No Price on Integrity

In a tweet on 29 May 2018, the “Roseanne” star Roseanne Barr referred to Valerie Jarrett as a product of the Muslim Brotherhood and the “Planet of the Apes.” Valerie Jarrett, the former senior advisor to President Barack Obama, said a racist tweet from actor Roseanne Barr should be used as a “teaching moment.” Roseanne was the biggest TV show in ABC (until May 2018) and The Walt Disney Company is the parent company of ABC.  

Without doubt, tone does start at the top. This is what we call “tone at the top” and the importance of tone at the top was highly mentioned in Corporate Ethics and Compliance Management Certification program (by Turkish Integrity Center of Excellence) that I completed last year. 

I have recently read “The Ride of a Lifetime” by Robert Iger, former CEO of Disney. In his terrific book, there is a reference to this “teaching moment” and how he led it. Let’s have a look at how former Disney CEO Robert Iger managed this situation from the top: 

I sent an email to the Disney board: “This morning we all woke up to a tweet by Roseanne Barr, in which she referred to Valerie Jarrett as a product of the Muslim Brotherhood and Planet of the Apes. We found this comment, no matter what its context was, to be intolerable and deplorable, and we made the decision to cancel Roseanne’s show. I don’t mean to stand on a high horse, but as a company, we have always tried to do what we felt was right, no matter what the politics or the commerce. In other words, demanding quality and integrity from all of our people and of all of our products is paramount, and there is no room for second chances, or for tolerance when it comes to an overt transgression that discredits the company in any way. Roseanne’s tweet violated that tenet and our only choice was to do what was morally right. A statement will be released momentarily.” 

It was an easy decision, really. I never asked what the financial repercussions would be, and didn’t care. In moments like that, you have to look past whatever the commercial losses are and be guided, again, by the simple rule that there’s nothing more important than the quality and integrity of your people and your product. Everything depends on upholding that principle. 

For me, Robert and the management team did what the top had to do to preserve the integrity of the corporation’s values. From investors’ point of view, there is no effortless way to quantify the level of integrity embodied in a company's DNA. Every company will say it prioritizes corporate responsibility. Actions speak louder than words, however. And this is a good example of how action towards integrity can be taken.