You Learn Something New Every Day

As strange as it sounds, I think the thing I’ll take away from this class is our first case study over Mike Leach. Maybe it’s because that’s the case study I got to write. Or maybe it’s because I’m a sports fanatic. Or maybe it’s even because I hate Texas Tech and love Mike Leach (probably), but whatever it is, that’s what stuck with me.

Ethics are, let’s face it, boring. They’re a yawnfest. They’re something you have to just wade through knee-deep until you understand it. And honestly, I’m not entirely sure I still understand it word for word. 

But ethics are something we live by every day. Without them, we’d see business world chaos. Sure, not all of the things we were learning about this semester were laws, but that doesn’t mean the real world doesn’t frown on you for breaking them. Teetering on the brink of unethical is dangerous enough, and at the end of the day, you don’t want to be the person caught off-balance if a situation arises. 

So back to Mike Leach. 

The reason I think it truly sticks in my head is because it was the first real opportunity I had to explore the world of ethics beyond simply talking about them. I had to dive into them head first and hope to grab hold of something I could understand. It turns out I did.

But the fascinating thing about the first case study was hearing people I knew talk about what they found in theirs. It would be totally contradicting what I was thinking. I think that was the first time I ever realized that ethics are 100 percent in the eye of the beholder. Where I think one thing is ethical, someone else will scoff and wonder how I can be so closed minded.

And of course they would be wrong, because everyone knows I’m infallible.

But in all seriousness, it’s something I actually look forward to in my future career. I feel like I can teach people things and they can do the same for me. It’s good to be able to look at a situation from both sides of the table, and at the end of the day that’s how you make friends and keep jobs. 

A good understanding of the entire scenario makes everyone easier to work with. Unless you’re working with monkeys – then I guess just have bananas handy.