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vern_humphrey
Guest
Then I’ll answer the fundamental point of this thread:I think you are missing the point of this thread
Adopt a simple, three-point program:
- Stop whining.
- Lose the holier-than-thou attitude.
- Get a job.
Morality of jobs and what am I supposed to DO for the rest of my days on this earth?
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ElizabethPH
Guest
Starting out waiting tables; becoming the line cook; taking business classes; ending up running the place. Opening up a restaurant of your own. Whatever!! Moral dilemmas are going to happen; that’s life; you learn to deal with it. Pray to God to help you discern the right career; and thank him while your at for giving you a higher education.
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Al_Masetti
Guest
If you are really Christian / Catholic, go to a Catholic Church that has Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration and FORMALLY put yourself in God’s Hands.
Then visit Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps recruiters and let them find a job for you that fits their needs and your education and other qualifications. They will put you through a testing program to find something suited to you.
The military values people with a four-year college degree. And they will provide outstanding leadership training and some sense of career / vocational direction. For people who aren’t sure what to do with themselves, the military is an excellent way to start out.
Pray every day for the best outcome … that God will use you for His Purposes.
Just get up out of your chair and go.
Leave the rest up to God.
Then visit Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps recruiters and let them find a job for you that fits their needs and your education and other qualifications. They will put you through a testing program to find something suited to you.
The military values people with a four-year college degree. And they will provide outstanding leadership training and some sense of career / vocational direction. For people who aren’t sure what to do with themselves, the military is an excellent way to start out.
Pray every day for the best outcome … that God will use you for His Purposes.
Just get up out of your chair and go.
Leave the rest up to God.
M
Magicsilence
Guest
- Sorry if that is how you perceive the questions
- Sorry it came across like that
- I graduate next Summer, I have a job waiting for me if I should so wish, that would put me in difficult situations time and again.
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Magicsilence
Guest
I’m not using this thread to justify laziness!
Getting a job and THEN facing the implications means getting fired. Again and again.
Since I have 5+ months till then, I am asking questions now.
And everyone is just telling me to get a job and worry about the consequences later.
This isn’t an exercise in practicality, but morality!
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Magicsilence
Guest
I’ve already ‘gone’ and it’s what prompted the thread.
Do you think its only army and self employment that are available to Catholics then?
p.s Thank you for your kind posts!
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vern_humphrey
Guest
How could anyone perceive a statement like this in any other way:
You don’t understand that you look down on all of us when you say jobs are immoral?
Take the job and do some honest work at it.
Stating the truth – no matter how unpalatable – is often the ultimate kindness.This thread was an appeal to find out what everyone else is doing. Thanks for the mockery
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kage_ar
Guest
Perhaps I have enough real world business experience to answer some of your questions?
I’ve worked in Mgmt for nearly as many years as the average college Junior has been alive, in a highly competetive technology field. I’ve spent many years dealing with both internal and external customers, private and public companies, professional sales staff/mgmt who carry high quotas, etc. Now, I am with a Fortune 500 company.
Each year I am required to sign a code of Ethical conduct.
Not once have I seen situations that in any way resemble the scenarios you have presented as examples of corporate moral corruption. I have seen individuals who do not act ethically, they are not long with the company. In similar fashion, companies who operate without ethics do not fare well.
Where you suggested quoting from the Creed during an interview, in the US it would be against the law for me as a hiring Mgr to respond to any comments you would make on religion during the interview process - in fact, I would make a point of putting my pen down on the desk and not making ANY note of what you said.
It does seem that you are getting impressions from a charicture of Corporate America, not what actually takes place on boardrooms and cubicles I’ve known.
I’ve worked in Mgmt for nearly as many years as the average college Junior has been alive, in a highly competetive technology field. I’ve spent many years dealing with both internal and external customers, private and public companies, professional sales staff/mgmt who carry high quotas, etc. Now, I am with a Fortune 500 company.
Each year I am required to sign a code of Ethical conduct.
Not once have I seen situations that in any way resemble the scenarios you have presented as examples of corporate moral corruption. I have seen individuals who do not act ethically, they are not long with the company. In similar fashion, companies who operate without ethics do not fare well.
Where you suggested quoting from the Creed during an interview, in the US it would be against the law for me as a hiring Mgr to respond to any comments you would make on religion during the interview process - in fact, I would make a point of putting my pen down on the desk and not making ANY note of what you said.
It does seem that you are getting impressions from a charicture of Corporate America, not what actually takes place on boardrooms and cubicles I’ve known.
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Al_Masetti
Guest
We just can’t cross the future bridges in the road of our life, until we get to them. Unhappily, we gotta take it as it comes. Can’t foresee or tell the future.
We lack perfect knowledge of the present and the past; we have almost no knowledge of the future.
It is impossible to optimize our careers or work lives or to find the “perfect job”. We will inevitably make some mistakes;it is unavoidable. That’s how humans learn. It’s how we handle those unhappy situations that form us; the way we handle those difficult situations that measure our morality and ethical responses.
Even if we did, by some miracle, find the “perfect job”, odds are it won’t stay that way for very long … because our bosses will move or the company will be acquired. If the company isn’t profitable enough it may fold or be sold. If the company is too profitable, competition will enter the market or it will be sold.
I have found that reading Forbes Magazine and Business Week to be helpful in trying to figure out trends and what’s going on. If you have some time at school, visit the library and peruse the back issues of those magazines.
Forbes, especially, has some interesting insights that can provide some sense of perspective.
Out of curiousity, what is your degree going to read? What is your major?
We lack perfect knowledge of the present and the past; we have almost no knowledge of the future.
It is impossible to optimize our careers or work lives or to find the “perfect job”. We will inevitably make some mistakes;it is unavoidable. That’s how humans learn. It’s how we handle those unhappy situations that form us; the way we handle those difficult situations that measure our morality and ethical responses.
Even if we did, by some miracle, find the “perfect job”, odds are it won’t stay that way for very long … because our bosses will move or the company will be acquired. If the company isn’t profitable enough it may fold or be sold. If the company is too profitable, competition will enter the market or it will be sold.
I have found that reading Forbes Magazine and Business Week to be helpful in trying to figure out trends and what’s going on. If you have some time at school, visit the library and peruse the back issues of those magazines.
Forbes, especially, has some interesting insights that can provide some sense of perspective.
Out of curiousity, what is your degree going to read? What is your major?
M
Magicsilence
Guest
This is a good background.
They sure do! They might not be overtly unethical (in line only with cultural objections) in direct practice, but the principle is to maximise wealth wherever possible. And if something can be hidden, or is OK by the rest of the nation, it is employed (like using sex to sell).
As an aside, do you know the principles of agency problems and costs?
The questions were from our baptismal promises, and perhaps corporate America is nothing like corporate U.K.
In Jesus Christ,
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Magicsilence
Guest
Business Management
and I’m specialising in Finance / Derivatives in this, my final year.
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Malcolm_McLean
Guest
I wasn’t thinking mainly about the girl behind the checkout, but the young man fresh from college who put in charge of a knitwear promotion. Whilst it is certainly possible to promote knitwear honestly, he will find that the entire store culture pushes him to a manipulative attitude to customers. The jumpers will be sold in one store at inflated prices so that they can be marked as “half price”, for example. Unless he is very sure of himself, it is difficult to make a stand.The vast majority of retail workers are honest folks who are just trying to make a living. I have never encountered anyone in retail who even had the psychological skills to be able to manipulate me, never mind anyone attempting to do so. The contrary, if anything - sometimes I get the feeling that they come to work to go on their coffee breaks; not to actually sell me anything, even when I want them to.
Remember this isn’t a job in a challenging area, like reproductive health or the police. It’s simply selling jumpers.
K
kage_ar
Guest
You asked if I have knowledge of “principles of agency problems and cost”.
In my experience, these theories make good eye catching charts and will serve you well if you work for a consulting firm. Sort of like communism - it looks GREAT on paper. Out in the trenches, real life is, well, messier.
Bottom line, this business exists for one reason, to make a profit. Profit is not immoral, profit is morally neutral. Through striving to make a profit, the business also provides goods and/or services to it’s customers, creates jobs, and in that way benefits society. As long as I am willing to contribute to that goal, I will have the opportunity to impact the lives of others for good - my Church, my family, my coworkers, my bosses, my team, my customers, my community.
Perhaps reading “The Way” might help some? Also, check out groups like legatus.org/public/index.asp.
In my experience, these theories make good eye catching charts and will serve you well if you work for a consulting firm. Sort of like communism - it looks GREAT on paper. Out in the trenches, real life is, well, messier.
Bottom line, this business exists for one reason, to make a profit. Profit is not immoral, profit is morally neutral. Through striving to make a profit, the business also provides goods and/or services to it’s customers, creates jobs, and in that way benefits society. As long as I am willing to contribute to that goal, I will have the opportunity to impact the lives of others for good - my Church, my family, my coworkers, my bosses, my team, my customers, my community.
Perhaps reading “The Way” might help some? Also, check out groups like legatus.org/public/index.asp.
M
Malcolm_McLean
Guest
Take your degree and get out of that way of life.Business Management
Get a job doing something fun, like lifeguarding, selling T shirts, working for children’s camps, webmastering. Anything that you enjoy and means you don’t have to rely on the state for welfare. Then think what God is calling you to do. There is no rush. God will tell you in His own good time.
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Magicsilence
Guest
Agency costs are very real, and exemplify the reality of immorality at a high level of management. Remember Enron?
Profit is not immoral, but what about the pursuit of it?
Eating good food is not immoral, but what about when the pleasure of eating is put above all other responsibilities?
Will have a look.
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rlg94086
Guest
No. The pursuit of profit is not immoral.
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kage_ar
Guest
And Enron went out of business. People became greedy - the LOVE of money.
Every corporation is not Enron.
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jmcrae
Guest
And if he does this on a regular basis, the customers will catch on and either take their custom elsewhere - some place that sells jumpers at cost-plus all year round - or else they will simply wait for the sales - the store will simply be empty of customers during the period of time that the jumpers are being sold at the higher price, while the customers either wait for the sale, or go to the other store down the street that doesn’t engage in this practice.
Again, it’s not the sale of the moment that matters; it’s the long-term relationships that you develop with your customers, that leads to success. If your customers know that you are looking out for them, they will return to you - if they think you are taking advantage of them, they’ll go elsewhere.
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jmcrae
Guest
How will you actually get it, if you don’t pursue it?
Psst - let me tell you one of the facts of life that maybe no one has mentioned to you, yet:
Profit is what causes the birth of all those nice little pay cheques that keep us warm, sheltered, fed, and clothed.
Here is another one:
You will never get something that you are not actually pursuing. If someone I’m doing business with doesn’t seem interested in my money, I certainly don’t feel obligated to offer it to him.
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rlg94086
Guest
Exactly. As you mentioned, there are more unethical practices done by individuals that are not endorsed by the company. I worked for such a person about a decade ago. I quit, rather than work with him, and he was fired shortly after when he was caught by upper management.
As a salesman, I do not claim to have always done my job as a “Catholic gentleman.” I am a work-in-progress. However, I have never been fired from a sales job for being upright, when faced with temptation. It is my own failings I have to be on the lookout for.
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