Quantity over Quality - America's Problem. Part 2

Last time around I began a discussion of America's seeming obsession with quantity over quality and its impact on real estate development. I'll wrap up those thoughts this time.

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This is not to say all homes and buildings need to be exquisitely handcrafted by master craftsmen using only the finest materials. That's great if you're a billionaire but the average person is certainly not that..

I believe much of the source of the problem lies in the current business school / MBA philosophy that the manager/executive is ultimately beholden solely to the shareholder to maximize returns. I get it. I went to business school and got my MBA but have never been comfortable with that position. Just as a real, live person is a member of his/her community and should act as a good citizen, a corporation, legally a person, should do so as well. 

This is not to say that profits are not important - they are. But I don't believe they are the be-all/end-all, especially "immediate quarterly profits" (and this belief is one reason I am a signer of the MBA Oath). The primary purpose of the oath is to encourage MBAs and businesses to "create value responsibly and ethically". A business needs to look to the long term health of the company, not just upcoming quarterly profits. And of course the compensation structure of C-level execs has long been a subject of debate and continues to be.

I worked for a company that was private when I started and went public during my tenure there. There was a major shift in corporate culture (and not for the better) and the company slowly went downhill as it chased quarterly profits, eventually going bankrupt (of course a major factor in its downfall was the Great Recession, but still...).

You might say "So what? A company is there to make money. Who cares if the employees are happy? The company is not there to serve them." I'd have to strongly disagree. Happy employees (but not so fat and happy they aren't striving to be better) make for happy customers and happy customers make for a successful, profitable company. 

So how do we tie this back into real estate development? Builders and developers need to once again take pride in their work. Almost more than any other product, ours is visible to the general public. We have chosen to create the built space the human race lives its lives in. Think about that. It's a fairly awesome responsibility. 

I won't berate the point. Long story short is that those of us in real estate development and construction need to stand up for providing profits AND value AND quality.