Who gets to say how I behave?

Who gets to say how I behave? Communication between corporate imperative and ethical prerogative
Inaugural lecture at the Department of International Business Communication by Adjunct Professor Maurice Biriotti

As one of the key contributors to developing the Humanities-in-Business agenda at CBS, the Department of International Business Communication explores the way businesses communicate across cultural and linguistic boundaries and how different minds meet – or don’t meet. In order to investigate the ways in which insights from the humanities further our understanding of the mechanisms involved in doing business and running an organization, IBC is now commencing collaboration with Adjunct Professor Maurice Biriotti, whose work has for many years been centrally concerned with the human factor in the success of business organisations. In his inaugural lecture, Maurice Biriotti will address questions of ethical limits to behaviour change in businesses.

Abstract: The desire to determine the behaviour of others has always been at the core of commercial communication. Doing business always called for communication which ensures a measure of control over the purchasing decisions of customers and running an organisation always called for communication which ensures a measure of control over the behaviour of employees. Businesses are in the business of behaviour change. But new insights into behaviour, new technologies and new questions about the ethical role and responsibilities of corporations in the modern world make business organisations rethink their roles in behaviour change. Amidst theories and tools of doing business and of running an organisation, the question that presents itself is: how far is it legitimate to go in our commercial, managerial and organizational desire to capture, understand and mould individual behaviour?  

The lecture will be introduced by Dean of Research, Alan Irwin, and will be followed by an open discussion initiated by two discussants from CBS, who will challenge some of the propositions and observations presented by Maurice Biriotti.

Professor Maurice Biriotti is the Chief Executive of SHM and a Founding Trustee of the SHM Foundation. Until 1996, Professor Biriotti was a full-time academic, working at the Universities of Cambridge, Birmingham and Zurich. His published work covers literature, philosophy, anthropology and the dynamics of cultural change. He left academia to set up SHM, a strategy and insight consultancy based in London.

The inaugural lecture and the discussion will be followed by a reception. All are welcome at the event, but please register not later than Thursday 25 September with Merete Borch, mb.ibc@cbs.dk.