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It was if he had left his ethical principles behind when he entered a context where fulfilling his ethical responsibilities to others meant less than the competitive drive to reach his goal. The fact that he had tried and failed to make the climb before, as a result of altitude sickness, was a further motivator for his callousness. The other climber's similar lack of care and concern for the man created a context where 'every man for himself' seemed to be the dominant ideology, not 'all for one and one for all.'
Later, Stephen attributed his fellow climber's failure to provide adequate care for the sadhu because sadhu was not a part of the climber's culture in his demeanor, and appearance. (McCoy, 1983, pp.104-106) the sadhu was alien, and disoriented as a result of altitude sickness. It was easy to render the man as 'other' or fundamentally different, Stephen argued, which would not have been the case, had they found a fellow Westerner in similar distress.
Three principles -- the common good over self-interest, the Golden Rule, and social justice
Stephen, despite the alien appearance of the sadhu, and finding his himself in a similar situation to his fellow climbers, was able to overcome the pressures of the situation, context and bridge...
Bowen McCoy attributes this to Stephen's commitment the religion of Quakerism, and the fact that Stephen's schema of cultural ethics transcended the situation. The rules of Stephen's religion that placed narrow self-interest below the common good of humanity held true -- Stephen would not abandon a fellow human being. He was also a member of a marginalized religion, or a religion not common to his fellow climbers and stood out as a result of this ethical code, from the beginning. Also, because of Stephen's placement of the common social good above that of the self, he was able to overlook the selfishness of the other climbers that normalized the determination to reach the summit at all costs.
But this sympathy could, one might also posit, have something to do with the fact that Stephen was suffering altitude sickness worse than almost anyone else on the climb, except for the sadhu.
McCoy remembered how he had physically suffered before hand, and failed during another climb to reach his goal. Perhaps this was why he unconsciously wished to avoid the face of the sadhu. Stephen was actively suffering, and thus may have been more easily able to identify with the sadhu. Stephen was also, like the sadhu, a religious
Parable of the Sadhu Bowen H. McCoy's 1983 Harvard Business Review article "The Parable of the Sadhu" describes the author's own experience of how he "literally walked through a classic moral dilemma without fully thinking through the consequences" (p.106). During a sightseeing junket to the peak of Everest, McCoy and his moralistic Quaker buddy Stephen have their travel interrupted by the discovery of a religious pilgrim -- a "sadhu" -- found
Parable of the Sadhu In the story "The Parable of Sadhu," author Bowen H. McCoy explores the question of ethics while his narrator hikes in Nepal. McCoy himself was the managing director of Morgan Stanley. He was also president of Morgan Stanley Realty, Inc. Bowen McCoy then is a figure who embodies the idea of business and financial gain. What then could he gain from a trek in the Himalayas
Parable of the Sadhu" is a legendary text in business ethics -- it won the Harvard Business Review's Ethics Prize in the year of its publication. McCoy, a managing director at Morgan Stanley, writes autobiographically about a real experience during his leisure hours, but the lesson of McCoy's piece is one about the fundamental ethics of the business community. Bowen McCoy describes how he and a colleague "literally walked
Parable of the sadhu teaches us the importance of a group's commitment to the welfare of an individual. In corporate ethics, this would mean the support of the entire organization for the welfare and career/personal growth of an employee. In the sense of individual ethics, it means instead of doing our bit and throwing the rest of others, we must pool our resources and offer complete commitment to the welfare
Corporate Accountability The corporate scandals of the last fifteen years have brought the issue of corporate accountability to new light, adopting at times a center-stage discussion. When the Bernie Madoff scandal broke, many professionals turned to the accounting department at Madoff Securities along with the auditors who had audited the firm before. Madoff was the one who admitted to stealing $50 billion dollars during the decades that his firm was