Imagine you are a Petroleum executive in the CEO – Suite. It’s the end of the 3rd Quarter and your company’s numbers don’t look good. You didn’t make your revenue targets. Wall Street is not impressed and your price per share is going down. Share holder pressure is up.

Meantime you know that Oil reservoirs are decreasing world-wide. The proverbial low hanging fruit has been picked and you have to invest in exploration in uncharted territory. With the exponential growth in people around the globe who expect a modern lifestyle with all its comforts, consumer demand is on a steady rise. So is competition and so are your migraine headaches.

One of your most talented managers from the deep water exploration division comes to make a presentation. It’s a break-through. His team has discovered a new source of oil -- a deep well. The technology you’ll need to employ to tap this source is unprecedented and largely untested. The well is 5,000 feet below sea level and you’ll be drilling another 30,000 feet into the earth’s crust. But the reservoir is huge and represents a massive revenue stream. It’s risky yes, but the risks of losing market share are greater. There are safe guards you could employ, but they are expensive, not legally required, and will cut into profits, and profits are you number #1 responsibility to shareholders.

What do you do?

You say yes to Deepwater Horizon.

What happens when a company defines its success by only one metric? By cutting safety corners and costs to boost profits, the companies working on Deepwater Horizon precipitated one of the great environmental disasters in history and the full extent of the damage is still unknown. We do know that there is irreversible harm done to birds, fishes and ecosystems of the Gulf as well as the livelihoods and traditions that go with them. What will the 5th generation Louisianan Shrimp Farmer do now? The distributor of New Orleans’ Oysters? The NYC restaurateur that showcases them on their menu? I had my teeth cleaned last week up here in the Northeast and even my dental hygienist is mad, “Those guys need to pay that shrimp farmer!” she steamed.

Deepwater Horizon demonstrates a deeply ingrained pattern.

I find the following fable instructive in understanding the behavior of many companies: The Scorpion and the Frog

One day, a scorpion looked around at the mountain where he lived and decided that he wanted a change. So he set out on a journey through the forests and hills. He climbed over rocks and under vines and kept going until he reached a river. The river was wide and swift, and the scorpion stopped to reconsider the situation. He couldn't see any way across. So he ran upriver and then checked downriver, all the while thinking that he might have to turn back. Suddenly, he saw a frog sitting in the rushes by the bank of the stream on the other side of the river. He decided to ask the frog for help getting across the stream.

"Hellooo Mr. Frog!" called the scorpion across the water, "Would you be so kind as to give me a ride on your back across the river?"

"Well now, Mr. Scorpion! How do I know that if I help you, you won’t try to kill me?" asked the frog hesitantly.

"Because," the scorpion replied, "If I try to kill you, then I would die too, for I cannot swim!"
Now this seemed to make sense to the frog. But he asked. "What about when I get close to the bank? You could still try to kill me and get back to the shore!"

"This is true," agreed the scorpion, "But then I wouldn't be able to get to the other side of the river!"

"Alright then...how do I know you won’t just wait till we get to the other side and THEN kill me?" said the frog.

"Ahh...," crooned the scorpion, "Because you see, once you've taken me to the other side of this river, I will be so grateful for your help, that it would hardly be fair to reward you with death, now would it?!"

So the frog agreed to take the scorpion across the river. He swam over to the bank and settled himself near the mud to pick up his passenger. The scorpion crawled onto the frog's back, his sharp claws prickling into the frog's soft hide, and the frog slid into the river. The muddy water swirled around them, but the frog stayed near the surface so the scorpion would not drown. He kicked strongly through the first half of the stream, his flippers paddling wildly against the current.

Halfway across the river, the frog suddenly felt a sharp sting in his back and, out of the corner of his eye, saw the scorpion remove his stinger from the frog's back. A deadening numbness began to creep into his limbs.

"You fool!" croaked the frog, "Now we shall both die! Why on earth did you do that?"

The scorpion said, as they both sank below the muddy waters of the swiftly flowing river:

"I could not help myself. It is who I am by nature."

Here’s my point: It is the nature of the publically traded multi-national corporation to pursue profit. Like the scorpion, the company is not evil; it is simply designed to behave according to its character.


The charter of a company, as it defines itself, is to maximize shareholder value. I submit it’s time to create a world where our interpretation of what this means shifts from shareholder value to sharing bold values. For unlike the Scorpion, we humans do have the power to change our behaviors in accordance with our values. Here are some of the essential values shifts we need now to avoid the deep waters of profit-driven irresponsibility:

From:                                                 To:

• Shareholder ----------------> Value Sharing Bolder Values
• My profit --------------------> Our prosperity
• Greed -----------------------> Generosity
• Hubris ----------------------> Wisdom
• Arrogance ------------------> Humility
• Denial ----------------------> Accountability

A caveat is due here. I love business. I love the pace, innovation and entrepreneurial spirit of it. I’m a third generation of CEOs and have run my own small business for two decades. My father, an immigrants’ son, came home from four years in the South Pacific during World War II with a few dollars in his pocket and took the risk to start a semi-conductor distributing company. With literal good fortune, he caught the Personal Computer Tsunami wave and prospered, creating jobs and the steady growth that we have enjoyed since. I have great admiration for my contemporaries like Dean Cycon CEO of Dean’s Beans, John Broucek of New England Naturals, who use the prosperity of their businesses to create jobs, support communities and respect the environment. My cousin Andrew Merz has a deck-building business in Baltimore that employees ten and has a reputation for quality and customer service.

“I don’t need to grow profits every year,” Andy told me. I stay small by intention, keep my profits at about 8-10% a year, pay my guys the best salary and benefits in the business, and send my kids to good schools. I like to have time to coach soccer. It’s a good life -- I don’t need more.”

So how much is enough? How can we transform our corporations to be for benefit, not merely for profit? How can we bring nature into the board room? Tune in next Monday.