Thursday, March 23, 2023

Unethical Business Behavior

 A great post by Kurt Harden on the weaselly justifications for unethical behavior in business.

Another consultant once told me about a major training proposal he'd submitted to a large organization. He didn't get the project and later on, one of the insiders told him that even before calling for proposals, they had decided on going with another firm. 

Thinking of all of the time he'd put into bidding on the contract, my friend asked, "Then why did you request proposals?"

The man responded calmly and with no embarrassment: "Because we have a rule that we must get at least three proposals before issuing a contract."

2 comments:

Chuck Pergiel said...

Compare the amount of work in preparing a proposal with the amount of work necessary to find out if there is any point in submitting a proposal. Divide that by the time available and you understand that people who have an in depth knowledge of the situation have an advantage. That's why both commercial and government agencies have a bunch of agents out sniffing around.

Michael Wade said...

Chuck,

It's also an argument in favor of a Sole Supplier provision when appropriate rather than the ruse of soliciting bids.

Michael