Mike Flanagan

A Ruthless CEO Explains What To Do “When Life Hands You Lemons”

/ Jack Marshall / 40 Comments

Mike Flannagan (not the old Orioles pitcher) is a rising star director/screenwriter in the horror genre. His brilliant and complex mash-up of “The Haunting of Hill House” was as good as any horror movie or series I’ve ever seen, and his two follow-ups, one a re-thinking of “The Turn of the Screw,” are also smart, original and excellent. Now his mash-up of Edgar Alan Poe tales in a modern day horror story evoking the Sackler family and the opioid scandal is on Netflix. As with the previous three, “The Fall of the House of Usher”—the Ushers are the Sacklers— is cast substantially with his “rep company” including E.T.’s Henry Thomas and Annabeth Gish.

Last night I saw the episode in which the Faux Sackler family head and chief villain, played by Bruce Greenwood, gives a spontaneous speech about what smart businesses do when “Life hands them lemons,” and boy, it sure isn’t “make lemonade.” The second I heard it, when I had stopped applauding, I decided that the speech was an instant classic, much cleverer and better than Oliver Stone’s celebrated “Greed is good” speech that he wrote for Michael Douglas in “Wall Street.” It should be appearing soon in business school lectures across the country, and maybe laws schools too. I’m going to use it in an ethics seminar.

Flannagan’s speech for the bitter Usher family head is at once funny, chilling, revealing and true, perfectly encapsulating the ruthless logic of 21st Century capitalism as well as the soul of entrepreneurism.

Presenting the Ethics Alarms Heroes’ Hall Of Honor

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

remember

Today, the anniversary of September 11. 2001, American minds should be occupied with thoughts of gratitude for heroes, the often anonymous and unknown people we may pass in the street every day, as well as the justly famous and celebrated, who make our lives and many others better by living their own selflessly and well. They are our salvation, role models and neighbors, and they teach us the lesson that all is never lost, and hope is always thriving, as long as there are good and courageous people who will do the right thing, no matter what the cost, when fate turns to them.

This seems like a propitious time to dedicate the Ethics Alarms Heroes Hall of Honor, the list of the Ethics Heroes Emeritus whose stories have been told here (and on this site’s predecessor, The Ethics Scoreboard.) Every current member of the Hall is now deceased, like the brave men and women who died this day, 12 years ago. Each of them, in a unique way, teaches how human beings can rise above the vicissitudes of mere survival, self-interest, personal benefits and the base desires of the species  to live  meaningful and virtuous lives. Some accomplished this over decades, some with one brilliant and transforming act of distinction.

There are currently 32 members enshrined in this virtual Hall. Obviously, it is far from complete. They are just symbolic representatives, worthy ones, of millions more who once breathed the same air we do today, and like those who perished twelve years ago, face the prospect of being forgotten over time, as we all go about the consuming task of getting from one day to another. Each one of us, I believe, is capable of emulating their example.

Here are the thirty-two members and their stories, as of this date,

September 11, 2013... Continue reading →