Are rules meaningless if not enforced?

If rules are not enforced, is it wrong to ignore them?

Two different readers shared two different but similar stories recently.

One of the readers recounted how a neighborhood baseball field had signs on its fence indicating dogs were not allowed on the field. Another reader wondered about passengers who pulled over to the side of the road to dump plastic garbage bags into public waste cans that had signs on them indicating no household trash was allowed. In each case, the reader mentioned that these weren’t one-time observations of rules violations.

The baseball park was regularly full of dogs and owners unless a baseball game was in progress. The reader noticing the household trash in the public bin regularly saw different people depositing a bag of trash from their car.

Neither of the readers ever witnessed any official policing the area. Officials did, however, regularly ticket illegally parked cars in the lot next to the baseball field.

Since the number of dogs being let onto the field seemed to be growing, that reader asked if it was implied that it was really OK for dogs to be allowed to roam since the regulation was not enforced.

The reader's question reminded me of a public presentation I once participated in in Madison, Wisconsin.

The presentation was about ethics in business and a local interviewer was asking me questions on stage. When the time came for audience questions, a gentleman stood up and pointed out that a sign on the door of what seemed to be a newly renovated auditorium indicated that no food or drinks were allowed in the auditorium. He questioned whether the two bottles of water next to the interviewer and me sent a message that the rules didn’t apply to us. He was trying to make a point about the inconsistency of the rule application even if most might find it acceptable for a speaker to need a gulp of water during a presentation. Nevertheless, he was right to raise the question.

If rules or regulations are set, then presumably they are set for a reason. In the case of the dogs, it could be a public health issue if the walkers are not rigorous about picking up after their pets. By forbidding the dumping of private trash in a public bin, it might be an effort to make sure that the bins aren’t overflowing or that people aren’t taxing the public services offered in a town in which they might not live.

But just because the rules are not being enforced does not mean it’s OK to not follow the rules. “But that guy did it,” is not justification for others to do something wrong as well. The right thing for individuals is to follow the rules. And the right thing for whoever has jurisdiction over the baseball field or trash can is to enforce the rules as much as they would enforce parking regulations.

And while it might seem understood, it wouldn’t hurt for that sign on the auditorium door to add the phrase, “unless you’re presenting on stage.”

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Fly me to the moon

Should companies honor reservations for a spaceflight made before civilian spaceflights existed?

Polaris Dawn, a spaceflight operated by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, traveled into space on Sept. 10 and successfully returned to earth on Sept. 15. Four private citizens operated the spacecraft. The operation was funded by Jared Isaacman, a billionaire, who reportedly paid about $200 million for the flight.

Isaacman’s flight on Musk’s spacecraft reminded me that at some point in my childhood, I’m pretty sure I signed up to reserve a flight to the moon.

I vaguely recall that when I was between 8 and 11 years old, I signed something to make a reservation to take a flight to the moon when they became available. A little bit of research suggests that my fuzzy recollection wasn’t simply imagined, but rather might have been part of a marketing campaign done by Pan American Airways called “‘First Moons Flight’ Club.” Between 1968 and 1971, Pan Am issued more than 90,000 cards to people who made reservations for a flight to the moon, although apparently informal reservations with Pan Am began as early as 1964.

While I have a memory of signing up, I have no memory of ever receiving a card. But somewhere, someone may still have a registry of everyone who signed up, including me.

Had Pan Am not gone out of business in 1991, presumably it would still be sitting on that list. Sure, it may have been nothing more than a marketing gimmick to engage customers who were caught up in space adventures around the time of the first moon landing on July 20, 1969. But if Pan Am were still around would it have an obligation to honor those reservations more than 50 years after they were made?

My guess is that legally Pan Am likely would have had no such obligation, as long as no money changed hands. My research suggests no money was requested. I am confident back then I had no money to send in to secure my place in line.

But should flights into space have become available and Pan Am were around as one of the purveyors of such flights, I believe the right thing would be to try to contact those on the list to gauge their interest. Granted, since the list was compiled well before the days of email or cell phone numbers that follow you around, many of the people would be challenging to track down. Nevertheless, the company could make a good faith effort to make good on the promise of space travel dangled decades earlier.

Since Pan Am is no longer with us, it seems a prime opportunity for Elon Musk’s SpaceX or Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin or Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic to do what they can to get hold of that reservations list. Wouldn’t it be grand for us to be given first dibs on hopping on board?

Of course, Pan Am never told us when the flights would become available. Nor did it name a price for each seat. I suspect most of us would have to take a pass at plunking down more than several hundred thousand dollars for a seat on Virgin Atlantic to several hundred million to book the whole craft on SpaceX. Still, when a company lures us in by promising the moon, the right thing would be to ask before assuming we can’t afford the adventure.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Should restaurants promise more than they plan to deliver?

Should businesses be careful in what they promise in their marketing materials?

Back in February, my son-in-law and I drove a truck and trailer cross country to deliver his son’s (my grandson’s) belongings to him. We figured the trip would be about a 30-hour drive from the Boston area to Colorado Springs, Colorado. We planned to share the driving and figured we could make it there in a couple of days if we left early in the morning each day and drove into the evening.

A bit of weather slowed us down, but we still found ourselves making good time. At the end of the second evening of driving, we stopped late for dinner at a chain restaurant that served breakfast all day and featured a country store selling nostalgic snacks and items; guests entered and left the dining area through the store.

The service was not particularly swift. After we had been seated for quite a while, we overheard a manager apologizing to a large party for how long their food had taken and how when food finally did arrive, it had not been what they’d ordered. The manager apologized and offered them free dessert.

We spent our time studying the sizable breakfast menu. I was particularly pleased that the menu indicated that any eggs would be “cooked to order.” When the waiter arrived I confirmed that “cooked to order” meant any style and they assured me that was the case. I placed my order for two poached eggs on toast and my son-in-law placed his order as well. Several minutes later our waiter returned to tell me that they don’t do poached eggs.

Now, in the scheme of things, telling customers you serve eggs any style or “cooked to order” when you know there are some styles you simply won’t do or orders you won’t take is not the end of the world. Should I have made a fuss? Maybe. But to what end? It was not likely that I was going to force the chef to poach an egg he didn’t want to poach. At the time of night we were eating after a long day of driving, if I chose to leave in a huff, I would go to bed hungry.

I responded to our waiter that it kind of means they don’t honor what’s on the menu. I ordered eggs over easy instead, and they nodded and took the order.

Businesses should make sure that they deliver on what they advertise. If they have no intention of doing so, then the right thing is for them not to promise otherwise and hope no one calls them on it. The restaurant had an extensive menu with many options and it served breakfast all day. Certainly that was enough without making false promises.

It took a while, but our meals finally arrived. My son-in-law’s meal was not what he had ordered. He told our waiter that they had delivered several side dishes, all of which were the same and none of which was what he had ordered. The waiter took his plate back to the kitchen for corrective action. No one offered us a free dessert.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

How we lose can define us

How important is it to be a good loser?

The year I was a senior in college, the band Steely Dan released its song “Deacon Blues.” A lyric from it has always stuck with me: “They got a name for the winners in the world. I want a name when I lose.” Walter Becker and Donald Fagen followed those lines with: “They call Alabama the Crimson Tide,” to make their point about how winners (in this case, the University of Alabama’s powerhouse football team) got a name. But then in an effort to provide a name to the loser narrating the song: “Call me Deacon Blues.”

It may not be a happy message, but the song gave a name to the losers of the world if we wanted to use it: Deacon Blues.

Losing, however, is not always a dire experience. Sure, approaching challenges with a desire to win can be a good practice. But even DJ Khaled, who sang, “All I do is win,” has had his occasional high-profile run-ins with losing. (You can look it up.)

From an early age, how we behave when we lose can help define our character. We learn it’s not OK to walk off the field of a baseball game if the opposing team is beating us by a dozen runs. We learn that it’s not OK to quit a competitive board game when it becomes clear we are going to be decimated. We learn not to walk away from the corn hole toss when our opponent’s bean bags seem magnetized to go in the hole while ours always fall short.

When we agree to a game, we agree to the rules of that game and there’s a sense of grace and honor to stick with that game even when we lose. There is no honor in trying to change the rules of the game halfway through or crying foul every time an opponent comes out ahead. There is no valor in claiming that you couldn’t possibly have lost a baseball game since your team scored more runs than it ever had scored in a game before, even if such parsing ignores that fact that the opposing team won because he scored even more runs than your team.

Sure, winning is great. It’s a blast to the ego to come out on top. But part of the understanding of competition is that not everyone is going to win.

Learning to accept our losses graciously, to congratulate our opponents on their victory this time, and then to go off and perhaps work hard to try to win the next time; these are some of the marks of an honest competitor.

And when we lose, as each of us will at something sometime, it’s not because the outcome was rigged. Sometimes we just lose, and then we move on. Call yourself Deacon Blues if it helps, but the right thing is to show some honor in defeat.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

 

Is it a yard sale faux pas to re-sell items from a neighbor’s trash?

Is it OK to make a profit off items you got free or paid little for at a neighborhood yard sale?

As in many neighborhoods across the United States, every year, a neighborhood in Boston has a neighborhood yard sale right around Labor Day. It’s a chance for people to clean out their basements or attics or cupboards or desks of things they don’t want and try to lure their neighbors to take on possession at a modest price. In this particular neighborhood, the running joke is that in five or so years, whatever item you sold will make it’s way around the block after being sold house to house to house.

The setup is a communal affair with a neighbor creating maps to post on telephone poles indicating which houses are participating. Mentions of the sale go out on closed groups on social media as well. At the end of the sale, people leave boxes out with free items they couldn’t sell. A side benefit is that neighbors get out and chat with neighbors.

But occasionally a question arises over whether someone’s tactics are inappropriate.

A reader we’re calling Anthony regularly sets up a table of items in front of his house. Typically, his wares consist of clothing he no longer wears, kitchen items he’s rarely used, or the occasional piece of furniture that seemed like a good idea at the time he purchased it.

Anthony noticed that a few weeks before the yard sale, one of his neighbors put out five or six dining room chairs to be picked up by the trash. Before the trash collectors arrived to swoop them away, Anthony saw another neighbor take them two at a time to his house down the block.

On neighborhood yard sale day, Anthony saw that the neighbor was selling the chairs he had rescued from the trash for $10 a piece or $50 for six chairs. Something about his neighbor’s action struck Anthony as being wrong. Shouldn’t the person throwing out the chairs have gotten the money if people were willing to pay for the chairs? Should Anthony say anything to the prior owner or the new seller?

No, Anthony has no reason to say anything to anybody. There is absolutely nothing wrong with what his neighbor did. If the person tossing the chairs wanted to make some cash, he could have tried to sell them at the yard sale. He chose not to.

There also would be nothing wrong if one of Anthony’s neighbors bought something at the yard sale early in the day from one of his neighbors and then tried to sell it for more on his own table of offerings. This is how yard sales work. You accumulate stuff you don’t want anymore and you try to make a bit of cash by selling it.

The right thing is for Anthony to sell his stuff, enjoy his neighbors, and if in the future he sees some nice chairs being given away for free that he believes might sell at the annual yard sale, to grab them.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

How up-to-date must your business card be?

How obligated are you to make sure all information on any business card you share is up-to-date?

Some people using business cards have shifted to a digital business card where users can share information electronically. Information on these cards can be updated relatively swiftly, making it simple for users to keep their information up to date.

But millions of paper business cards are still printed and in circulation. Updating a paper business card takes a bit more effort than updating a digital business card app.

Some users changing jobs or titles might not have a printed business card in hand soon enough to share at an upcoming sales call, marketing event or other encounter that seems to call for a business card. If the phone number, email address and company affiliation are all still accurate, is it dishonest to use an old business card that contains other information that is no longer factually correct?

It might seem like it’s no big deal to go ahead and share. What’s the big deal? Often, it might not be a big deal and any change might mean little to anyone other than the card holder and his or her or their colleagues. But this is not always the case.

If, for example, someone had been the head of a department or the director of a program, but no longer held that role, then sharing a business card with that title on it would be misleading. It would suggest to a recipient that the card sharer held a position of authority at a company they didn’t really hold. The recipient might not care, but that doesn’t erase the fact that the information on the business card does not accurately reflect the role of the person doling it out.

The right thing is not to use a business card with information on it that is not accurate. But if someone is sold on wanting to share a business card, there are honest options from which to choose as the new business cards are being printed.

One is to simply tell the recipient that new business cards are being printed and offer to tell the person any contact information, which they can record. Another inelegant solution is to cross out anything inaccurate on the existing card and leave the contact information. Or even users sold on continuing to use printed business cards can make use of a digital business card to hold them over. While some digital business cards charge a fee, there are some free apps available. In such cases, it seems wise to clear the use of digital business cards with your employer who may or may not recommend using such services.

While there are numbers floating around about how many millions of business cards are printed every day, it’s hard to quantify how many of those actually get used. It’s more than likely that the vast majority of business cards shared don’t make it far beyond the closest wastebasket.

Perhaps it’s wise to figure out if a business card serves any real purpose before you have a few hundred printed up. It may be hard to turn the offer of a business card down without appearing rude, but perhaps letting someone know you’d rather just put their contact information in your phone might be welcomed.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.