture today.
Jeffrey S. Leavitt
Hickory Hills, IL
pdinfull1@aol.com
17226 Letter: Statistics at Work
ASQ Staff
Nov-04-03
In his "Statistics Roundtable" column "n," Lynne Hare demonstrates, in an exceptional
way, what statistics is all about (August 2003, p. 72). The insight on what got Ralph to
ask about the required sample size of tomato sauce cans needed for identifying the