Wall Street Movie

¶ … leadership problems presented in the film? Refer to the models of leadership from organization behavior. The seductive appeal of Gordon Gekko's credo "greed is good" has proven so persuasive with audiences that it is easy to forget about the organizational problems his leadership style creates for Wall Street firms. Gekko's autocratic yet ethically defiant mode of leadership creates a cult of personality around the man, without advancing the interests of any particular permanent business organization.

Rather than an organization that builds upon past successes to create models for the future, the type of organization portrayed led by Gekko instead completely revolves around Gekko's charismatic personality. His whole world revolves around his immediate needs and the system of rewards he seeks, in terms of making money. This creates a rapacious organizational structure around him, a structure that has little sense of loyalty to anything other than Gekko's autocratic leadership style of charisma and the individual employee's sense of self and self-aggrandizement through financial gain.

Question2 How does Gekko exert power and influence over others? Gekko's influence can even be seen in the power his rapaciousness has in the eyes of audience members, who thrill at his utter lack of ethics. By refusing to pay lip service to morality, and exerting tremendous power, the man creates a negative personal example for others around him. His strength of conviction in money and greed makes his behavior seem okay, even normal to Bud.

As an example of success, Gekko holds his life out as a template for others to follow, and they do, to their ultimate destruction. Thus Gekko is, if nothing else, an example of the power of a leader to set the tone for an organization. Question 3 What seems to motivate Bud? Originally, Bud seems to be motivated purely by financial gain and the desire to overcome his blue-collar roots -- but really, acquiring the leadership attributes of Gekko seem to drive him more than simply making money.

The power that money conveys, rather than the material assets of wealth make the organizational culture of the firm of "Wall Street" attractive. At one point in the film, Bud asks Gekko how much money is enough to make someone happy and satisfied.

The truth is that there is no dollar figure on this amount, because after a certain point money is besides the point -- rather Gekko enjoys milking the system for all of its worth, and bending and The breaking the law to make even more millions, for the power it gives him outside of the conventional system of hard work and ethics, as embodied by Bud's father.

Question 4 What are the ethical problems of the case? Insider trading, profiting off of secret knowledge unobtainable to the public drives the plot of the film. Also, even from the beginning of the film, Bud's ethics present a problem of divided loyalties. By day, Fox works for a conventional Wall Street firm as a stockbroker. Although this firm is primarily focused on making money, it at least attempts to adhere to the letter of the law, a fact that Bud is.