Poll: Enron CEO's "Honest Services" Defense

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  local ethics04/03/08 Report as spam
  1

  Jeff Skilling Defense

  Jeff Skilling has admitted to "big risks"; who was at the highest point of risk? Convictions center on defending the defenseless, or those who are at supreme risk.
  
  Skilling has admitted to lying to auditors. The primary job of financial or any auditor is to correct erroneous information with expediency before there are negative results.
  
  When Jeff Skilling was "bending the rules", did he clarify who he was bending to...does he play to the company rules or to law and ethics. He admits to "urging" unwise risks...who evaluated those risks and sold the deal to Enron?
  
  In private, the Chicago area finds his actions reprehensible and would rather he no longer sully any other image to retain his own.
  
  This is the ethical pension plan.

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  nppatro04/03/08 Report as spam
  2

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  Honesty needs to be in the larger interest and not at the cost of it.
  Larger interest is not that unclear for Jeff or Enron.
  
  nppatro

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  satha cisco04/03/08 Report as spam
  3

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  I think he owes a responsibility of 'being honest' to the company and the society has a whole. A one off " not so honest" situation may be acceptable and put down to " calculated business risk". But prolonged activity is totally unaccpetable.
  
  Satha Arumanayagam
  CEO
  SVA Global (www.svaglobal.com)

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  atko04/03/08 Report as spam
  4

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  If you look at the global economy and examine those companies that have been caught acting unethically and dishonestly you have to ask yourself "are people being hurt" The inevitable answer is YES. Executives like Enrons CEO contribute to overall corporate bad behaviour which ultimately damages all of us. Sending him to the slammer is a clear message to others to clean up their act.

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  WAEOL404/04/08 Report as spam
  5

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  Dishonest acts may generate profit for a company but unsustainably. Such acts cannot be described as honest services, since companies are expected to operate with some values/ethics - transparency, integrity, respect for others, etc. A company that considers disnonest acts as "honest services" is simply a dishonest company. It will collapse in a matter of time.
  
  EMMANUEL OLUWANIYI, LAGOS, NIGERIA.

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  Fedja Hvastija04/04/08 Report as spam
  6

  Honest fraud

  Fraud is fraud, really. There is no "honest fraud", and the ends do -not- justify the means. The whole market operates under the assumption that the domination of one company over another is limited by a certain set of rules. Bend that, and the system as such fails.

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  Ian P04/04/08 Report as spam
  7

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  In the UK we have a defence, principally used by animal rights and anti-war terrorists of "committing a crime to prevent a greater crime". This has been used to justify assault on CEO's of research companies, the damage of military jets, kidnapping and similar crimes.
  The justification for the defence in law was to avoid imprisoning those well intentioned people who, for example, need to break into a building (a crime) in order to rescue someone from being murdered (a heroic act).
  
  As is the way of things, these laudable defences get used by the not-so-laudable.
  The key to successful use of the defence lies in showing that your motives in committing the act or series of acts was honest and well intentioned.
  Jeff Skillings defence is similar to this and I guess he has a mountain to climb in demonstrating his honesty.
  
  However for those who put him in jail and those who want him to remain there, a word of caution. Skilling was seen throughout the world as a scapegoat who was jailed for a long time because some rich people (and some not-so-rich) lost a lot of money.
  When you condemn him to a life in jail, search your own motives in casting the stone.

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  icmcl04/04/08 Report as spam
  8

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  Let's be honest - Jeff Skilling was primarily self interested in the same way as every other Director in big business, and they often make vast personal fortunes through it. However, "business risk" in corporate land usually equates to some sort of deception and historically corporate law has provided a fairly robust safe harbour for Directors. This lack of personal accountability has led to corporate fraud being seen as just normal business practice, so many Directors genuinely believe that they are simply making an honest living - often because their crimes have no immediate victims. Jeff Skilling will probably take the full 24 years to work out that he is a crook.

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  mcanzi04/04/08 Report as spam
  9

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  Skilling is an honest CEO like George Bush is a spectacular President.

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  jim_moroney@...04/04/08 Report as spam
  10

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  Let's face it! Being truly ethical can hurt your career. To practice high ethical standards is a risky course of action. Employers say they want ethical employees but many don't. Some want executives that will lie to auditors, fudge the numbers, etc. These are the people who often get promoted into highly paid positions. Skilling was one of these. As someone who has suffered from taking the ethical course of action, I feel somewhat justified when someone gets caught. Next time I encounter a corporate exec who wants to lie to auditors or hide an embarassing fact, I can tell them about that guy who got 24 years for lying to auditors. When they answer "Who's going to find out" I can remind them that that's probably what Jeff Skilling said.

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  kathryn.bashaar@...04/04/08 Report as spam
  11

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  "Honest service"? When he lied repeatedly and then he and few other highly-placed exeuctives walked away with millions while others were wiped out? That doesn't meet any definition of honest. The guy needs to stay in jail as a warning to others. Our economic system is the goose that lays golden eggs, and it is based on trust. If cheaters are never punished, people stop trusting the system and the goose dies.

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  rsmastersjr04/04/08 Report as spam
  12

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  I'm a sure guy. Suppose the scheme had worked. Would any of the shareholders want to hand back the money? The Enron management team would be regarded as heroes, innovators and visionaries. And, really, if a few cards had fallen the right way, it would have worked.

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  Emmarex@...04/04/08 Report as spam
  13

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  Jeff's case can be argued in very many ways but the bottomline is that he flaunted business ethical guidelines corporate responsibilities, which the student of business is taught to adhere to strictly. This will be the case regardless of whether his manuevers were successful or not.
  
  Emmarex Okhakhu

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  Emmarex@...04/04/08 Report as spam
  14

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  Jeff's case can be argued in very many ways but the bottomline is that he flaunted business ethical guidelines /corporate responsibilities, which the student of business is taught to adhere to strictly. This will be the case regardless of whether his manuevers were successful or not.
  
  Emmarex Okhakhu

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  brandbuddies@...04/04/08 Report as spam
  15

  Forest Gump

  In the film Forest Gump, you may remember hearing Forest say "stupid is as stupid does".
  
  One need only look at the level of self interest this monster had to know that his dishonesty was on behalf of himself not the company- when he was in too deep to get out his dishonesty increased to the point where he knowingly made the choice to destroy the lives of families, husbands wives and children... Electric chair anyone??

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  jim@...04/04/08 Report as spam
  16

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  As Mr. Skilling did in his ENRON days, so to is he doing in his JAIL HOUSE days - GAMING the System - using the rules, policies and procedures of a system against itself for purposes outside what these rules were intended for.

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  pverberne@...04/04/08 Report as spam
  17

  High Stakes

  Skilling was playing a game. He gambled, and the payoff if he won was was power, prestige, and untold millions. The price for losing was his liberty. His arrogance was thinking he was too smart to lose. This was likely buoyed by the fact that prior to Enron we were comparatively light on this type of white collar crime so he probably never truly considered the depth of the downside. I wonder if he takes any comfort in knowing he was one of the engineers of a new business environment in which executives will go to jail for committing fraud in the name of the corporation.

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  cirving04/04/08 Report as spam
  18

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  In my 25+ years as a leader, I have seen many things done by fellow executives, some got rich by selling services to their own companies, some others got rich by becoming 10%guys, others sold temselves the company trash at bargain prices and became millionares. The funny thing is that many of these companies new about it or at least it was a secret know by all. We can not say to the staff - this acts are "Honest Services" and these are not.
  The only way to get companies cleaned up is by having a severe punishment to infractors, otherwise the loss does not serve anybody. In Enron's case, I personally believe that these guys -knew very well what they were doing - and that can never be called - "Honest Services" - this is a joke!

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  AManganyi04/07/08 Report as spam
  19

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  The arguement is a sheer under-estimation of the seriousness of the wronfulness of the crimes committed and it is an indication of lack of remorse. The arguement justifies that a more stiffer sentence than 24 yrs term of imprisonment should have been impossed.

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  MRCunningham04/09/08 Report as spam
  20

  RE: Poll: Enron CEO's

  I would expect nothing else from this narcissitic person; Jeff Skilling. He was a representative of the company. He was allowed and even encouraged to take the risks he took. He did it as much for himself as for the company - self first. The ethics of his actions as a company representative should have been a number one concern. His very risk taking personality was a factor in his decisions; a personality flaw - he crossed the line. He implies he made the decisions he did to benefit the company, but fails to indicate that the when the company benefitted, so did he - largely.