Lea P. Stewart

Imagine yourself walking down a street in an unfamiliar neighborhood at night. You come to a corner, and you have two choices--walking down a well-lighted street or walking down a dark alley. Which one do you choose? You probably picked the well-lighted street. Given the circumstances, this seems like the reasonable choice. But why? Your choice illustrates a facet of decision making that has received a great deal of research support. When people are asked to make a decision in the absence of full information (you really don't know anything about this hypothetical neighborhood), they usually make their decision on the basis of stereotypes. We choose well-lighted streets because we think they will be safer. In this situation, we are probably right, but what about other situations?

In this case, the engineers at the Sunnyvale division of Universal Corporation make a decision with only limited information, and they make it on the basis of stereotypes. When they hear that their new supervisor is a woman, their perception of her conforms to their stereotyped notions of a "woman boss," and they react to her accordingly. They really don't know anything about her, but they assume that they will have a hard time with her because she is a woman and not like them. And they do. They see her as a "pushy and somewhat aggressive feminist" because she responds to a remark by saying that her private life is her own affair and that she should be called "Ms." not "Miss" or "Mrs." They never really give her a chance to prove herself as a supervisor. In a way, they are experiencing a self-fulfilling prophecy. They believe that they will not be able to get along with a female boss (probably because they have never worked with one before) and so they are not able to get along with Joan.

Joan Dreer also reacts on the basis of her past experience and stereotypes. She has been sexually harassed by her supervisor at her previous assignment for the company. When she hears the engineers debating what to call her, she reacts defensively. She overhears a conversation that seems sexist and she reacts "tersely." She never gives them an opportunity to explain their perception. Her behavior is understandable given her past experiences on the job, but the engineers don't know this and her reaction only confirms their stereotype of a humorless female boss.

A great deal of research has been conducted on the problems faced by organizational tokens--people in the minority on their jobs. In this case, Joan Dreer is a token because she is the first woman engineer at Sunnyvale. Rosabeth Moss Kanter, in her book Men and Women of the Corporation (Basic Books, 1977), has written that organizational tokens are continually reminded that they are different than other people in the organization. The token "stands out" from the group, and his or her behavior is continually scrutinized. The group is likely to see the token's behavior in stereotyped ways because there are not enough tokens to contradict the group's view of the "typical" other.

Joan's problems as a token are magnified by the attitudes of the other engineers. Jim Grimaldi reacts to her situation by "blaming the victim." He notes that, "women aren't really suited for this kind of work." His evidence for this statement seems to be that Joan's subordinates "seem to have been dragging their feet in small ways" and "other groups have also been showing some reluctance to cooperate with the groups under Joan Dreer's supervision." Are these behaviors due to Joan's supervisory techniques or to the negative feelings of the engineers she supervises? Grimaldi never really discusses her actions as a supervisor. He blames all of the actions of the work groups on her and does not assume that they are responsible for their own behavior.

One way to test the ethical situation presented by this case is to put yourself in the position of the person being criticized. How would you react if you were Joan? Imagine that you are the only one of your group (male, female, young, African-American, Asian, handicapped, etc.) in this situation. How would you feel if people treated you like they treated Joan? How would you want to be treated?

All workers deserve to be given a chance to prove themselves on the job. It is sometimes difficult to overcome our stereotypes, but we need to be careful not to let previous perceptions interfere with our current judgments. Joan deserves her chance to prove herself as a supervisor.

One of the hardest parts of any manager's job is laying off or firing employees. In this case, Arnold Raskin, Vice-President of Manufacturing, faced this difficulty by delegating this task to Tony Furillo. At first glance, it would be easy to blame Arnold for the resulting problems because he would not accept the responsibility himself. On the other hand, Tony is in close contact with the employees he supervises and, although it is never easy to be laid off, the message might have been a bit easier to handle coming from someone the employees knew will. Nevertheless, Arnold gave Tony the assignment, but Tony declined to carry out his task on the day before Christmas.

Tony delayed a difficult task. Because of this delay, an employee learned of the layoffs in an inappropriate manner (during a church service) and another employee placed a $500.00 nonrefundable deposit on a trip that she may not be able to afford. Tony did not want to be a Scrooge. His seemingly charitable act, however, resulted in a great deal of unhappiness--perhaps in more unhappiness that would have happened if he announced the layoffs on Christmas eve.

Tony bases his decision on the golden rule. He claims that "if it were me, I sure wouldn't want my Christmas spoiled." He is reasoning that he should do unto others as he would have them do unto him. He does not think he would want someone to spoil his Christmas, so he does not inform any of the employees of the layoffs. Of course, the assumption here is that having a happy Christmas is the most important thing to be considered in this situation. He never thinks past Christmas to consider how this situation will affect the rest of the employees' lives. He assumes that letting them have one happy day will somehow ameliorate the terrible news they will receive after Christmas.

This type of reasoning is very paternalistic. Tony assumes that he knows what is best for his employees. He thinks that he would want an unspoiled Christmas, so he projects this wish onto his employees. He does not consider that they may hear the information in other ways or that they may make financial decisions based on the assumption that their jobs are secure. Of course, we can all sympathize with someone who has to tell his employees on the day before Christmas that they are being laid off, but Tony cannot assume that the news will be any easier to take after Christmas.

Although Tony had a variety of what he thought were charitable reasons for his actions, his behavior was, in fact, lying. Sissela Bok provides an excellent analysis of this phenomenon in her book, Lying: Moral Choice in Public and Private Life. Bok reminds us that lying may harm the people being lied to, but it can also harm the liar. In this case, Tony is clearly harmed by withholding information about the layoffs (his lie). Not only is Arnold angry with him, but Tony must also face the workers after Christmas. It will be especially difficult to face them since at least one of them already knows the situation. In addition, one of them is likely to hold him responsible for her decision to book a vacation and the potential loss of money that could result if she cannot afford it after being laid off. Thus, lying (withholding information) harms Tony as well as his employees.

Tony decided to base his actions on an accepted ethical principle--the golden rule. The resulting problems in this case do not negate this principle. The problem in this situation is that Tony made his decision without considering the full ramifications of the situation. The situation is not as simple as ruining Christmas versus not ruining Christmas. Many other factors need to be considered. For example, would Tony have wanted to learn about his layoff in a casual conversation at church on Christmas eve? Would he have liked to have decided to spend a considerable amount of money without knowing that he would be laid off? The golden rule is an ethical principle that can be effectively applied only if we truly know the full meaning of the situation to ourselves and to others.