The thing I liked most about this documentary was the fact that it focused on the guys at the top, the self-proclaimed "smartest men in the room", the so-called geniuses who knew the energy business so much better than the rest of the industry. And what a piece of work these men were. Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room shows us how basic human nature does not change, whether it's in the easy fall into killing as a means to resolve disputes, or in the incessant human obsession to acquire for acquisition's
it took Enron 16 years to go from about $10 billion of assets to $65 billion of assets, and 24 days to go bankruptcy. Enron is also one of the most celebrated business ethics cases in the century. There are so many things that went wrong within the organization, from all personal (prescriptive and psychological approaches), managerial (group norms, reward system, etc.), and organizational (world-class culture) perspectives. This paper will focus on the business ethics issues at Enron that were
- a person oblivious of the pattern though engaged in it, and thoroughly stunned an unprepared to be caught and “treated” like a criminal””. (p.113). Risk Analysis Theory After reviewing the film Enron - The Smartest Guys in the Room, apply the risk analysis theory by identifying the characters in the film that fall into each of the theory categories, that is, the "risk averters," "risk neutrals," and "risk seekers." 1. Do the white-collar criminals as portrayed in the film consistently display
was called Enron and was doing very well in business but unfortunately, after many bad decisions were made by the executives of the company, Enron went bankrupt. The executives of Enron were essentially gamblers in the stock market. They took terrible risks and misreported their financial standings in order to encourage people to invest in their stocks. When the stocks crashed in 2001, these people fell victim to the lies and misleading information that Enron reported. Finally, Enron had reached
Prior to watching the movie "The Smartest Guys in the Room" and learning in class in depth about the Enron scandal and the counterparts that had hands in it I didn 't know much about it nor the effects it had on the way companies are regulated today. Prior knowledge of the Enron case was learned in my auditing class but only briefly to provide an introduction to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act passed in 2002 by Congress to protect investors from the possibility of fraudulent accounting activities by corporations
Enron Overview. For those who do not know what fraud is, it’s basically deception by showing people what they want to see. In business it’s the same concept, but in a larger scale by means of manipulating figures that will be shown to shareholders and investors. Before Sarbanes Oxley Act there was “Enron Corporation”, a fortune 500 company that managed to falsify their statements claiming revenues over 101 billion in a span of 15 years. In order for us to understand how this corporation managed
Task 2. Using points from the discussion at the end of the Week 2 lecture on Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room (2005) movie, prepare your answers to the following. 1. What were the individual factors that contributed to the failure of Enron? Briefly explain two key factors. There were several individuals, all of whom were senior members of staff that contributed to the failure of Enron. A corrupt corporation driven by greed and egoism caused an avalanche of illegal and unethical business practices
The memories of the Frauds at Enron and WorldCom still haunt many investors. There have been many accounting scandals in the United States history. The Enron and the WorldCom accounting fraud affected thousands of people and it caused many changes in the rules and regulation of the corporate world. There are many similarities and differences between the two scandals and many rules and regulations have been created in order to prevent frauds like these. Enron Scandal occurred before WorldCom
and Peter Elkind, “The Smartest Guys in the Room”. This documentary helped me to gain a better understanding of one of the biggest scandals in the history of the United States. In this paper I will examine some main points of interest in relation to the scandal concerning the Enron Corporation. The documentary began with Peter Coyote narrating about the suicide of one Enron’s former top administrators, Cliff Baxter. Jeff Skilling, another former top administrator of Enron had a close personal relationship
stable, Enron Corporation grew immensely since its humble beginnings in 1985. In the span of 15 years, Enron Corporation employed 21,000 workers in more than 40 countries and revenues that totaled to 111 billion. Enron had great success, even given the title of America’s Most Innovative Company for 6 consecutive years. However, what was greater than Enron’s success, was the fall of the company, widely known as the Enron scandal. The question is, what initially caused the collapse of Enron? This is
A documentary film released in 2005 called the Smartest Guys in the Room reveals the shocking collapse of Enron. The Smartest Guys, Kenneth Lay, Jeff Skilling, Andrew Fastow, Lou Pai, Clifford Baxtor, and Arthur Anderson, were all involved with America’s ultimate Corporation Scandal. But who do we blame? Enron had over 20,000 employees and was founded by Kenneth Lay, CEO of Enron, in 1985. Lay wanted to push his views of deregulation which pushed him to start the company (SGR). The first event that
illustrative case is the now defunct Enron Corporation. In the movie, Enron: The Smartest Guys in the room, (Gibney A, 2005) We observed how Enron traders sham... ... middle of paper ... ...rse if it is necessary. A well written and precise business code of ethics will pay dividends far into the future for all who take care to follow them. Works Cited Gibney, A. (Director). (2005).Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room [Documentary]. USA: Magnolia
to riches but, this is not the case of the Enron Scandal. In 1985 Ken Lay created Enron when he merged two companies in the Natural Gas industry. Moving into the early 90s, he aided in the selling of electricity at regular market prices. Following this initial action the US Congress approved the deregulation in the sale of natural gas. This caused Enron to be able to sell the energy at higher costs, increasing their profit. Once this plan was set Enron was on its way to the top in becoming the largest
Enron Corporation was an energy company founded in Omaha, Nebraska. The corporation chose Houston, Texas to home its headquarters and staffed about 20,000 people. It was one of the largest natural gas and electricity providers in the United States, and even the world. In the 1990’s, Enron was widely considered a highly innovative, financially booming company, with shares trading at about $90 at their highest points. Little did the public know, the success of the company was a gigantic lie, and possibly
Enron formed in 1985 when InterNorth merged with Houston Natural Gas, whose CEO Kenneth Lay would become the CEO of the newly formed Enron, who at its peak was worth 70 billion dollars. Lay held a Ph.D. in Economics. Lay was also a contributor to being granted deregulation and the ability to sell energy on the free market. It was this deregulation that caused Ken Lay to see the money he could make in energy and what ultimately caused Enron to form. This is what Ken Lay had dreamed of since he was
BUAD2172 Movie Reviews For each of the assigned movies, you will complete a Movie Review and turn it into GA View by the time designated in your Course Schedule. 1. Summary of the Movie. a. The movie Enron: The Smartest Guys In The Room is a documentary about how the seventh largest company went from $65M in assets to bankrupt in a month. The story generally focuses on the masterminds at the top that created this smoke show, knowing what they were doing was illegal and usually at the cost of the
The film Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room was a great film loaded with examples of unethical behavior with Enron being an unethical corporate culture. The film portrays the rise and fall of Enron, one of the most corrupted corporations this country has seen. Enron had started off as a promising energy company with a vision to do good which quickly turned sour when top executives torn the company down while stealing millions of dollars from people. A reason for the downfall of Enron was the deregulation
or hear “Enron” is corruption. This a company where highly paid executives were able to pocket millions of dollars while carelessly eroding the lifesavings of thousands of unwitting employees. It is sad to see that same company was also ethically successful, driven, focused, and environmentally responsible went down the drain. The authors state “The strategy an organization follows is its plan for how to compete successfully, survive and grow (Mathis, Jackson, Valentine 38). Clearly Enron did not
Enron Cultural Analysis Enron, which was the seventh largest company not so many years ago, was forced into bankruptcy in 2001 due to the collapse of their once successful organizational structure. Enron was seen and widely recognized as one of the most innovative companies of its time, and its downfall came as a great surprise to many. However, Enron’s consistent rise in profits did raise some eyes. In fact in that turned out that Enron had conducted millions dollars of accounting fraud. What set
proper ethics, it is representing not only itself in a positive manner, but its partners, shareholders, and clients as well. On the other hand, when an organization partakes in unethical activities, all parties are negatively affected. The collapse of Enron is a major case of unethical conduct in the corporate world, because the circumstances surrounding the firm’s chaotic plunge where so scandalous that it left “creditors wrangling over Enron's skeletal remains” (Helyar) long after the company had seen