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Case 3-1
The Parable of the Sadhu
Bowen H. McCoy
(Reproduced with the permission of the Harvard Business Review)
Last year, as the first participant in the new six-month sabbatical program that Morgan Stanley has adopted,
I enjoyed a rare opportunity to collect my thoughts as well as do some traveling. I spent the first three months in
Nepal, walking 600 miles through 200 villages in the Himalayas and climbing some 120,000 vertical feet. My sole
Western companion on the trip was an anthropologist who shed light on the cultural patterns of the villages that we
passed through.
During the Nepal hike, something occurred that has had a powerful impact on my thinking about corporate ethics.
Although some might argue that the experience has no relevance to business, it was a situation in which a basic
ethical dilemma suddenly intruded into the lives of a group of individuals. How the group responded holds a lesson
for all organizations, no matter how defined.
The Sadhu
The Nepal experience was more rugged than I had anticipated. Most commercial treks last two or three weeks and
cover a quarter of the distance we traveled.
My friend Stephen, the anthropologist, and I were halfway through the 60-day Himalayan part of the trip when we
reached the high point, an 18,000-foot pass over a crest that we’d have to traverse to reach the village of Muklinath,
an ancient holy place for pilgrims.
Six years earlier, I had suffered pulmonary edema, an acute form of altitude sickness, at 16,500 feet in the vicinity of
Everest base camp–so we were understandably concerned about what would happen at 18,000 feet. Moreover, the
Himalayas were having their wettest spring in 20 years; hip-deep powder and ice had already driven us off one
ridge. If we failed to cross the pass, I feared that the last half of our once-in-a-lifetime trip would be ruined.
The night before we would try the pass, we camped in a hut at 14,500 feet. In the photos taken at that camp, my face
appears wan. The last village we’d passed through was a sturdy two-day walk below us, and I was tired.
During the late afternoon, four backpackers from New Zealand joined us, and we spent most of the night awake,
anticipating the climb. Below, we could see the fires of two other parties, which turned out to be two Swiss couples
and a Japanese hiking club.
To get over the steep part of the climb before the sun melted the steps cut in the ice, we departed at 3.30 a.m. The
New Zealanders left first, followed by Stephen and myself, our porters and Sherpas, and then the Swiss. The
Japanese lingered in their camp. The sky was clear, and we were confident that no spring storm would erupt that day
to close the pass.
At 15,500 feet, it looked to me as if Stephen was shuffling and staggering a bit, which are symptoms of altitude
sickness. (The initial stage of altitude sickness brings a headache and nausea. As the condition worsens, a climber
may encounter difficult breathing, disorientation, aphasia, and paralysis.) I felt strong–my adrenaline was flowing–
but I was very concerned about my ultimate ability to get across. A couple of our porters were also suffering from
the height, and Pasang, our Sherpa sirdar (leader), was worried.
Just after daybreak, while we rested at 15,500 feet, one of the New Zealanders, who had gone ahead, came
staggering down toward us with a body slung across his shoulders. He dumped the almost naked, barefoot body of
an Indian holy man–a sadhu–at my feet. He had found the pilgrim lying on the ice, shivering and suffering from
hypothermia. I cradled the sadhu’s head and laid him out on the rocks. The New Zealander was angry. He wanted to
get across the pass before the bright sun melted the snow. He said, “Look, I’ve done what I can. You have porters
and Sherpa guides. You care for him. We’re going on!” He turned and went back up the mountain to join his friends.
I took a carotid pulse and found that the sadhu was still alive. We figured he had probably visited the holy shrines at
Muklinath and was on his way home. It was fruitless to question why he had chosen this desperately high route
instead of the safe, heavily traveled caravan route through the Kali Gandaki gorge. Or why he was shoeless and
almost naked, or how long he had been lying in the pass. The answers weren’t going to solve our problem.
Stephen and the four Swiss began stripping off their outer clothing and opening their packs. The sadhu was soon
clothed from head to foot. He was not able to walk, but he was very much alive. I looked down the mountain and
spotted the Japanese climbers, marching up with a horse.
Without a great deal of thought, I told Stephen and Pasang that I was concerned about withstanding the heights to
come and wanted to get over the pass. I took off after several of our porters who had gone ahead.
On the steep part of the ascent where, if the ice steps had given way, I would have slid down about 3,000 feet, I felt
vertigo. I stopped for a breather, allowing the Swiss to catch up with me. I inquired about the sadhu and Stephen.
They said that the sadhu was fine and that Stephen was just behind them. I set off again for the summit.
Stephen arrived at the summit an hour after I did. Still exhilarated by victory, I ran down the slope to congratulate
him. He was suffering from altitude sickness–walking 15 steps, then stopping, walking 15 steps, then stopping.
Pasang accompanied him all the way up. When I reached them, Stephen glared at me and said: “How do you feel
about contributing to the death of a fellow man?”
I did not completely comprehend what he meant. “Is the sadhu dead?” I inquired.
“No,” replied Stephen, “but he surely will be!”
After I had gone, followed not long after by the Swiss, Stephen had remained with the sadhu. When the Japanese
had arrived, Stephen had asked to use their horse to transport the sadhu down to the hut. They had refused. He had
then asked Pasang to have a group of our porters carry the sadhu. Pasang had resisted the idea, saying that the
porters would have to exert all their energy to get themselves over the pass. He believed they could not carry a man
down 1,000 feet to the hut, reclimb the slope, and get across safely before the snow melted. Pasang had pressed
Stephen not to delay any longer.
The Sherpas had carried the sadhu down to a rock in the sun at about 15,000 feet and pointed out the hut another 500
feet below. The Japanese had given him food and drink. When they had last seen him, he was listlessly throwing
rocks at the Japanese party’s dog, which had frightened him.
We do not know if the sadhu lived or died.
For many of the following days and evenings, Stephen and I discussed and debated our behavior toward the sadhu.
Stephen is a committed Quaker with deep moral vision. He said, “I feel that what happened with the sadhu is a good
example of the breakdown between the individual ethic and the corporate ethic. No one person was willing to
assume ultimate responsibility for the sadhu. Each was willing to do his bit just so long as it was not too
inconvenient. When it got to be a bother, everyone just passed the buck to someone else and took off. Jesus was
relevant to a more individualistic stage of society, but how do we interpret his teaching today in a world filled with
large, impersonal organizations and groups?”
I defended the larger group, saying, “Look, we all cared. We all gave aid and comfort. Everyone did his bit. The
New Zealander carried him down below the snow line. I took his pulse and suggested we treat him for hypothermia.
You and the Swiss gave him clothing and got him warmed up. The Japanese gave him food and water. The Sherpas
carried him down to the sun and pointed out the easy trail toward the hut. He was well enough to throw rocks at a
dog. What more could we do?”
“You have just described the typical affluent Westerner’s response to a problem. Throwing money–in this case, food
and sweaters–at it, but not solving the fundamentals!” Stephen retorted.
“What would satisfy you?” I said. “Here we are, a group of New Zealanders, Swiss, Americans, and Japanese who
have never met before and who are at the apex of one of the most powerful experiences of our lives. Some years the
pass is so bad no one gets over it. What right does an almost naked pilgrim who chooses the wrong trail have to
disrupt our lives? Even the Sherpas had no interest in risking the trip to help him beyond a certain point.”
Stephen calmly rebutted, “I wonder what the Sherpas would have done if the sadhu had been a well-dressed Nepali,
or what the Japanese would have done if the sadhu had been a well-dressed Asian, or what you would have done,
Buzz, if the sadhu had been a well-dressed Western woman?”
“Where, in your opinion,” I asked, “is the limit of our responsibility in a situation like this? We had our own well-
being to worry about. Our Sherpa guides were unwilling to jeopardize us or the porters for the sadhu. No one else on
the mountain was willing to commit himself beyond certain self-imposed limits.”
Stephen said, “As individual Christians or people with a Western ethical tradition, we can fulfill our obligations in
such a situation only if one, the sadhu dies in our care; two, the sadhu demonstrates to us that he can undertake the
two-day walk down to the village; or three, we carry the sadhu for two days down to the village and persuade
someone there to care for him.”
“Leaving the sadhu in the sun with food and clothing–where he demonstrated hand-eye coordination by throwing a
rock at a dog–comes close to fulfilling items one and two,” I answered. “And it wouldn’t have made sense to take
him to the village where the people appeared to be far less caring than the Sherpas, so the third condition is
impractical. Are you really saying that, no matter what the implications, we should, at the drop of a hat, have
changed our entire plan?”
The Individual versus the Group Ethic
Despite my arguments, I felt and continue to feel guilt about the sadhu. I had literally walked through a classic moral
dilemma without fully thinking through the consequences. My excuses for my actions include a high adrenaline
flow, a superordinate goal, and a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity–common factors in corporate situations, especially
stressful ones.
Real moral dilemmas are ambiguous, and many of us hike right through them, unaware that they exist. When,
usually after the fact, someone makes an issue of one, we tend to resent his or her bringing it up. Often, when the
full import of what we have done (or not done) hits us, we dig into a defensive position from which it is very
difficult to emerge. In rare circumstances, we may contemplate what we have done from inside a prison.
Had we mountaineers been free of stress caused by the effort and the high altitude, we might have treated the sadhu
differently. Yet isn’t stress the real test of personal and corporate values? The instant decisions that executives make
under pressure reveal the most about personal and corporate character.
Among the many questions that occur to me when I ponder my experience with the sadhu are: What are the practical
limits of moral imagination and vision? Is there a collective or institutional ethic that differs from the ethics of the
individual? At what level of effort or commitment can one discharge one’s ethical responsibilities?
Not every ethical dilemma has a right solution. Reasonable people often disagree; otherwise there would be no
dilemma. In a business context, however, it is essential that managers agree on a process for dealing with dilemmas.
Our experience with the sadhu offers an interesting parallel to business situations. An immediate response was
mandatory. Failure to act was a decision in itself. Up on the mountain we could not resign and submit our résumés to
a head-hunter. In contrast to philosophy, business involves action and implementation–getting things done.
Managers must come up with answers based on what they see and what they allow to influence their decision-
making processes. On the mountain, none of us but Stephen realized the true dimensions of the situation we were
facing.
One of our problems was that as a group we had no process for developing a consensus. We had no sense of purpose
or plan. The difficulties of dealing with the sadhu were so complex that no one person could handle them. Because
the group did not have a set of preconditions that could guide its action to an acceptable resolution, we reacted
instinctively as individuals. The cross-cultural nature of the group added a further layer of complexity. We had no
leader with whom we could all identify and in whose purpose we believed. Only Stephen was willing to take charge,
but he could not gain adequate support from the group to care for the sadhu.
Some organizations do have values that transcend the personal values of their managers. Such values, which go
beyond profitability, are usually revealed when the organization is under stress. People throughout the organization
generally accept its values, which, because they are not presented as a rigid list of commandments, may be
somewhat ambiguous. The stories people tell, rather than printed materials, transmit the organization’s conceptions
of what is proper behavior.
For 20 years, I have been exposed at senior levels to a variety of corporations and organizations. It is amazing how
quickly an outsider can sense the tone and style of an organization and, with that, the degree of tolerated openness
and freedom to challenge management.
Organizations that do not have a heritage of mutually accepted, shared values tend to become unhinged during
stress, with each individual bailing out for himself or herself. In the great takeover battles we have witnessed during
past years, companies that had strong cultures drew the wagons around them and fought it out, while other
companies saw executives–supported by golden parachutes–bail out of the struggles.
Because corporations and their members are interdependent, for the corporation to be strong the members need to
share a preconceived notion of correct behavior, a “business ethic,” and think of it as a positive force, not a
constraint.
As an investment banker, I am continually warned by well-meaning lawyers, clients, and associates to be wary of
conflicts of interest. Yet if I were to run away from every difficult situation, I wouldn’t be an effective investment
banker. I have to feel my way through conflicts. An effective manager can’t run from risk either; he or she has to
confront risk. To feel “safe” in doing that, managers need the guidelines of an agreed-upon process and set of values
within the organization.
After my three months in Nepal, I spent three months as an executive-in-residence at both the Stanford Business
School and the University of California at Berkeley’s Center for Ethics and Social Policy of the Graduate
Theological Union. Those six months away from my job gave me time to assimilate 20 years of business experience.
My thoughts turned often to the meaning of the leadership role in any large organization. Students at the seminary
thought of themselves as antibusiness. But when I questioned them, they agreed that they distrusted all large
organizations, including the church. They perceived all large organizations as impersonal and opposed to individual
values and needs. Yet we all know of organizations in which people’s values and beliefs are respected and their
expressions encouraged. What makes the difference? Can we identify the difference and, as a result, manage more
effectively?
The word ethics turns off many and confuses more. Yet the notions of shared values and an agreed-upon process for
dealing with adversity and change–what many people mean when they talk about corporate culture–seem to be at the
heart of the ethical issue. People who are in touch with their own core beliefs and the beliefs of others and who are
sustained by them can be more comfortable living on the cutting edge. At times, taking a tough line or a decisive
stand in a muddle of ambiguity is the only ethical thing to do. If a manager is indecisive about a problem and spends
time trying to figure out the “good” thing to do, the enterprise may be lost.
Business ethics, then, has to do with the authenticity and integrity of the enterprise. To be ethical is to follow the
business as well as the cultural goals of the corporation, its owners, its employees, and its customers. Those who
cannot serve the corporate vision are not authentic businesspeople and, therefore, are not ethical in the business
sense.
At this stage of my own business experience, I have a strong interest in organizational behavior. Sociologists are
keenly studying what they call corporate stories, legends, and heroes as a way organizations have of transmitting
value systems. Corporations such as Arco have even hired consultants to perform an audit of their corporate culture.
In a company, a leader is a person who understands, interprets, and manages the corporate value system. Effective
managers, therefore, are action-oriented people who resolve conflict, are tolerant of ambiguity, stress, and change,
and have a strong sense of purpose for themselves and their organizations.
If all this is true, I wonder about the role of the professional manager who moves from company to company. How
can he or she quickly absorb the values and culture of different organizations? Or is there, indeed, an art of
management that is totally transportable? Assuming that such fungible managers do exist, is it proper for them to
manipulate the values of others?
What would have happened had Stephen and I carried the sadhu for two days back to the village and become
involved with the villagers in his care? In four trips to Nepal, my most interesting experience occurred in 1975 when
I lived in a Sherpa home in the Khumbu for five days while recovering from altitude sickness. The high point of
Stephen’s trip was an invitation to participate in a family funeral ceremony in Manang. Neither experience had to do
with climbing the high passes of the Himalayas. Why were we so reluctant to try the lower path, the ambiguous
trail? Perhaps because we did not have a leader who could reveal the greater purpose of the trip to us.
Why didn’t Stephen, with his moral vision, opt to take the sadhu under his personal care? The answer is partly
because Stephen was hard-stressed physically himself and partly because, without some support system that
encompassed our involuntary and episodic community on the mountain, it was beyond his individual capacity to do
so.
I see the current interest in corporate culture and corporate value systems as a positive response to pessimism such
as Stephen’s about the decline of the role of the individual in large organizations. Individuals who operate from a
thoughtful set of personal values provide the foundation for a corporate culture. A corporate tradition that
encourages freedom of inquiry, supports personal values, and reinforces a focused sense of direction can fulfill the
need to combine individuality with the prosperity and success of the group. Without such corporate support, the
individual is lost.
That is the lesson of the sadhu. In a complex corporate situation, the individual requires and deserves the support of
the group. When people cannot find such support in their organizations, they don’t know how to act. If such support
is forthcoming, a person has a stake in the success of the group and can add much to the process of establishing and
maintaining a corporate culture. Management’s challenge is to be sensitive to individual needs, to shape them, and to
direct and focus them for the benefit of the group as a whole.
For each of us the sadhu lives. Should we stop what we are doing and comfort him; or should we keep trudging up
toward the high pass? Should I pause to help the derelict I pass on the street each night as I walk by the Yale Club en
route to Grand Central Station? Am I his brother? What is the nature of our responsibility if we consider ourselves to
be ethical persons? Perhaps it is to change the values of the group so that it can, with all its resources, take the
other road.
