Carson’s View on Ethics in Sales and the Golden Rule The art of business and sales can be seen as a grand balance of give and take. Thomas L. Carson explains in his essay “ The Ethics of Sales” that we first need to distinguish between lying, deception, withholding information, and concealing information; this is stated in reference to the beginning the understanding between ethics and business sales. Carson later adds that there are four main duties that salespeople should have and that are prima facie duties, in which they are believed as true until proven otherwise. Carson adds a segment in his essay that brings up the Golden Rule, do unto others as you would like them to do to you. The four duties are a corrected or revised version
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In an ever-growing world of business, time is money for both the buyer and seller so when doing business it is a must to completely think of both sides of the table. The Golden Rule helps supports these duties by showing common courtesy to both parties as they are trying to balance the give and take exchange known as business. Carson’s own take on the Golden Rule is by far not the simplest but yet it is one that can correlate both the Rule and sales into the same frame of reference. When demonstrating a balance between fairness of the buyer and seller the golden Rule automatically becomes a basic principle of ethics since the outlets to buying something is massive and therefore it is in the interests of the seller to be as honest to the buyer as they are in the actual product. It would be foolish to bash one, in not many, experience just to make a quick dollar when word of mouth is one of the quickest ways to market a product or service. In the case of salespeople, the Golden Rule implies that the buyer is sacrificing their hard earned money to purchase a product and within this exchange is trust that the money has not been falsified and therefore neither has the product or …show more content…
Holey’s theory is a great start into the thinking process of determining what goes into ethics of sales but with Carson’s own interpretations, he starts to break it down into a formidable list that doesn't “rub elbows” with any other duty; unlike Holley’s Theory in which the second and third duty clash within themselves, even if only in certain scenarios. Also, Carson’s 1-4 duties help explain an expansive number of different situations sales people come across on a daily basis. All in all, Carson has a more plausible outlook within his 1-4 duties and can be of greater help when determining ethical behavior within sales. He also adds three examples of ethically poor behavior between a buyer and seller, like a person selling a car without explaining that the car has bad brakes, changing the car's initial appearance so that it appears to work fine at every startup, or the deception of caring towards a customer. These examples are all seen as morally wrong in the light of Carson’s four main duties. This can be agreed upon since they conflict with the guidelines of those four ethical duties but also because none of the examples are performing in parallel with the Golden Rule. In this case, none of the sellers would much appreciate the same act passed back to them down the line or ever at all, and so these examples would in fact be morally
In an ever-growing world of business, time is money for both the buyer and seller so when doing business it is a must to completely think of both sides of the table. The Golden Rule helps supports these duties by showing common courtesy to both parties as they are trying to balance the give and take exchange known as business. Carson’s own take on the Golden Rule is by far not the simplest but yet it is one that can correlate both the Rule and sales into the same frame of reference. When demonstrating a balance between fairness of the buyer and seller the golden Rule automatically becomes a basic principle of ethics since the outlets to buying something is massive and therefore it is in the interests of the seller to be as honest to the buyer as they are in the actual product. It would be foolish to bash one, in not many, experience just to make a quick dollar when word of mouth is one of the quickest ways to market a product or service. In the case of salespeople, the Golden Rule implies that the buyer is sacrificing their hard earned money to purchase a product and within this exchange is trust that the money has not been falsified and therefore neither has the product or …show more content…
Holey’s theory is a great start into the thinking process of determining what goes into ethics of sales but with Carson’s own interpretations, he starts to break it down into a formidable list that doesn't “rub elbows” with any other duty; unlike Holley’s Theory in which the second and third duty clash within themselves, even if only in certain scenarios. Also, Carson’s 1-4 duties help explain an expansive number of different situations sales people come across on a daily basis. All in all, Carson has a more plausible outlook within his 1-4 duties and can be of greater help when determining ethical behavior within sales. He also adds three examples of ethically poor behavior between a buyer and seller, like a person selling a car without explaining that the car has bad brakes, changing the car's initial appearance so that it appears to work fine at every startup, or the deception of caring towards a customer. These examples are all seen as morally wrong in the light of Carson’s four main duties. This can be agreed upon since they conflict with the guidelines of those four ethical duties but also because none of the examples are performing in parallel with the Golden Rule. In this case, none of the sellers would much appreciate the same act passed back to them down the line or ever at all, and so these examples would in fact be morally