I turned out to be a pretty good student. I found the classes interesting, challenging and informative. I kept my head down and worked hard. I also managed to keep my mouth shut, most of the time. There was one class that was the exception. Professor Raul Thayer’s Business Management course pulled my string a little too hard and a little too often. Much like that doll that talks when its string is released, I, too, tend to mouth off when mine reaches its limit.
Professor Thayer had taught at Harvard Business School until retiring to North Carolina. I think he took the part-time night job at Buncombe so he could continue to hear himself talk. He stood about five foot eight and weighed less than Earl’s dog. He always wore a bow tie, heavily starched white shirt, and black dress pants that stopped about three inches above his highly polished wingtips. His corduroy sports coat looked like he bought it twenty years ago which was also, in my estimation, the last time he got laid. The height of the pile of bullshit he stacked up each evening was only exceeded by the elevation of his lofty ego. One might say that I wasn’t exactly aligned with his way of thinking. I was of the opinion that he was also less intelligent than Earl’s dog.
“In business, profit is not one thing, it is the only thing. As a top tier business man, your sole loyalty is to your stakeholders. You serve them through maximizing profit. You do this any way you can within the bounds of law. Of course, if the law interferes with maximizing profits, do what you need to while ensuring you don’t get caught.”
He paused and glared at us. I think he was waiting for applause or laughter. What he received was a nervous twitter.
“Of course, that’s a joke. Especially if this room is bugged by the Feds,” he said with a broad wink and a shit-eating grin on his face. “If your business is not number one and crushing the competition, you have no right to be in that business. The only business book that is required reading for this course, besides the excellent one I wrote, is Niccolo Machiavelli’s The Prince.”
Although it was against my better judgment, I couldn’t seem to stop myself from raising my hand. The professor glanced my way but didn’t show any signs of acknowledging me. So, when he stopped to take a breath, I launched in.
“What about loyalty to the employees that work hard to run your business every day? What about loyalty to the community that surrounds you and allows your business to operate? What about loyalty to your customers?”
“Oh, I see we have a future failed businessman in our midst.”
I had several thousand great comebacks to that, but managed to bite down on my tongue.
“Let me address that in case the rest of you are similarly misguided. First, without profits, there is no place for the employees to work. Does anyone truly think your employees are going to be loyal to your business? Each one of them would run to work for a competitor if they served better hamburgers in the cafeteria. Their only loyalty is to that paycheck that they get twice a month.”
He continued without letting me respond. “Second, the community is privileged to have your business operating there. You are the tax base that pays their politicians and allows little Jimmy to be on a Little League team. Without you, they would dry up and blow away. You owe them no loyalty. Your efforts need to be directed at making sure they don’t get in your way.”
I could feel myself get hot and turning red.
“And finally, loyalty to your customers is funnier than the joke I told a few minutes ago. If your product is a nickel more than your competitors or takes thirty more seconds to access, your customers will scatter like roaches when the lights come on.”
He turned his back on the class to face the blackboard and signal that the King had spoken and the peasants should shut the fuck up. I think the majority of the class was in my corner. Unfortunately, they were the classic silent majority. That left it up to me.
“Iggy Pop had a rock album titled Blah, Blah, Blah and that’s what I’m hearing from you, Professor. We, as students, are your customers. Are you saying that you have no loyalty to us?”
Now he was getting hot and turning red which I found quite amusing. “How dare you challenge me? I have been teaching business since before you were born. There is also a classic rock album by the Beatles titled Let it Be. I suggest that is what you do. What is your name? It’s Nick, isn’t it?”
Mama didn’t raise no fool. “That’s right, my name’s Nick. I wonder how many businesses you ever ran. My father operates a very successful business based on loyalty to his employees, community and his customers. He may not be the fastest or cheapest at what he does but everyone knows he is honest and can be trusted. He may sacrifice some profit to ensure he lives and operates by his principles.”
“Since you are attending night school and not Harvard Business School, I’d say he sacrificed quite a bit of profit. I’d like to know what his business is and where it is. I will go there tomorrow and open a competing business and crush him like a bug. Any business that puts trust and honesty above profits will quickly become as useless as an insect and ultimately be wiped out by the truly talented exterminators in the marketplace.”
“I take it you are saying that ethical business values are becoming extinct and the middle class is a collection of useless insects.”
“Not exactly, but close.”
“You do know that without insects, our food supply would dry up and we would all become extinct. Without a strong foundation rooted in small businesses in middle class America, our country would also crumble. Is that what you’re promoting? An end to the American way of life? And I hope I said that loud enough for the Feds’ bugs to pick up.”
Now that got a laugh from the class. I’ll admit I might have been channeling Otter from Animal House with the un-American routine, but I was enjoying myself.
“I’m done wasting my time arguing with you, Nick. You’re an idiot.”
My tongue got ahead of my brain as I quickly retorted, “And you’re an asshole.”
You could have heard a pin drop. I could see a calm descend over Professor Thayer as the bright red color faded from his face. He smiled as he retorted, “Yes, but I’m the asshole that’s giving you your grade.”
That turned out to not quite be true. That following Saturday evening, Professor Thayer was pulled over by a certain large county sheriff after leaving a wine tasting party. He blew a little too high on the breathalyzer test and was found with an open bottle of Chardonnay in his car. Being a first offense, he didn’t do jail time, but he did lose his position at Buncombe.
Oh, by the way, I had already read Niccolo Machiavelli’s The Prince.