Roone Arledge Quotes

We want to move along and make sure, both internally and externally, that people realize how the company is being run, and it's being run by a group of people now, not just me.

Transparency, accountability and sustainability have become the slogans of the market leaders. Companies carry out environmental and social audits to court the consumer, and even the bluest chips woo organisations such as Greenpeace and Amnesty.

History has shown that one cannot legislate a culture of integrity. And yet, one of the paramount responsibilities and challenges of corporate leadership is to ensure such a culture.

We have to raise the bar on corporate governance. Shareholders want ethical behavior and honesty.

Secrecy cannot be used to cover up bad management.

You're used to seeing values listed on waiting-room walls. Communication, integrity, excellence, and respect. Those were actually Enron's values.

We follow highest level of corporate governance, which is in line with a global company like ours.

It is important that global business leaders understand that they need to think beyond their quarterly balance sheets and see what it is that they are creating.

Doing good business - being ethical, being transparent, being caring, implementing values in your business - makes a difference, and you make money at the same time.

I have always felt that public, commercial and community organisations should be as open as possible about their affairs. They need to be accountable to their owners, their customers, their members and communities and other interest groups.

Corporate executives need to re-frame their responsibilities to include the interests of all the stakeholders in society at large; not just shareholders, but also employees, the citizens of our communities, and those who care about the environment.

Multinationals are more sensitive to public pressure because they have bigger brand names, and they have made commitments to be environmentally sensitive. Chinese firms are not used to this kind of pressure yet.

Infosys was going to be a different type of company. It was going to be very ethically run, meritocratic, quality-conscious, transparent. People didn't confuse the personal with the corporate.

Most of the time nothing much is required of directors, which is a pity.

Shareholder meetings are not usually the occasion for utter candor - or for that matter, arch sarcasm - by chief executives.

The more moral the people are in their business dealings, the less paperwork you need, the more handshakes you can have, the more the wheels of capitalism work better because there's trust in the marketplace. Business ethics is not a joke. And, in fact, I think most businesses that I've dealt with encourage exactly that type of behavior.

We've created a tenfold core value protocol to make sure that we don't fall into an 'empire' attitude.

It took a generation for companies to recognise their responsibilities in terms of labour practices and another generation for them to recognise their environmental obligations.

I believe that companies are, above all, agents of transformation.

I feel like I'm part of history being made. I leave Apple board meetings thinking, 'I've got to do a better job.'

Business practices and how we treat the planet are also in desperate need of re-humanization.

We measure everything - why not governance?

For a long time, the for-profit world has told us in the not-for-profit sector to behave more like businesses.

Despite their good intentions, today's businesses are missing an opportunity to integrate social responsibility and day-to-day business objectives - to do good and make money simultaneously.

I often say that shareholders should feel very responsible for how responsive corporations are to the public trust.