Question 2

APUROOP KALAPALA
(261)
BHOOMIKA GOYAL
(262)
GANGULY
ANTHARIKSHA (263)

Parable of the Sadhu: A Summary

GARIMA RAMOLE (264)

GAURAV MADANPURI

The "Parable of the Sadhu" presents a complex situation encountered by a group of

individuals and its parallelism to a business organization During a hike in Nepal, the
author Bowen H. McCoy, and a group of mountaineers elect to clothe and give provisions
to a hypothermic holy man, but not to care for him further. The article moves on from the
details of the story to highlight several moral dilemmas and ask questions of both the
author's moral responsibility and the responsibility of the group in such a situation. The
underlying question of whether or not individual and group ethics are the same is then
applied to the business world. McCoy makes it clear that even though ethics are difficult,
common values and a corporate culture based on thoughtful personal values, are integral
to the success and health of every corporation.

Let us discuss consequentialism first. Consequentialism focuses on consequences as the

most important factor in the decision making process. For consequentialists the motives
of an act are not as important as what comes out of it. Utilitarianism is one of the
branches of consequentialism. Utilitarianism believes in the greatest good for the number.
This method along with egoist consequentialism was probably the one that was used
subconsciously by the mountaineers. Leaving the Sadhu was fine because in the end the
greater amount of people would have reached their goal and that would have made them
happy. Egoist consequentialists who believe that the greatest good is their own would
have done the same, satisfying their desires before helping someone else. This method,
however, is not the best for this situation. One proving factor is that McCoy still feels
guilty about this incident. Therefore, this method did not produce the most ethical
response.
Virtue ethics, unlike consequentialism, focus on the kind of person each one of us should
be. They focus on cultivating certain characteristics and look at every situation in terms
of its potential influence on the morale of the person. This method, although much more
helpful than utilitarianism, still produces an unclear response. On one hand, kindness and
compassion are both virtues that would be cultivated if the mountaineers decided to help
the Sadhu and carry him to the village. On the other hand, if mountaineers continue their
journey virtues such as courage and determination would flourish. It is difficult to decide
which virtues are more important than others and therefore, this method is too ambiguous
to be applied to this situation.
To address the ethical issues that were faced, we can take another approach, there
are assumptions that need to be analyzed and separated into two groups, the first four

applies to an individual or a small group of individuals and the second group applies to a
larger structured group of people such as a corporation. Understanding the ingredients is
the first step to deriving a process for ensuring that the best ethical solution is discovered
next.
1. How should the climbers have assessed the weight of the crisis in the middle of the
dilemma? For example how should the climbers have dealt with assessing the unknown
condition of the stranger?
2. The process for developing a consensus of the problem and solution is key. The lack of
communication was apparent in this story as the climbers were spread across the
mountain side.
3. The cultural conflict when there is little or no ethical center piece was apparent in this
story and can be found in other dilemmas.
4. How much help is considered enough help and when is it appropriate to hand it off to
someone else. At what point is it good enough?
When it comes to a corporation the following needs to be dealt with:
5. Should a profit focused business approach the issue differently than an individual?
6. How much power should the company give the employees at various levels to engage,
create solution and solve the problem?
7. In a corporate environment how does a company filter and judge between what it
should focus on when there are some many possible dilemmas it could find itself entangle
with if it was not careful?
8. What is the balance between expertise, resources, and determination to solve the
problem and who manages it and makes the decisions? Where are those lines drawn for
the company?
9. Should a corporation be treated differently than an individual?
The parable of the Sadhu gives an opportunity to ponder over many questions that lay
dormant in daily situations, issues waiting to be discovered, discussed, and formed into
problems that can then be addressed. The fundamental flaw in looking for a solution that
would have applied to the situation of the Sadhu, is that it supposes the discovered
solution would apply in other situations, but circumstance is so critical in these situations.
The solution is not a resolution of events to complete next time, but a process that can be
formed after assessing the fundamental questions raised and applying that process to
unique circumstances and teams of people.