More about being “responsible”

This is an excerpt of the original article. It was written for the September-October 2019 edition of Supply Chain Management Review. The full article is available to current subscribers.

September-October 2019

It’s that time of year again, when we feature the Top 25 supply chains from Gartner. What I enjoy most about this research is the window it provides into where supply chains are going next: After all, while some lead, the rest of us follow.

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My last Insights column, “Advocating for ‘responsible’ supply chains,”* was written because I noted that in today’s seemingly toxic, contentious and uncivil culture, people seem to be confusing being ethical with being responsible. However, they are two different concepts, in my view.

Ethical is defined as “pertaining to or dealing with morals or the principles of morality; pertaining to right and wrong in conduct.” Responsible, meanwhile, means “answerable or accountable, as for something within one’s power, control or management.” I believe the latter is more appropriate for business decisions, because the law dictates those business activities that are legal (think good) versus illegal (think bad).

I first used the term responsible in an Insights article where I postulated that companies over-outsourced over the past several decades.** At the time, I pointed to a variety of factors that might have incentivized companies to do so. However, I also felt that too many outsourcing decisions were not considering an important factor: Justice. That is, justice dictates that companies have a national debt to pay to their country of origin.

Because I never really appreciated the one philosophy course I took in college, several years ago I watched a PBS series, “Justice: What’s the Right Thing to Do;” based on a course given to undergrads at Harvard University by Professor Michael Sandel.

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