Developing societies are facing challenges with basic needs of food and water, housing and energy. Increase in population is intensifying the challenges. The problems of sustainable development, distribution of energy and energy security are interlinked with each other and therefore a new idea or innovation is required to address the societal challenges. The social environment is rapidly changing with the want of sustainable economic development and stable democracies. Scientists and engineers play vital role in social innovation and helps in addressing the social needs and challenges of the people. Social innovation is the adoption, integration development and creation of new practices and concepts that creates a better world. The innovation gives most importance to people and planet. Social innovation involves steps that focus on people health, community development, education and working conditions. People residing in a society are the main components of society that leads to social development. Social innovation Continue reading
Business Ethics
Indian Ethos For Modern Management
Indian ethos for management means the application of principles of management as revealed in our ancient wisdom brought forth in our sacred books like our Gita, Upanishads, Bible and Quran. There are 6 basic principles, which come to light in the holy books applicable in today’s management world. They are : Each soul is a potential God Holistic approach Equal importance to Subjectivity/Objectivity Karma yoga Yogah Karmasu Kaushalam Co-operation 1. Each Soul is a potential God A human being has a soul, a spark of the Divine. The divine resides in the heart of a person. The Divine means perfection in knowledge, wisdom and power. Therefore a human being has immense potential power or energy for self — development. Thus human efforts can achieve even an apparently impossible goal and convert the impossible into a reality. The partnership of God and Man can bring about extraordinary or miraculous results; Continue reading
Case Study: Scam of the Century – Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi Scheme
In the world of finance, there are a select amount of manipulative masterminds that sit on a throne of lies. Those who commit these white-collar crimes take advantage of institutions and all classes of people. Ultimately, the enormity of these crimes brings ruin and chaos to the lives of those affected. In this manner, Bernard Lawrence Madoff is just one of these individuals who ran history’s largest Ponzi scheme. To begin, Bernie Madoff was born in Queens, New York in 1938. He received his Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from Hofstra University in 1960 and shortly thereafter started his own firm known as Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, LLC., which offered reliable returns, alongside his wife Ruth. Due to the companies growing popularity from those reliable annual returns, his client list grew to include impressive celebrities like Steven Spielberg, Kevin Bacon, and Kyra Sedgwick. Also included were some of the Continue reading
Case Study: The Financial Collapse of the Enron Corporation
Enron began its life in 1985 and appeared to be a rising star in the business world. In conjunction with the accounting firm Arthur Anderson Enron became one of the biggest accounting scandals in history. There were numerous ethical dilemmas in addition to the many illegal acts during rise and fall of Enron. The Enron scandal was the biggest bankruptcy in United States history which cost 4,000 employees their jobs. Once it was obvious that something was amiss with Enron’s bookkeeping, there was action on behalf of the Securities and Exchange Commission. By October 31, 2001 the inquiry had upgraded into a formal investigation and on December 2, 2001 Enron filed for bankruptcy. It was an event that will always be remembered as one of the most disastrous events in the financial world. In late 2001 Enron’s shares drastically dropped from over $90.00 to just pennies which was seen as Continue reading
Creative Accounting – Definition, Techniques and Ethical Considerations
Definition of Creative Accounting Creative accounting is accounting practice that falls outside the regulation and give benefit to certain people. It can be described as a practice with a clear aim to interrupt the financial reporting process which affects reported income to make it looked normal and provides no true economic advantages to relevant parties like shareholders. Concisely, creative accounting is the transformation of financial accounting figures from what they actually are to what users’ desire by taking advantage of the accounting policies which is permitted by accounting standards. Creative accounting is a practice that potentially being undertaken as a result from some individual care more on their own interest and indirectly causes issues arise in ethical dimension of creative accounting. From information perspective, agency theory gives a clear picture on creative accounting scenario. Whereby managers misuse their privileged position in manipulating financial reporting in their own interest which Continue reading
Case Study on Corporate Governance: UTI Scam
Of all the recent encounters of the Indian public with the much-celebrated forces of the market, the Unit Trust’s US-64 debacle is the worst. Its gravity far exceeds the stock market downswing of the mid-1990s, which wiped out Rs. 20,000 crores in savings. The debacle is part of the economic slowdown which has eliminated one million jobs and also burst the information technology (IT) bubble. This has tragically led to suicides by investors. And then suspension of trading in US-64made the hapless investors more dejected at the sinking of this “super-safe” public sector instrument that had delivered a regular return since 1964. There is a larger lesson in the US-64 debacle for policies towards public savings and public sector undertakings (PSUs). The US-64 crisis is rooted in plain mismanagement. US-64 was launched as a steady income fund. Logically, it should have invested in debt, especially low-risk fixed-income government bonds. Instead, Continue reading