More Than 1,000 B-School Profs Urge CEOs To Condemn Trump

When Harvard Business School Professor Deepak Malhotra cast his ballot on Oct. 23, he remarked that it was a productive day. “I was able to vote against incompetence, corruption, racism, immorality, misogyny & fascism all with one stroke of the pen,” he wrote on his Twitter feed.

Malhotra, however, may have had an even more productive day when he wrote an open letter to American business leaders asking them to repudiate President Trump. Since he drafted and affixed his own name to that letter just three days ago, more than 1,000 other business school professors have signed on in condemnation of the president (the number has been updated since our original publication).

Some of the most famous professors in business education have joined Malhotra’s unprecedented effort, including Nobel laureates Alvin Roth and William Sharpe, as well as Wharton’s Adam Grant and Angela Duckworth, Stanford’s Jeffrey Pfeffer, Michigan’s Michael Jensen, and MIT Sloan’s Edgar Schein.

MORE THAN 30 PROFESSORS FROM TRUMP’S ALMA MATER HAVE SIGNED THE LETTER

Every hour, more professors are supporting the effort. But when the count was slightly more than 700 on Wednesday night, some 32 professors from Wharton, Trump’s undergraduate alma mater, were among the signatories, along with 30 professors from Harvard Business School, including leadership expert Bill George, Deborah Spar, Len Schlessinger, and David Yoffie. Faculty members from dozens upon dozens of business schools have signed on.

“Business school professors from every region of the country have come together to say that 2020 is different,” notes Malhotra in a tweet. “This is not about left vs right. This is something else entirely.”

Only days earlier, more than 340 current MBA students at Wharton endorsed Joe Biden over Trump who graduated from Wharton’s highly acclaimed undergraduate business program in 1968 after transferring to Penn in his junior year from Fordham University. The students claimed that “entirely absent from his presidency are the fundamental lessons in leadership we have learned and the core values that we embody.” A Poets&Quants survey of MBA applicants and students found overwhelming support for Trump’s Democratic rival, with 73% saying they intend to vote for Biden and just 24% saying they support the reelection of Trump.

Malhotra, who was named by Poets&Quants’ as one of the 40 best business school professors under 40 six years ago, has been on Harvard’s faculty for 18 years, ever since gaining his Ph.D. from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. He is highly thought of by his students. Supermodel-turned-entrepreneur Tyra Banks, who attended Harvard’s owner/president management program and had Malhotra ss a professor, was among those who nominated him for the Poets&Quants honor. “Deepak Malhotra has an unmatched ability to go beyond Jedi negotiation techniques and empower his students to negotiate with empathy and strategic depth,” wrote Banks.

Malhotra’s open letter is a scathing indictment of the president. “It is time for business leaders to declare publicly what so many have been saying privately: that President Trump is unfit to lead and is a threat to the Republic,” according to the letter drafted by Malhotra who teaches negotiations.  “And it is time for journalists to start asking America’s CEOs whether they believe four more years of Trump would be good for the country. Ensuring that the Republic survives is not a partisan issue. Demanding a peaceful transfer of power ought not to reveal your political affiliation. And safeguarding our laws, institutions, and norms is important to both Republicans and Democrats.”

B-SCHOOL FACULTY SAY IT IS AN ‘ACT OF CONSCIENCE’ TO SUPPORT BIDEN  

The open letter notes that “large groups of veterans, generals, soldiers, politicians, scientists, doctors, ambassadors, civil servants, lawyers, journalists, and others have now come out against a President who denigrates science, peddles in lies, incites violence, attempts to delegitimize the press, politicizes everything from the justice department to the CDC to the postal service, and seeks to undermine the integrity of American elections. These bipartisan groups—who disagree on many things—now agree that no positive vision for our country can be realized under the continued presidency of Donald Trump.

“It is time for business leaders to follow suit and speak out against the threat Trump poses to our country. For a profession that incessantly proclaims the importance of corporate values, makes much ado about CSR initiatives, and proudly embraces a commitment to everything from sustainability, to inclusion, to ethical business practices, it is unacceptable and immoral to remain silent at this time. As the growing list of open letters and editorial statements from other groups makes clear, publicly supporting the Democratic candidate in this election is not a political act. It is an act of conscience.”

The complete open letter follows:

It’s Time for America’s Business Leaders to Speak Out Against the Threat Trump Poses to Our Republic

An Open Letter & Call for Action – Signed by Business School Professors from Across America

Click here to add your name. (Only open to business school professors from across the U.S.)

Polarization in American politics is at record highs, with Republicans and Democrats disagreeing strongly on many issues. But the American people—although disheartened by politics, divided on policy, and deadlocked on ideology—are still able to find common ground where it matters most. Indeed, an unprecedented streak of bipartisanship has emerged in recent weeks, with throngs of prominent citizens—representing a wide range of institutions and professions—speaking out against what they consider an existential threat to our Republic.

Large groups of veterans, generals, soldiers, politicians, scientists, doctors, ambassadors, civil servants, lawyers, journalists, and others have now come out against a President who denigrates science, peddles in lies, incites violence, attempts to delegitimize the press, politicizes everything from the justice department to the CDC to the postal service, and seeks to undermine the integrity of American elections. These bipartisan groups—who disagree on many things—now agree that no positive vision for our country can be realized under the continued presidency of Donald Trump.

It is time for business leaders to follow suit and speak out against the threat Trump poses to our country. For a profession that incessantly proclaims the importance of corporate values, makes much ado about CSR initiatives, and proudly embraces a commitment to everything from sustainability, to inclusion, to ethical business practices, it is unacceptable and immoral to remain silent at this time. As the growing list of open letters and editorial statements from other groups makes clear, publicly supporting the Democratic candidate in this election is not a political act. It is an act of conscience.

On September 24, a group of almost 500 former national security leaders—including generals, admirals, ambassadors, and senior NCO and civilian officials—signed a letter supporting Joe Biden in this election.  “While some of us may have different opinions on particular policy matters,” they explained, “we trust Joe Biden’s positions are rooted in sound judgment, thorough understanding, and fundamental values.”

The editorial boards of the two most respected scientific journals in the world have also warned of the danger that President Trump poses to America. According to the editorial in Science, President Trump “deliberately lied about science in a way that was imminently dangerous to human health and directly led to widespread deaths of Americans. This may be the most shameful moment in the history of U.S. science policy.” The editorial board of Nature went a step further: “No U.S. president in recent history has so relentlessly attacked and undermined so many valuable institutions, from science agencies to the media, the courts, the Department of Justice—and even the electoral system… Joe Biden’s trust in truth, evidence, science, and democracy make him the only choice in the US election.”

More than 1,500 Department of Justice employees—both Democrats and Republicans—have expressed their “ongoing concern that President Trump and Attorney General Barr are weaponizing the DOJ in the service of Trump’s personal interests, thereby doing grave damage to the rule of law.” Over 1,000 present and former Epidemic Intelligence Service Officers have decried the “ominous politicization and silencing” of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The New England Journal of Medicine, the pre-eminent medical journal in the world, has called for a changing of the guard in the wake of Trump’s deadly lies. “Reasonable people will certainly disagree about the many political positions taken by candidates. But truth is neither liberal nor conservative.”

Business leaders pride themselves on innovation and being first to market with a good idea, but there is also such a thing as a second-mover advantage. With other professions having already paved the path with their statements in support of Joe Biden, the risks are lower today for CEOs and executives who decide to speak out against the threat Trump poses. Analyses by Goldman Sachs and Moody’s—which indicate that a Biden presidency could be better for economic growth, better for employment, and better for lower- and middle-income families—provide additional cover to those in the business community who need it.

But speaking out in 2020 should not, ultimately, come down to such calculations. You would be hard-pressed to find a business that doesn’t feature integrity in its list of corporate values. It is hard to find a CEO who doesn’t want to instill a culture of honesty and accountability in the workplace. And rare is the corporate executive who does not believe that business can be a force for societal good. For a profession so dedicated to creating value, and so allegedly motivated to doing what is right, it is no longer acceptable to stay quiet.

It is time for business leaders to declare publicly what so many have been saying privately: that President Trump is unfit to lead and is a threat to the Republic. And it is time for journalists to start asking America’s CEOs whether they believe four more years of Trump would be good for the country. Ensuring that the Republic survives is not a partisan issue. Demanding a peaceful transfer of power ought not to reveal your political affiliation. And safeguarding our laws, institutions, and norms is important to both Republicans and Democrats.

The future of America—as always—will be a negotiated compromise among contending visions. But that negotiation requires a willingness to talk to each other. It requires a strengthening of the norms that inspire civic engagement and facilitate political discourse. It requires the preservation of institutions that safeguard our journey into the future. And it requires defending the rule of law on which our democracy is premised. No one can win if these are sacrificed. And everyone gains when these are protected.

This is not an attempt to change any business leader’s mind about the current president. It is simply a demand that those who already recognize the grave danger Trump poses to our Republic not stay silent. Never more relevant were the words of John Stuart Mill: Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing.

It is time for our business leaders to exhibit the moral courage and civic-mindedness that they have long professed—and that others have already shown. It is time to sound the alarm.

DON’T MISS: THE MBA VOTE: BIDEN VS. TRUMP or TO HELP GET HIM INTO WHARTON, TRUMP ALLEGEDLY PAID SOMEONE TO TAKE THE SAT