Wall Street Journal Article on the Topic of Betty Vinson

Betty Vinson was put in a tough spot by her superiors at WorldCom. She started out as a very hard worker and would “do anything you told her” according to the Wall Street Journal article. This attitude made sure that she did not hurt any relationships she had built up in the company When she decided to go along with the orders to make false accounting entries, it was because of fear. She feared that since the telecommunications market was in a slump, the company she worked for would not be able to continue unless the numbers went up.

She also feared that if she went against these orders, her job would be taken from hers Her family needed her salary in order to survive, as she was making nearly double that of her husband, a printing salesman.

When she realized that it was not just a one-time occurrence, it was too late to fix and she was sucked into the scheme herself, knowing that any reversals of what she had done would be immediately caught by auditors or the SEC In order to prevent this from happening to myself, I believe that you have to take a firm stand against bad accounting procedures from the start.

When I say a firm stance, I do not just mean saying no to what you are asked to do Betty knew that what was being asked of her was wrong, and had thought about resigning. Unfortunately for her, she did not think she would be able to secure another job right away so she went against her wantsi Realistically, there are millions of accounting jobs available in the world, as every business needs proper accounting to be done.

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With her outstanding background in accounting and experience working for a top company like WorldCom, there was no way some upstart company wouldn‘t hire her. It would take strong moral ethics to say no to your boss, but you know what is right and what is not, so you must hold your stance from a moral perspective, as you do not want to become an unethical person in the business world that is exactly what happened to Ms Vinsont. When we watched the study of obedience that took place at Yale, we could see that some people, when put into a situation where they are bound by certain rules, will not make decisions on their own.

The “teachers” in the experiment could have easily stopped administering shocks to the learner at any time, but would not stricLly because the scientist would tell them “you must keep going, for the sake of the experiment”. People are willing to lose their personal morals and administer pain to others if rules are put in place that bind them This is an example of stage 4 of Kohlberg‘s theory of moral development, which is an orientation towards fixed rules. This pertains to legal and illegal activities, since for certain people a rule may be in place that makes an illegal act seem like the right thing to do. An example would be a gang member who is told to commit a crime their may be rules in place for his gang that make this a necessary act, and they will follow these rules to avoid consequences, even if it is against the law.