EDITION 7
WeeklySEpTEmbEr 7, 2012
Why Harvard Mishandled Its Cheating Scandal
The World Is Catching Up on Anticorruption Enforcement
Corporate Social Responsibility for Profit
Thalidomide: A Specter Still Haunts the World
Why harvardMishandled its Cheating sCandalrichard S. Levick, Esq.Originally Published on Forbes.com
It’s an unpleasant trait of the human per-
sonality that we instinctively want to think
the worst of those who have more money,
more power, more opportunity than we do.
When, for example, an institution like Har-
vard University announces that it is investi-
gating possible cheating by its students, it’s
not long before high-authority publications
are posting articles with titles like “Yes, they
cheat at Harvard, too.”
One week after Harvard’s announcement,
many of the stories still highly ranked on
Google news either discuss cheating itself as a
national problem that needs to be addressed,
or basically ignore the underlying issue in this
particular case. Happily, a few recent pieces do
eloquently define that underlying issue, argu-
ing that, in fact, a grave injustice is being done.
Yet responsibility for this injustice ultimately
rests neither with the media nor the public’s
collective schadenfreude. We design institu-
tional codes to assure the fairest possible pro-
cess when problems arise, and we have best
communications practices to protect institu-
tions and individuals from calumny.
Harvard failed its students on both scores.
The inquiry focuses on a take-home final exam
and the possibility—based on purported simi-
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larities in how exam answers were phrased—
that students may have copied answers. Around
125 students are involved; they were enrolled in
a course called Introduction to Congress taught
by Matthew Platt.
The students under suspicion will be sum-
moned to an Administrative Board hearing and
face sanctions ranging from one-year suspen-
sions to formal reprimands. As the events in
question happened last spring, students who
were supposed to graduate in 2011 remain in
limbo. They’re not the only ones whose lives
are on hold. Some who did graduate are cur-
rently unemployable. Others are loath to apply
for jobs under the assumption that they may
be disciplined and their standing with their
employers fatally compromised as a result.
Needless to say, the students at risk are not
likely performing at full capacity under
these conditions.
Now, I should not be telling you any of this
because no one should have told me. Univer-
sity policy demands total confidentiality. While
Harvard naturally declined to reveal names,
we should certainly not be reading that “Har-
vard officials called it the biggest such probe
in living memory.” We should not know how
many students are involved, nor how a teach-
ing assistant was disturbed by what he read
in the suspicious exams, nor what steps the
university will take to spread the gospel of
academic integrity—which assumes the as-yet
unproven point that those steps are at all nec-
essary in light of this inquiry.
It’s a very fair guess that, after a year of dutiful
silence, Harvard was contacted by the media
and decided to go proactive. Get ahead of the
story. Don’t wait for reporters to tell it for you.
Show how transparent you are. To be sure,
corporations and institutions are well-advised
to consider just such practices in the shadow of
an impending crisis.
But absent sound judgment regarding the
particulars of each situation, these bromides
are just that—bromides, ill-advised and rather
dangerous. Lawyers don’t typically comment
on pending litigation, and for good reason.
Boards don’t reveal the details of their inves-
tigations when CEOs are under fire, and for
good reason.
In compliance with Harvard’s own policy, a
brief statement, with only minimal confir-
mation (if any) that an investigation is being
speedily conducted, would have sufficed.
The need for a tight-lipped response was all
the greater because of that aforementioned
“underlying issue,” which could well exculpate
the majority of students involved. The Student
Handbook provided by the Administrative
Board prohibits students from discussing exam
questions or in any way collaborating on how
to interpret and answer those questions. But
there is a crucial exception.
According to the Handbook, “The amount of
collaboration with others that is permitted
in the completion of assignments can vary,
depending upon the policy set by the head of
the course. Students must assume that col-
laboration in the completion of assignments is
prohibited unless explicitly permitted by the
instructor…”
Instructors are thus allowed to waive the
restriction, which many students may reason-
ably have believed to be the case. After all, his
office and those of the class’ Teaching Fellows
—some of whom innocently provided specific
answers—were open at all times. Discussion of
the test questions was encouraged, so much so
that it may be fair to surmise that, if the exam
answers seemed familiar from student to stu-
dent, it’s because those students picked up the
phraseology from Platt and the Teaching Fel-
lows themselves. Students were also permitted
to share lecture notes, which would likewise
encourage similar-sounding answers. There
were no restrictions put on how the direct help
provided by the instructors could be shared.
The shroud over these students is all the more
lamentable since there is a fundamental peda-
gogical issue here—the role of “collaboration”
versus enforced individual effort—hat merits
open and lively discussion. Instead, we get it
buried under a disciplinary probe.
One can fairly assume a few extraneous forces
influencing Harvard in this matter. The Eliza-
beth Warren plagiarism controversy may have
played a hand in light of the savage depictions
of Harvard’s response by the conservative
media. Equally savage, there are the inevitable
academic politics, including support from
some faculty for a formal honor code. (Like
most American universities, Harvard has
never had one.) The “scandal” plays right into
that agenda.
“ The Elizabeth Warren plagiarism controversy may have played a hand in light of the savage depictions of Harvard’s response by the conservative media. Equally savage, there are the inevitable academic politics, including support from some faculty for a formal honor code. (Like most American universities, Harvard has never had one.) The “scandal” plays right into that agenda.”
Anyone who’s ever experienced on-campus
politics anywhere can well imagine these 125
students caught in such a power struggle even
as the institution itself indulges a dubious stab
at reputation management. One shudders at
the possibility of FOIA requests down the line,
of careers damaged in ways we’ll never know
about. In all matters involving communications,
proactive or not, the Hippocratic imperative,
“First, do no harm,” is a guiding principle.
Fortunately, I am quite sure that Harvard has
the institutional integrity to seize on any honor-
able way out of this situation. There is one.
Since the whole issue of “collaboration” has
come to the fore (albeit as a result of disclosures
that should not have been made), Harvard can
now focus on it as a positive take-away. If
the problem can be defined as lack of clarity
about where collaboration ends and cheating
begins, the solution lies with open, university-
wide dialogue to define and stabilize the
middle ground.
It’s a much more practicable and equitable
solution than preaching academic integrity
to students and instructors. You might just be
preaching to the choir.
Richard S. Levick, Esq., President and CEO of LEVICK,
represents countries and companies in the highest-stakes
global communications matters—from the Wall Street
crisis and the Gulf oil spill to Guantanamo Bay and the
Catholic Church.
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the World is CatChing Up on
antiCorrUption enforCeMent
For the last several years, corporate direc-
tors in the U.S. have been wrestling with cor-
ruption issues with greater frequency than
ever before. Aggressive enforcement of For-
eign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) strictures
and new game-changing whistleblower laws
have introduced a number of new liabilities
that include record-setting fines, jail time
for executives, high-profile securities litiga-
tion, and the reputational challenges that
accompany each. As a result, compliance is
taking on added significance in many board-
rooms as directors seek to ensure that a
commitment to ethical behavior permeates
their companies from top to bottom.
That’s a good thing—because the U.S. in no
longer among only a handful of countries that
are intensifying their anticorruption efforts.
Today, the world is catching up and introduc-
ing a new universe of liability for companies
that do cross-border business.
Consider the six new cases that have been
filed under the UK Bribery Act 2010, which has
been called the toughest enforcement stan-
dard in the world and, for the first time, made
failure to prevent bribery a criminal offense
(even the FCPA doesn’t go that far). Consider
the 34 bribery cases under investigation in
John LovalloOriginally Published on LEVICK Daily
Canada—a figure that ranks the country with
Australia and Austria as Transparency Interna-
tional’s most-improved enforcers. Even China is
getting in on the act, as it has promised to stiffen
anticorruption controls after a series of embar-
rassing episodes—including the 2011 ouster of
Railway Minister Liu Zhijun from the Commu-
nist Party for allegedly accepting bribes.
With intensified enforcement and new anti-
corruption regimes springing up all over the
world—and even in the most unexpected of
regions—boards of directors need to carefully
examine what their companies are doing
to articulate compliance both internally
and externally.
Within the company, the board needs to ensure
that all employees know the rules of the road
that govern their dealings overseas and the
consequences for operating outside acceptable
boundaries. That means the C-Suite needs to set
a strong “tone at the top” with messages that
emphasize a culture of compliance. It means
routine training for foreign agents and even
contractors and other business partners.
At the same time, every employee also has to
be well aware of the internal mechanisms by
which they can report perceived violations.
When companies encourage employees to
speak up, they keep potential whistleblowers
within the fold while also providing them-
selves the opportunity to self-report (a strategy
that often diminishes the penalties at play).
When it comes to external communications,
companies are sometimes reticent to publi-
cally discuss compliance issues for fear of
creating an issue where none exists. But when
they do so, they not only provide themselves
an advantage in markets that are emphasizing
ethics like never before, even as they condi-
tion the marketplace, investors, and regulators
to give them the benefit of the doubt should
trouble arise.
The U.S. is no longer the only sheriff in town.
And with more watchdogs come more oppor-
tunities to attract their attention. That means
boards must not only ensure that compliance
is a priority; they also need to ensure that the
company’s dedication to ethics is articulated
far and wide.
John Lovallo is a Senior Vice President, Chair Corporate
Reputation Practice at LEVICK. He is also a contributing
author to LEVICK Daily.
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“ When it comes to external communications, companies are sometimes reticent to publically discuss compliance issues for fear of creating an issue where none exists.
COrpOraTE SOCIaL rESpONSIbILITy
FOr prOFITrichard S. Levick, Esq.Originally Published on Forbes.com
There’s an ongoing transformation in the very way companies define their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) programs. The messages are different, the goals are different, and, to be sure, the strategies are different.
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Consider two recent studies.
One report by the Havas Media Lab under-
scores this transformation with a list based
on a survey of 50,000 consumers worldwide
who identified the companies they feel have
the most “meaningful” CSR. The 10 top names
included Unilever and Bimbo, Ikea and Leroy
Merlin, as well as consumer technology compa-
nies like Samsung and Sony. As the Lab’s direc-
tor Umair Haque quips, they’re not “necessar-
ily the do-gooding corporate entities you
might expect.”
In lieu of such “do-gooding,” Haque talks about
CSR as a way to connect to the personal well-
being of customers. Nike+ is a prime example.
“Instead of putting up another campaign of
billboards with celebrities saying, ‘Buy our
shoes’…Nike+ actually helps makes you a bet-
ter runner,” he says.
In other instances, companies underscore
their commitment by taking substantive risks.
Early last year, for example, Unilever CEO Paul
Polman really spoke the language of CSR as
value—not just donations—when he made an
ambitious sustainability and anti-hunger plan
an investment prerequisite. “If you don’t buy
into this [program], I respect you as a human
being, but don’t put your money in our com-
pany, he said.
It’s easy for consumers to read this resolve as a
personal message to them: that we as a com-
pany are guided by the same determination to
produce beneficial impacts for you—not just
the direct beneficiaries of our CSR largesse—
even at the cost of a few big shareholders.
Many of the highly ranked CSR programs on
the Havas list predictably feature green initia-
tives, often, as with Leroy Merlin, highlighting
how the company’s own employees person-
ally volunteer in repair and recycling efforts
around the world. Here too, with this volun-
teerism, we’re a long way from the passive
check-writing that defined the old CSR.
The message to consumers is, again, personal.
Since these Leroy Merlin people commit
themselves, their own time and sweat, to these
responsibility programs, it’s no reach to infer
that they do the same when they manufacture
the home improvement products that have a
direct impact on our lives.
In another report, Pike Research found that
“the closer the company’s business is related to
consumer electronics, the higher its CSR score.”
Companies like IBM, HP, and Texas Instru-
ments topped the charts for transparency and
reported results. For starters, their sustainabil-
ity initiatives have impressed consumers, the
report suggests.
These sector-leading companies have pushed
hard to highlight their greater focus on en-
hanced sustainable design, manufacturing,
distribution, use, and end-of-use management.
The message is, our products are socially re-
sponsible across a broad spectrum of consum-
er needs, beginning with the benign impact
they have on the world in which they’re used.
In turn, that message rivets consumer attention
on the products themselves and encourages the
compelling supposition that responsibly manu-
factured products are simply better products.
In the new CSR lexicon, “impact” is invoked
as the crucial factor—the impact of a phone
or a computer on the daily lives of their users.
The key is to build a better mousetrap, not just
provide lavish demonstrations of goodwill.
Such an approach to CSR comes quite naturally
to consumer electronics leaders like Steve Jobs
whose ingenuity, more than their philanthropy,
won the hearts and minds of consumers in the
first place.
To be sure, the green movement has played a
key role for many industries in the transforma-
tion of CSR because it’s all about being systemic
in approach. You’re expected to not pollute
the river—Haque would call that the “table
stakes”—but, beyond that, what “impact” on
the environment do all your business opera-
tions have, including how much water the
plumbing in your corporate office saves on a
yearly basis?
Mr. Haque’s new book, Betterness: Economics
for Humans, provides a useful context in which
these varied issues can be understood as part
of the transformation from impersonal cor-
porate giving to the “impact” of products and
services on consumers’ lives—and, of course,
the profits generated in the process.
There is ample data to confirm this profit-gen-
erating potential. More than half the consumers
surveyed by Havas want to reward responsible
companies by buying their products. 53% would
even pay a 10% premium for those products.
But the benefits don’t stop at the check-out
line. They extend to stock value as well, as
suggested by Harvard Business School data
confirming that this new species of socially
responsible company gets more favorable rat-
ings from securities analysts.
The Harvard report specifically underscores
the difference between yesterday’s CSR, which
was largely based on gratuity, versus today’s
model based on impact. The study notes that
the former were often perceived by the mar-
kets as “value-destructing” while the latter is
now seen to be “value-creating.” Today’s ana-
lysts know that high-impact products generate
revenue simply because they work better even
as they provide the tools with which society
can improve itself.
It doesn’t matter what you sell. People are
looking hard at how you do business and the
companies that do it best win the CSR race,
ahead of those for whom “corporate giving” is
the only index of corporate responsibility.
Richard S. Levick, Esq., President and CEO of LEVICK,
represents countries and companies in the highest-stakes
global communications matters—from the Wall Street
crisis and the Gulf oil spill to Guantanamo Bay and the
Catholic Church.
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thalidoMide:a speCter still haUnts the World
richard S. Levick, Esq.Originally Published on Forbes.com
William Faulkner said it. “The past is never
dead. It’s not even past.” Those are caution-
ary words in an age when digital coverage
of today’s global disaster seems to imme-
diately erase the memory of yesterday’s
global disaster.
So there it was over the Labor Day weekend,
topping the Google News charts for most of
one day. The Grünenthal Group, German
manufacturer of the drug thalidomide, issued
its first apology to the victims a full 50 years
after agreeing to recall the infamous drug.
Thalidomide, which was given to pregnant
women to relieve morning sickness, was
recalled in 1961 in the aftermath of a wave of
birth defects in Europe, Australia, Canada, and
Japan. The drug was also found to cause pro-
found damage to the eyes, ears, heart, genitals,
and internal organs of developing babies. It
was never approved in the United States.
Grünenthal settled a lawsuit in Germany in
1972 and expressed regrets. But the company
has not admitted liability, claiming all required
clinical trials were dutifully conducted.
News reports about the apology were haunting
on at least four levels.
Personally, it was a reminder to me of the
forces and events that have shaped my own
sensibilities, political and otherwise. In fact, I’d
group thalidomide with the Vietnam War and
the civil rights movement as formative impacts
in my life. I’m particularly haunted by the me-
dium through which those impacts were made.
Dead soldiers and civilian babies, hoses turned
savagely on peaceful protesters, limbless chil-
dren held fast by agonized parents…Then as
now, visual images mold our perceptions and
transform our lives.
Morally, it was a reminder that no one can es-
cape the shadow of the past; that, somehow in
some way, we eventually confront the demons
of our own actions, individual or corporate.
They call it karma, from which there’s no
escape by simply writing a settlement check to
remit ancient sins or recent misdeeds.
Historically, it was a reminder of how the tha-
lidomide nightmare helped shape the current
environment in specific practical ways. Class
actions and plaintiffs’ lawyers cast as moral
avengers; aggressive regulation on all business
fronts (nowhere more so than with food and
drugs); lobbyists enlisted to ease the burden
on manufacturers and NGOs deployed in the
opposing cause—the thalidomide litigation and
public furor were indeed eloquent precursors
to our current mélange.
Professionally, it was a reminder that, for all
that companies may be learning in terms of
crisis communications, there are still situa-
tions that sorely test those evolving skills. In
that context, the Grünenthal Group’s current
ordeal merits a closer look.
Grünenthal’s chief executive Harald Stock not
only apologized for the suffering of thalido-
mide victims, he apologized for not apologiz-
ing. “We ask that you regard our long silence
as a sign of the shock that your fate caused in
us,” said Stock, speaking in the city of Stolberg,
where Grünenthal is based. The occasion was
the unveiling of a bronze statue of a child born
without limbs—again, a reminder that power-
ful visual images drive events.
According to Stock, the need for a public apol-
ogy was impressed on the company during
recent talks with victims. Yet it’s hard to imag-
ine that Grünenthal could have expected many
of those victims or their families to respond
warmly to its pronouncements. Predictably, vic-
tims like Freddie Astbury—born armless and
legless 52 years ago and now a thalidomide vic-
tim’s advocate—were instead contemptuously
dismissive. “It’s a disgrace that it’s taken them
50 years to apologize,” said Astbury. “For years
[the company] insisted they never did anything
wrong and refused to talk to us.”
In the art of the Public Apology, there is a
central precept: in order to be credible, there
must be some sort of remediation, a penitential
act that will serve those who’ve been injured
and provide the public with sufficient reason to
believe that you’re taking steps to ensure that
similar tragedies won’t happen in the future.
Instead, Stock maintained that “the suffering
that occurred…50 years ago happened in a
world that is completely different from today.”
In many countries, victims are still waiting for
compensation from Grünenthal. So we have
only a stunningly belated apology that offers
no solution for anyone to anything. Instead,
the company has only underscored the tardi-
ness of the apology (it was in “shock” for 50
years) and encouraged perceptions that its cur-
rent tears are but crocodile tears.
The apology is additionally puzzling in light of
ongoing class action litigation that Grünenthal
has refused to settle. (Grünenthal’s British dis-
tributor did settle in July.) From a strictly
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business standpoint, Stock’s apology won’t like-
ly serve the company’s interests in that lawsuit;
it may only remind the fact-finders of what the
plaintiff’s lawyer in the case calls “a calculated
corporate strategy to avoid the moral, legal
and financial consequences of its reckless and
negligent actions…”
What then could have possibly driven Grü-
nenthal to ensnare itself in this cul-de-sac?
One explanation is that, when the idea for the
memorial was proposed, the city government
stipulated that Grünenthal be involved. Pre-
sumably, the company felt it had no choice.
How could it refuse? But once it said yes, what
was Stock supposed to say?
It was a no-win situation. If Grünenthal had
simply declined to participate, it would have
seemed heartless and indifferent. On the other
hand, in a hard-ball approach, the company
could have cited ongoing litigation as reason to
bow out. The adverse reaction might have been
less stinging than the response to its messy
apology for not apologizing, while the city of
Stolberg might have shared the blame for set-
ting an impossible condition to the memorial
going forward.
Once Grünenthal decided to participate, the
error in judgment was in saying too much.
Some few careful, compassionate words would
have sufficed and, for the rest of the occasion, a
dignified non-committal silence.
Yet there was an alternative solution to which
we have already hinted. Without admitting
past liability or infuriating victims with is
apology, Grünenthal might have used the oc-
casion to propose any number of initiatives
underscoring the company’s good citizenship.
Grünenthal did take a step in that direction in
2009 when it pledged 50 million euros to help
victims, although bitter complaints still abound
as victims say Grünenthal’s settlements and
benefactions are woefully inadequate to sup-
port their day-to-day needs.
A more practicable strategy may lie with the
drug itself. After all, thalidomide is still used
as a treatment for multiple myeloma (a plasma
cell cancer) and leprosy. Research is also being
conducted to determine if thalidomide is useful
in the treatment of AIDS and arthritis as well
as other cancers.
It would seem that here, if anywhere, is an
opportunity for the company to make what-
ever atonements it feels in its soul should be
made. Direct support for that research, as well
as a public information campaign to spotlight
its potential, might be apology enough for 50
years of guarded silence. It’s never too late to
save somebody’s life.
Richard S. Levick, Esq., President and CEO of LEVICK,
represents countries and companies in the highest-stakes
global communications matters—from the Wall Street
crisis and the Gulf oil spill to Guantanamo Bay and the
Catholic Church.
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the UrgenCyof noW.