Dear Mr. Doan:
business has cast itself in the role of the doting parent, scratching its corporate head and asking: Now where have I gone wrong? We on the other side of the aptly-named generation gap can readily answer your question. The question we can't answer—and the one you must answer—is more difficult: What does, and what will, business do right?
The image that the corporate world has created in the academic world is a highly negative one. Business, which has sold us everything from living space to living bras, has been unable to sell itself. Hopefully, our dialogue will help dispel the "business myth"-although all myths are based on varying degrees of truth.
And what exactly is this image?
It's that of a potential vehicle for social change overcome by its own inertia. Business has an immense social power which is exceeded only by its inadequate social commitment. This is not to deny that many major corporations are involved in health research, agricultural improvement, etc. But what we question is whether business is really carrying—or plans to carry-its share of the social burden.
A psychologist's association test, for instance, would yield such verbal gems as "business" and "air pollution," "business" and "warprofiteering," "business" and "planned obsolescence." You yourself know only too well the two-syllable associative response generated by "Dow Chemical." It is hard for us to applaud a new measles vaccine juxtaposed with such immoralities.
Thus, many of the qualities we associate with business are contrary to our very way of life. We have awakened from the sleepy fifties and have begun to challenge both political and social tenets. Yet, while we question our involvement in a more-than-questionable war, business apparently closes its eyes and fills its wallets.
This is what troubles us. As corny as it sounds, we do hope to change the world. Business, meanwhile, is trying to change its image. But in so doing, it is merely creating a battle of antithetical stereotypes.
Thus unless it decides to give itself—and not merely its image a major overhaul, business can continue to write off a growing segment of college youth. Perhaps our dialogue will help give the corporate world the rectal kick it so desperately needs.
Forget your image, business... Overhaul yourself
Stan Chess Journalism, Cornell
Dear Mr. Chess:
I agree with you that business has done a wretched job of selling itself. We tend to feel that our role in developing the highest living standards in the world is self-explanatory, and doesn't need much selling; and we are so busy, and engrossed, in what we're doing that we don't really have time to "sell" what we do.
Simple explanations of why a company is producing a product in the national interest don't provide the answer to "selling" business, as we at Dow are all too well aware. The fact that in the judgment of our military leaders the tactical use of napalm is effectively saving lives of our troops, and serves an indispensible need in accelerating the end of a dirty and unpopular war . . . the fact that there simply is no truth to reports of massive casualties among Vietnamese women and children resulting from napalm . . . the fact that hundreds of American doctors who have volunteered their services in Vietnamese hospitals report not having a single civilian napalm burn case, all are documented facts blandly ignored by those not responsive to reason. But I have yet to hear criticism of napalm from any returning combat veteran.
Doesn't this really mean that judgments should be made on the basis of objective inquiry and not unfounded opinion? Honest differences will always arise. But a better understanding of viewpoints and motives will follow from objective discussions. Business must sell "itself" not an image of itself.
It is from this perspective that I think we should examine your central question of "whether business is really carrying—or plans to carry-its share of the social burden."
You are of course aware of business' direct involvement in contemporary community affairs through such programs as those dealing with hard-core unemployment,blight-area housing,civil rights,traffic congestion,and pollution problems. To me these programs are evidence that business today is assuming a much more active social role. But this does not answer two questions fundamental to your inquiry; to what extent should business-an economic vehicle whose primary commitment to the community lies in its economic functions assume social burdens; and how can these social responsibilities be discharged most effectively?
Obviously all of society's institutions must assume some share of the burden; there is no sole responsibility. Can you visualize a solution in which only one segment of society provides equal opportunity for Negroes?
I believe maximum long-term profit growth is consistent with, and in fact cannot be achieved without, maximum service to society. Maximum service to society can be achieved only through maximum development of, and release of. the ability of individuals. And maximum release of individual abilities brings about maximum profit-growth.
Further, in my view, service cannot be delivered best by deliberately trying to be of service. Service can more often be achieved by indirection than by any direct attempt to be of service.
Business does so many things right that I don't really see this as an issue. We have developed a system that the rest of the world is frantically trying to copy. It is the worst system going except for all those other systems. Business can't do everything for everyone, of course; it wasn't designed for that. Like all of us, it should be doing what it does best. As an economic instrument, it can best fulfill its social commitment by excelling in that respect.
Our nation is going through a period of transition to new policies and new philosophies. Your generation on the campus is doing us a real service by questioning our assumptions, and by making us aware of hypocrisies and outmoded parts of our systems and institutions. You want to do away with outmoded ideologies, and so do I. As new values are accepted which emphasize the role of the individual in society today, and new relationships develop between the public and private sector of society, then more realistic answers will be found as to how business, in harness with government and education, can share the social burden by providing real rather than illusory-service.
IS ANYBODY LISTENING TO CAMPUS VIEWS? BUSINESSMEN ARE. Dialogues
Three chief executive officers—The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company's Chairman, Russell DeYoung, The Dow Chemical Company's President, H. D. Doan, and Motorola's Chairman, Robert W. Galvin—are responding to serious questions and viewpoints posed by students about business and its role in our changing society . . . and from their perspective as heads of major corporations are exchanging views through means of a campus/corporate Dialogue Program on specific issues raised by leading student spokesmen.
Here, Stan Chess, a Journalism senior at Cornell, is exploring issues with Mr. Doan.
In the course of the entire Dialogue Program, David M. Butler, in Electrical Engineering Program at Michigan State, also will exchange viewpoints with Mr. Doan; as will Mark Bookspan, a Chemistry major at Ohio State, and David G. Clark, Political Science MA candidate at
Stanford, with Mr. DeYoung; and similarly, Arthur M. Klebanoff., in Liberal Arts at Yale, and Arnold Shelby, Latin American Studies at Tulane, with Mr. Galvin.
These Dialogues will appear in this publication, and other campus newspapers across the country throughout this academic year. Campus comments are invited,and should be forwarded to Mr. DeYoung, Goodyear, Akron, Ohio; Mr. Doan, Dow Chemical, Midland, Michigan; or Mr. Galvin Motorola, Franklin Park, Illinois as appropriate.