"Back to school"
Pete Worley teaches philosophy to primary school kids in the London Borough of Lewisham. He talks to them using words they understand. He asks them simple but difficult questions about life and encourages them to think about them in the context of their lives in a multi-cultural deprived urban area. The results of Pete’s work and others like him across the world have been very encouraging. Rational and emotional intelligence scores in schools that teach philosophy have increased significantly. So has behaviour.
Pete and I met and swapped insights and experiences a couple of years ago. We were both very encouraged to find that we had similar approaches to teaching both younger and older human beings how to stop and think. He sat in on an ethics workshop I was running on a very high floor of one of the Canary Wharf towers. In one sense the contrast was extreme. My audience was full of affluent middle class professional adults. However, what was identical was the humanity that came flooding through when these “greedy bankers” were given the opportunity by me to talk about their lives at work. We talked about how people develop a moral conscience. We shared a common understanding of what “good” looks like. We laughed about the “functioning sociopaths” who fill too many of the top jobs in every walk of life. We worked through tough dilemmas that challenge us in our daily lives. Pete was struck by how the initial cynicism and scepticism of many of the people simply evaporated in the first few minutes. By the end of the workshop he said that he felt our shared approach to teaching ethics had already changed the way most of these affluent middle-class professionals spoke and behave.
As I write this column I’m keeping an eye on the news. What I see and read makes me really angry. Politicians, regulators, business people and the media are running around trying to fix the car wreck of our banking, financial and economic system. But what they’re doing is to fill the perforated petrol tank with yet more fuel. They’re lining the driver up for a firing squad. But they haven’t bothered to tend to the injured - the people all over the world losing jobs, homes and livelihoods. They haven’t stopped to think about what a human economy ought to value. They haven’t realised that the only sustainable currencies we have left are the same human moral values that unite our families and friendships. These values are universal and enduring.
So what are they? Well they’re not about “quantitative easing” or “economic stimulus packages” or “free trade”. No, our enduring moral values are things that your average child would understand. “Honesty”, “courage”, “love” and “fairness” are the moral values we need, to rebuild the trust that sustains all human communities. And until politicians, regulators, business people and the media start talking the language that a 10-year-old in Lewisham would understand, I’m going to stay angry and keep writing about this stuff.
(This column first appeared in the April - May 2009 edition of Chartered Banker Magazine. www.chartered banker.com)
Bankers have had a bad press lately. In fact it’s been so bad that we might soon begin seeing new collective nouns for them. Perhaps an “apology of bankers” might help to restore the trust and reputation of the industry. Yes, banking is an industry, not a profession. Being a profession implies that professional standards transcend revenue and profit targets. But whilst the industry spins its rhetoric of integrity, the brutal reality is that a focus on these short-term financial outcomes has destroyed not only most of the value of most of the world’s banks, it has seriously damaged the wider economy and the real jobs and real homes of real people. That doesn’t feel very professional, now does it?
But is it fair to point the finger solely at bankers? What about customers who were so eager to apply for credit they couldn’t afford, to buy stuff they didn’t need? And what about the politicians who continue to promise infinite economic growth and unending prosperity to a gullible, greedy and childish electorate? And what about regulators who are so busy ticking boxes, they didn’t see or hear the tick of the credit time bomb?
The reality is that we are all responsible for this mess we’re in – bankers, customers, voters, investors, politicians and regulators. And the really scary part is whilst everyone is pointing the finger at the bankers, politicians are pouring more fuel on the credit bonfire. Consumers are positively encouraged to buy more stuff they don’t need (SALE - 50” plasma TVs NOW £499); and some politicians are now claiming that for their next trick they’ll save the world. I thought that saving the planet was about less, not more? I thought that it’s about conservation. Economy is about getting by with less, not more. How can we save the planet without economic restraint?
Now as a corporate philosopher, it’s my job to stop and think about why we don’t stop and think about the things we do and why we do them. It’s then my job to help people at work - including bankers - to stop and think before it’s all too late. I’m also the Visiting Professor of Organizational Ethics at Cass Business School and this means I get to do some fascinating research. Last year, we developed the “ethicability® Moral DNA Test”, which measures how people stop and think about what’s right. With the help of The Times and PricewaterhouseCoopers, we managed to persuade over 20,000 people from 162 countries to complete the test. Quite a lot of these people were bankers. Many more of course were bank customers, consumers and voters. Several hundred were in government and regulation. And guess what? Bankers were about average in terms of their ethicability® score. Housewives were the highest scoring, but people in government were in the lowest quartile, along with the unemployed. Fascinating, but also a little scary!
But moral grown-ups don’t do scary, we do courage. We face up to the brutal truth of any threat and do something about the root causes of the problem. So I’m with those who are now challenging this myth that we can go on having anything we want. That 7 billion human beings can all live like celebrities and can look forward to an even bigger plasma TV next year. My money is with the philosophy of Mums who won’t give sweeties to their screaming kids at the checkout.
We'll restore trust when we all grow up as moral citizens. Mum knows best…
(This column is my first for Chartered Banker magazine and was printed in the Feb-Mar 2009 edition. www.charteredbanker.com)
