BSB250 – Week 1 Lecture & Discussion Notes

Course Context: BSB250 – Business Citizenship

• Lecturer opens by welcoming students to BSB250 and immediately plays a video whose key line is “Deception is not ethical.”
  • Purpose of the video: provoke thinking about why a business‐citizenship course should start with an ethics clip.
  • Immediate discussion prompt: “What possible relevance does that have?” Students are asked to chat with peers.

Multifaceted Nature of “Right” Decisions

• A single decision in business can be judged on three separate dimensions:
  • Legal: Is the action permitted by law?
  • Ethical: Does the action align with moral principles?
  • Economic: Is it financially prudent?
• A choice can satisfy one or two dimensions while failing the third (e.g.
  • Legal + ethical but financially unsound;
  • Profitable + legal yet unethical, etc.).
• The course will focus primarily on building a framework for the first two non-economic dimensions:
  • Understanding legal reasoning (agency law, vicarious liability, organisational structures).
  • Understanding ethical reasoning at scale inside organisations.
• Explicit statement: “None of this is going to be trying to change your ethical perspective.”
  • Ethics is acknowledged as a belief system, not an empirically provable fact.

Scaling Issues in Modern Organisations

• Modern business = working in and through organisations.
• Key question: How do you scale both legal compliance and ethical behaviour?
  • Legal scaling: use of formal structures, documented responsibilities, agency relationships.
  • Ethical scaling: creation of values statements, codes of conduct, culture, training.

Learning Design & Pedagogical Techniques

• Readings + Podcasts will supply much of the knowledge transfer so in-class time can be interactive.
• Lecturer repeatedly asks questions for two main reasons:
  1. Brain activation – forces immediate processing.
  2. Practice testing – one of the most effective evidence-based study techniques.
• Recommended study cycle includes multiple exposures to material; a rough sequence: \text{Exposures} = {\text{Reading} \rightarrow \text{Lecture} \rightarrow \text{Tutorial Prep} \rightarrow \text{Tutorial} \rightarrow \text{Reflection}}
  • By exam time, additional cramming should be minimal if exposure cycle is followed.
• In-class peer discussion (“turn to the person beside you”) provides the same cognitive benefits as answering publicly but lowers anxiety.
• Time management inside a 1-hour lecture: ethical obligation to balance lecturer’s material with student contributions.

Networking & Social Capital Discussion

• Prompt: Which relationships help more with career success—close friends or acquaintances?
  • Consensus: Acquaintances (weak ties) are often more valuable for finding opportunities (e.g. first jobs).
• Concepts introduced:
  • Loose ties: people you kinda know; they possess non-overlapping information.
  • Structural holes: gaps between social groups (e.g. Business School vs Mathematics faculty). Bridging these yields novel information and opportunities.

Student Examples & Anecdotes (Illustrating Community & Well-Being)

• One student is crocheting a glow-in-the-dark top for a November Addison Rae concert.
  • Crafting described as good for mental health and memory—parallel drawn to studying benefits.
• Another student recently took up sewing; class camaraderie around creative hobbies fosters informal networks.
• Students debate benefits of in-lecture participation vs. respect for limited class time—ties back to ethical decision-making about fairness.

Philosophical Reflection on Ethics

• Student voices: Ethics is “situational,” “fluid,” “an opinion,” varies by culture, country, faith.
• Wish expressed for a universal standard, quickly critiqued as impractical by peers (“Freaking idiot argument” said tongue-in-cheek).
• Lecturer hints most moral theorists recognise absolute standards can exist, yet expressions vary contextually.

Practical Takeaways & Action Items

• Complete assigned readings before lectures to maximise the effectiveness of practice testing.
• Seek or create multiple exposures (>5) to each key concept—reading, listening, speaking, writing, reflecting.
• Build professional networks by bridging structural holes; actively connect with acquaintances beyond immediate friend group.
• Reflect on legal vs ethical vs economic dimensions in any business scenario; practice classifying real-world decisions accordingly.