. Moreover, these new corporations have been actively hurting society by continuing to push for lower taxes, which limits the social programs governments can undertake; successfully attacking regulation in a variety of fields, from workplace safety to the environment; and undermining unionization. As well, a number get caught in schemes that flout the law, from asbestos in Johnson & Johnson baby powder to emissions cheating at Volkswagen.
But he stresses in an interview that doesn’t mean the people who work for it are psychopaths. He offers a wonderfully Canadian analogy to help us understand our own situation as managers within the new corporation. Hockey is a violent game, combining high speed, hard surfaces, and intense physical contact. The games rules allow behaviour that outside the game – at work or in a mall – would attract criminal prosecution.
What surprised him in his research was the degree to which corporate leaders he interviewed like Lord John Browne, former CEO of BP, and Jamie Dimon, chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, are sincere in their new corporation efforts. “There is a real sense of humanity while as business leaders they are doing things that to my view are highly problematic and contrary to the values they espouse,” he says in the interview.