At Issue - 3/8/13

>> Lori: Coming up next on At Issue, our topic will be Ethic, and more specifically, Ethical Intelligence with our Special Guest, Dr. Bruce Weinstein. Dr. Weinstein has made several appearances on National Television, is a contributor to the Huffington Post, and author of 'Ethical Intelligence, Five Principles for Untangling Your Toughest Problems at Work and Beyond'. That's coming up next on At Issue, so don't go away. Thanks for joining us for At Issue, I am your host, Lori Casey, and I am so pleased to be joined by Dr. Bruce Weinstein, also known as the Ethics guy. Now you are here as part of our EIU School of Business Ethics and Social Responsibilities series, so we want to thank you for taking time out to come over to the station and visit with us. >> Dr. Weinstein: Absolutely. I am happy to do it. >> Lori: Well, let's start; tell us a little bit about your background. >> Dr. Weinstein: Well, I studied philosophy at Swarthmore college and loved it and decided to get a Ph.D. in it and it turns out Georgetown University has a program with a concentration in Bioethics, so a lot of graduates become professors in medical schools, and dental schools, and that is exactly what I did once I got my wings in '89 for six years I was a professor at West Virginia University Medical School, and I loved it and it was great, but I felt that I wanted the world to be my classroom, so I left in '95 and went off the South Africa to make a memory, about something completely different, but I got back, I decided I really want to make a go of this, go around the world and talk of these things, but not limited to medical ethics, or dental ethics, or pharmacy ethics, so since I guess the late '90's I've been traveling around the world, or as Jules would say from Pulp Fiction, walking the earth like Cain and Kung Fu. Sort of. More peacefully, i hope. Cain was peaceful. But, talking about this concept of ethical intelligence that I am really excited about. >> Lori: Ok, well let's talk about that. Ethical intelligence. It's not just ethics, what is ethical intelligence in your mind? >> Dr. Weinstein: Well, the reason why I like to use Ethical intelligence is because I found the word ethics is as appealing to a lot of people as the words dental surgery. And when you think about it, when you hear the word ethics, in the paper or hear about it in a PBS report, what word is it normally associated with? Ethics? And what else? Violation. It is often associated with people who are doing the wrong thing. They are being punished. So there is this punitive sense that has gotten unfortunately, because ethics as I understand it, is bringing out the best in ourselves, and in other people, and it's something that we ought to embrace, because it is good for us. It's not something that you have to swallow like a bitter pill. So, I thought if I used the word ethics, it's a turn off, but this concept of ethical intelligence that would be much more engaging, because most of us, especially members of a network like this, believe that we are intelligent, and that we'd like to become more intelligent. SO, I thought well the concept of emotional intelligence has been used successfully, this could be a compliment to that, and that's what I've been developing. >> Lori: Ok, So do you think ethics are, you know, is it something we learn from our parents, or is it in our nature to be ethical, how do people go off the wrong track and become unethical? >> Dr. Weinstein: You know, that's a great question, and we learn ethics everywhere. We learn how to do the right thing from our parents, from teachers, from if we are believers, from our houses of worship, but we learn about ethics, from the movies, from TV shows we watch, and a lot of the moral lessons come from how not to live. For example, one of the most popular films of the last 30 years is Scarface. Brian DePalma's version of the Howard Hawk's film. And a lot of people have made Tony Montana the protagonist, into a hero, because you know he has this rise to fame and fortune for much of the story, but they conveniently forget that he is killed by his own ambition by the end. So, I think, stories like the Sopranos and Scarface, Good Fellows, The Godfather, teaches dangers of living an immoral life, if wiling to take the time to look carefully at what the stores are telling us. >> Lori: I mean, when you think about ethics, you think of medical ethics, legal ethics, you know, we have ethics as a state of Illinois employee, we have to take an ethics test. Ethics is really all around us. It is something that hits us every day. >> Dr. Weinstein: And in fact, you know, if you are going out on a, let's say that you are interested in meeting someone through an on-line dating service, and the person's photo appeals to you, and you set up a date and you meet them. And the person is actually 20 years older than their photograph. And you ask the person, now wait a minute why did you use a photo from 1985? Well, you know, if I had a current picture, people wouldn't probably be as interested. Well, that's a form of unethical behavior, but you know, we don't often think of ethics as having to apply as applying to the world of romance. We think about it as you mentioned, medical and legal ethics, but it applies is every interaction that we have. Especially on a date. That's what most of us relate to, much more than who gets the last liver, or the last kidney. >> Lori: You talk about >> Dr. Weinstein: Can I mention another Dating dilemma here, and it is very common and it is something that I bet everyone can relate to. Let's say that you are on a date, and the bill comes and that expensive bottle of wine you ordered is not on the bill. What's the right thing to do? And I actually went out with a woman many years ago, before I was married to my current wife, and this should have been the first red flag in this relationship. When the bill came, she said, "oh I guess it was free. I guess it was a gift to us. And she was treating me, and I wasn't comfortable with it, but I went along with it. And it turned out to be a very good indicator to what kind of person she was, because if somebody is going to stiff a waiter, or restaurant they are going to do other things that turned out to be the case. So, ethics really is a part of everyday life. >> Lori: Oh, yeah, we sometimes we gloss it over, but you have occasions like that. Oh, what's the right thing to do? >> Dr. Weinstein: That's right. Every time we ask, "what's the right thing to do?" we are asking an ethical question. >> Lori: I was reading your bio, and it said one of the keys to success is life is ethical intelligence. Can you expand a little bit on that? >> Dr. Weinstein: That's true. Well, you know, Daniel Goldman wrote a book called "Emotional Intelligence" and he admits that he did not coin the term, but he's popularized it all over the world, and it's a very important part of living the good life, so but it's not quite the same as ethical intelligence, and I'll tell you why. Lets say that you and I know each other pretty well, and we meet at the mall one afternoon, and we haven't seen each other for a while, and you say how are you doing Bruce? And I say, "I am fine." I say I am fine, but you know that I am anything but fine. Now what clues would give you the, would lead you to come to the conclusion that I am not fine. I say I am fine, but what would you? >> Lori: Well, maybe the way you look, just the tone of your voice, you know maybe you've posted some things on social media that has kind of given some clues that maybe things aren't going so well. >> Dr. Weinstein: So, it's through you emotional intelligence that you are able to perceive the difference between how I present to the world, and what's really going on, because you are perceptive. You see how I am feeling, you don't just take my word at face value, that's emotional intelligence, but then the question becomes, well what should you do? Should you ask me right there at the mall, is something wrong, Bruce? Should you follow up with an email or text, should you forget about it? Should you call my wife, what's the right thing to do? Emotional intelligence will not and cannot help you there, because emotional intelligence is a psychological phenomenon. And when you ask what' the right thing to do, you are asking an ethical question, so we have to build ethical principles, or what I call the principles of ethical intelligence to help make the right decision. SO we need both, to lead a fully human life, we need both emotional and ethical intelligence. >> Lori? So, when you are thinking, trying to think ethically, does it the question that comes to mind start with what's the right thing to do? >> Dr. Weinstein: That is an ethical question. If you find yourself asking what is the right thing to do, as opposed to what is the easiest thing for me to do? What can I get away with? What can I do that will allow me to enrich myself? It may be a question that we've all asked ourselves, but it's not an ethical question. >> Lori: Ok. I want to talk about one of your books talks about these five principles for I think untangling difficult things in the workplace and in life, what are those five principles? >> Dr. Weinstein: I'll tell you the five principles and I'll preface that by saying that I did not come up with them. I adapted them from a book called "Principles of Biomedical Ethics" that was written for the medical and scientific community, but these principles are common in all faiths, all religions, all cultures. I am merely trying to popularize them, and I don't want people to think that I am claiming that I came up with them. But the five principles of ethical intelligence are first, Do no harm, the most fundamental principle of all, and we tend to associate that principle with the medical community, because we know that in medical school, nursing school, dental school, pharmacy school, students are taught, first, do no harm. When you have a relationship with a patient, the goal is to help make him or her better, at least don't make them worse. If you think about it, don't that apply not just to physicians, and pharmacists, and dentists, but to TV producers and pundents, and really to everybody, it applies to students here at the university, it applies to everyone, the most fundamental principle. Number two, make things better. It isn't enough to avoid hurting people, ethics calls upon us to go beyond what the law would require and the do no harm principle is a legal, as well as an ethical principle, but ethics demands more of us and tells us, we ought to use our skills and knowledge to make a positive difference in the lives of other people. The third principle is respect. Respect other people, and there are three powerful ways that we show respect in an ethical sense, by keeping confidential things confidential, by telling the truth, and by keeping our promises. >> Lori: OK. >> Dr. Weinstein: Principle number four, be fair. To give to others they're due. And the fifth principle, the principle of compassion. It tells us that we ought to treat others, and ourselves kindly, with care, with love. And those five principles are not a recipe or formula but they are a framework for helping us make the right decisions, >> Lori: So, do you think our society has become spent; we've spent less time thinking about these five principles before we make decisions? >> Dr. Weinstein: You know, there is so much pressure on all of us, there are economic pressures, pressures on student to get into good schools, and it seems as though temptations are greater than ever before. And possibly the actual conduct is worse than before, but there is a sense that our society has made some moral progress in some areas. I mean, for example, when I grew up, in the late '60's and early '70s my teachers were telling the class, girls, you can be a nurse, or you can be a teacher. I mean there were occasionally you'd hear about women in the legal profession, but mostly it was in those two areas. We've gone far beyond that. I mean, in 1968, if you said, we are going to have several women on the US Supreme Court, you know, it would have been a pipe dream, people were hoping for that, but you know, to actually imagine that happening. It was something that would have surprised a lot of people. There were segregated movie theatres and drinking fountains in this country. Slavery was legal, women weren't allowed to vote for many years, until 1921, so we don't have these prescription any more, so in that sense, we have come, we've made you know, some progress. We certainly have a way to go before we can consider ourselves a fully just society. >> Lori: So, what are, you gave two speeches at Eastern, the first one was, I like this, "It's Not Cheating If I Don't Get Caught". Is it still cheating if I don't get caught? What was kind of the premise of that speech? >> Dr. Weinstein: I wanted to engage students by presenting five different scenarios they find themselves asking what's the right thing to do, for example, you wake up with the flu, is it ok to go to school when you have the flu, or is it ok to stay home and rest, is it better to go to school, but socialize only with the people you don't like? What's the right thing to do? This is something we find ourselves asking, so I presented five different scenarios and I asked the students how would you act in each scenario? And not surprisingly, in a group of 300 people, different people respond differently. But then the question is, what is the right thing to do? Are some responses better than others? And I said I will show you that there are five principles that you already know, that help you make the right decisions in these situations, in anytime you find yourself asking, "What is the right thing to do?" So we went through the principles, we had some interactive exercise, and we wrapped it up by I showed how the principles point us in the right direction, in the quiz that I presented at the beginning. And that was it. >> Lori: You did an evening speech. What was that focus? >> Dr. Weinstein: That, I showed I've done, not to toot my own horn, but I've done about two hundred plus interviews on CNN and Today Show, and PBS, and but my favorite one is an argument I had on Fox News a while ago, about the right to health care. And I decided I was not going to let them off the hook, the way they were abusing a particular word, and the segment was supposed to be three minutes, you know, unlike PBS you have >> Lori: Yeah, you have the whole half hour here. >> Dr. Weinstein: It was such a vigorous debate that they kept it going for seven minutes, and I am really proud of that discussion, because I wouldn't, I refused to be bullied by the host, and the second hour I showed that clip, and we had a discussion about it. about the intersection between business, and journalism, and ethics. >> Lori: Well, you are here as part of the school of business, and I think what comes up you know, when you think of business, it's do whatever you have to do to get ahead, you know, and ethics, what are you, what's your message to our student body, or to anybody out there, you know, when it talks, we are a society, where we want to do better than our parents did, and we want to get ahead in life, how do you balance that drive to do better, with ethical responsibility? >> Dr. Weinstein: It seems as though the conflict between doing the profitable thing on one end, and doing the right thing, that you can either enrich your wealth and your business, or you can take the high road. In the short run, that may be true, but Bernie Madoff, literally Made Off with billions of dollars, but it caught up with him. Lance Armstrong, it caught up with him. Over and over again, we see how in the long run, people who take a shortcut and enrich themselves in the short run, are eventually, their feet are held to the floor. So, what I want to show people, is that it is in your own, if all you are interested in, is doing right for your business, and enriching the bottom line, these five principles are the best way to do it. When you ask yourself, what is the most valuable commodity that I can have in business, it is positive word of mouth, and you know, there are these websites like "Fiver" have you heard about this? FIVERR.com I have no financial stake in it, in fact, I am about to say something critical, but you can find people for five dollars who will stand in line at Starbucks and talk about how great your company is. >> Lori: Wow! >> Dr. Weinstein: And what that, so you know, if you are in Starbucks, and you hear someone saying, "wow you know, that new candy bar is fantastic" and you might be tempted to get it, and you taste it and its awful, they've, the company has done well in the short run, but in the long run, you are going to get negative word of mouth, especially when people find out it was a ruse. SO, the best way to get positive word of mouth is by encouraging people to trust you. And the best way to develop trust is by striving to live by these principles of ethical intelligence. Even though I recognize it is really hard to do this, it is extremely hard, and in fact, I give away post-it notes with the five principles on it, and in fact, if any of your viewers want one, I will be happy to send them, if they email me. It's, if you keep these principles front and center, it reminds us that as difficult as it is, it's not only the right thing to do, it's the smart thing to do. It's the commercial thing to do, if you will. >> Lori: You had mentioned you know, national headline news, Bernie Madoff, more recently Lance Armstrong, when something like that happens, when you see a major figure, let's use Lance Armstrong, everybody looked up to him, and we as a society, find out wow it was all a lie, do things like that kind of make us sit back and go like maybe getting ahead at any cost and throwing those ethics aside is not worth it? I don't want to say that's a good thing, that that happened, but does it, do you think that makes us as a society, a little more about what's the right thing to do? >> Dr. Weinstein: If we are smart, it will. And what I've suggested publicly, is that Lance Armstrong can become a force for good, now by using a significant portion of the rest of his life, and we hope that he has a long time to live, for talking to young people in our country and beyond, and to talk about what he did, and why he did it. And it's much more powerful than the ethics guy coming into a class and talking about why you shouldn't cheat. If you have a guy who says, I had it and I lost it all because I made one foolish choice that would really make a positive difference. It could steer kids to the right path, so there, we believe in this country and in other countries as well, as redemption, the people, that there are second acts in American life, F. Scott Fitzgerald not withstanding, but also this fifth principle of passion calls upon us I think to look kindly to recognize that yes, Lance Armstrong messed up, but we do to. And you know, and there, but for the grace of God, go on. So, it's probably not a smart thing to be really harsh in thinking about a fellow like that, but maybe we haven't doped for twenty years, or ever, but you know, we all make mistakes. >> Lori: Is there a national figure out there that you think is a good example of an ethically emotional person that really displays these five principles? >> Dr. Weinstein: I am a little embarrassed to tell you that the first person that popped up in my head, and I may be alienating your viewers by this, now, people are leaning into the TV's, what is he going to say? I can't even believe that I am about to say this, but I just finished his biography, his autobiography, Peter Chris, the drummer of KISS, >> Lori: Really? >> Dr. Weinstein: Yeah, I'll tell you why. >> Lori: Ok. >> Dr. Weinstein: No, it's every since Keith Richards wrote his memoir "Life" there's been this bum rush to get every possible rock memoir out there, and it's the same story, right? The rise to fame, the sex, the drugs, alcohol abuse, then you fall off the wagon, you have the divorce, then you come clean, but what I was really surprised and what I found really inspirational is that he was diagnosed with breast cancer, and instead of covering it up, literally, and figuratively, he decided he wanted to help other men recognize that there is no shame in coming to terms with this, and getting treated for it. There is everything right to do in doing that. So, he has become in the last phase of his life, 'A Forceful Goodbye', using his misfortune to educate a lot of men in this country and the world, who otherwise would never see a doctor about discovering a lump in their ***. SO I am not saying that he is a saint, by any means, and he recognizes that he isn't, but I was just really struck that by the end of his story, that this is how he is going to spend, you know, the remainder of his life doing that. >> Lori: Hmm, that's interesting. >> Dr. Weinstein: By the way, when you hear that, do you think, "the ethics guy? What the heck are you doing talking about the drummer of KISS?" >> Lori: Well, and it's a good story, and it is a great example of someone taking their own misfortune and rather than wallowing in it, doing something good with it, and in this case, educating people about breast cancer in men. >> Dr. Weinstein: And you remember Betty Ford in the '70's, she came forward talking about breast cancer, and encouraged a lot of women to get checked up and that actually resulted in a lot of treatment for things that otherwise would not have been diagnosed. Same with Ronald Regan's colon cancer, he did the same thing. >> Lori: Yeah, it is, it's a good thing, it makes you feel good when you see our national figures taking, you know, they are in a position of some level of notoriety, and authority, and you know, to use it for good, >> Dr. Weinstein: Exactly. >> Lori: Let's talk a little bit about, you have an ethics IQ test. >> Dr. Weinstein: Yes, I do. Did you take it by the way? >> Lori: I haven't yet. I am going to after we are done with this interview. Tell us about that. >> Dr. Weinstein: You know, people love to take tests, and they love to see where they rank, how they are doing, there are tests for every possible, how well can you decorate your house? How well can you tie your shoes, how well can you cook vegetarian meal for your family, something, but there haven't been tests to test your ethical intelligence. I recognize that the multiple choice format is very limiting, and obviously there's a lot of nuance, and ambiguity, and room for discussion, but I thought at least putting something basic out there as a springboard for discussion would work, and when I look at the Google analytics, to drive people to my website, the ethics, quiz, that's what, because you take this quiz, and then you find out how you rank, what may be according to the principles, my own analysis, and I may be wrong, but according to this analysis, why this action would be better. For example, going to work with the flu. Or yes, when you have the flu, is it right to go to work? And you may feel like you are being a team player, and you are not letting the team down, but you are not only putting other people at risk of harm, you are making it harder for you to get better. So that is not the ethically intelligent thing to do. You know, people do it all the time. You don't have the flue right now? >> Lori: No, or I hope I don't. >> Dr. Weinstein: But if you did, what would you do? >> Lori: Knowing my co-workers, I'd stay at home. Because if I did come to work, they'd say please stay home, we don't want this. >> Dr. Weinstein: Are there any other reasons? And that is praiseworthy that you are concerned about them, but are there any other reasons besides not wanting to infect your co-workers that will prompt you to stay home? >> Lori: That would be the biggest one. >> Dr. Weinstein: This is the missing piece, and this is why I think ethics is such a turn-off for people, because it seems so focused on what we think of other people, and that part of it, but it also about what we are to ourselves. And going to work with the flu, is not a compassionate way to treat yourself. > Lori: Yeah, you are not doing yourself a favor by going to work, you are not going to get any better. >> Dr. Weinstein: Exactly. And staying at home and working is not doing yourself any favors. It will take you longer to get better. You are entitled to stay at home and watch Andy Griffith reruns and drink broth, and anything that it'll take to get you better. That's the ethically intelligent response, so that's one of the ethics questions, that I think you can show that some answers are better than others. >> Lori: Ok, so you've given these two speeches at Eastern, you speak all over the country, what are some of the key things that you want, we just have a few minutes left that you want people to take away after they've heard you speak, or after they've watched our show today? >> Dr. Weinstein: Well, I want people to be inspired to be the best that they can be. And when people come up to me afterwards and say you inspired me, I knew these principles already, but I really want to put them to good use and to make them front and center, that's really what it's about. I want to take people not just on an intellectual journey, but an emotional journey, and by the end they say, have you even seen a film where by the end they say I want to be like that. I want to do those sorts of things, for me it was Schindler's List. You know, that moment where he cries at the end, I hope I'm not giving anything away, but people who haven't seen it, but he could have done more to help people, and you get goose bumps, because you say, yes, maybe, but look at how much good you did for people, and that's just one of many films I want to mention about because it's inspirational. And that's setting a pretty high bar, I want people to feel about my talks the way people feel about Liam Neeson in Schindler's List. But you have to, you know, a person's reach to extend his grasp. >> Lori: So, what's next for you? More books, more speaking? >> Dr. Well, right now, I'm flying to Cincinnati to speak to Xavier University, and then Montana, and Canada twice, and sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and I say, 'What city is this?', but fortunately I haven't gone out and said, 'Hello Cleveland', and it's Charleston, Illinois. >> Lori: Uh huh. >> Dr. Yes, it's not walking the earth, I guess, but flying around the earth, talking about this, and writing some new books, and just enjoy it. I cannot believe I get paid and the checks usually clear, to do something that I am so passionate about, except for the hassle of getting through airport security and the indignation of having to get dressed not once, but twice, other than that, it's a very privileged life, I am very fortunate. >> Lori: Well, thank you so much for coming. Now when we see him on the Today Show, we can say I've met him in person, and he was here at WEIU. Thank you, Dr. Weinstein, it's Weinstein, I got it wrong >> Dr. It's like Rupert Pumpkin, it's misspelled and mispronounced. But that's ok. >> Lori: Thank you for coming to Charleston, and WEIU. >> Dr. It's a pleasure, thank you for inviting me here.