Executive Summary
The Penn State scandal demonstrates a lack of ethics in organizational management affairs. Several instances of child abuse were leveled against Sandusky. Through his charity organization, he ended up abusing various children.
Personnel at Penn State University were also accused of being aware of the scandal but failing to report it. Officials were required to report this abuse, but failed to do so for an extended period. The paper provides a summary and research update of the case, discusses the ethical issues involved and the company’s response to the situation, and recommends ways that could have been adopted to address the moral issues.
Summary and Research Update of the Case
The Penn State Nittany Lions football team is a powerhouse that began in 1887. It has two national titles, five national championships, two Big Ten conference Titles, and seven undefeated seasons. It was commonly known as the “Grand Experiment” due to its evident devotion on and off the field. Between 1966 and 2011, the Late Joe Patron was the coach of the Nittany Lions (Jemmings, 2018). He was recognized as the winning coach with three ties and 409 wins to 164 losses. Penn State fans, alumni, and students highly valued him. He died in January 2012 from lung cancer at the age of 85. He left a football legacy that is quite remembered in the US.
The Penn State scandal became public in March 2011 and was recognized in November 2011 when Sandusky was accused of 52 counts of child sexual harassment that took place between2009 1994 and. In June 2022, Jerry Sandusky was guilty of 45 counts of sexual abuse against 10 boys, which led to a sentence of a maximum of 60 years and a minimum of 30 years. At the Pennsylvania State University, he was known as the assistant coach.
Second Miles, a non-profit organization meant to ensure that all troubled boys achieve their potential as individuals and community members, is an organization he founded. Sandusky’s arrest shocked the college athletics world because of the extent to which others had enabled it despite its severity. For instance, Penn State leaders were aware of the issue but chose to ignore it, which allowed Sandusky to feel empowered to do anything he wanted because he had a seat in the organization. The case opened the door to further inquiries into how administrators and university head coaches, like Joe Paterno, knew about the illegal activities and consciously or unknowingly covered them up.
Paterno died before Sandusky’s trial had commenced. Before his death, he described his incident with Sandusky. Graduate assistant Mike McQueary told him that he had seen Sandusky with a youngster in an uncomfortable position in the locker room showers. However, he did not know how to deal with such a situation; hence, he called his superiors and informed them. During police investigations, he stated that he knew nothing about Sandusky’s activities. Further investigation of Penn State’s conduct revealed that its administrators consistently and utterly disregarded the sexual harassment victims and covered up a serial killer’s assaults from 1998, including Paterno.
The scandal adversely impacted PSU employees, including former President Graham Spanier, Vice President Gary Shults, and Athletic Director Tim Curley. They were accused of crimes like perjury, failing to disclose child abuse, and obstructing the legal system. A report commissioned by the trustees of Penn State was made public by a group led by the former FBI Director Louis Freeh. Later, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) announced sanctions. Penn State was hit with a $60 million penalty, which prevented the team from competing in the postseason for 4 years and reduced the number of football scholarships. All the football team’s victories were vacated, costing Paterno 111 wins that put the team on five years of probation.
NCAA president Mark Emmert stated that the sanctions were intended to ensure that the University embraces an athletic culture in which football is not placed above protecting, nurturing, and educating youngsters. A Big Ten Conference meeting was held, imposing a $13 million fine. In 2015, the sanctions were lifted, restoring Paterno’s successes, and the fines were spent on programs to prevent and treat child sexual abuse.
Additionally, the scholarships were cancelled while Penn State and NCCA implemented changes to combat child abuse and immoral sexual behavior. The US Department of Education also fined Mr. Paterno 2.4 million dollars for failing to report sexual assault allegations against Mr. Sandusky. However, in 2016, Mr. Paterno was honored.
The University accepted the Freeh Report once it was written, without reservation, and, as of November 2012, has adopted half of the 199 suggested changes. Mr. Sandusky gave his first interview to Ziegler, who made a documentary titled ‘The Framing of Joe Paterno.’ In addition, his son was also arrested for child abuse after an investigation was conducted. Jay Paterno, Paterno’s son, and his other family members have insisted that he did the right thing by reporting what he had been told by the eyewitness McQueary (Bennet, 2021). The family took the step of retaining General Richard Thornburgh as their attorney to review Freeh’s report.
The report claimed that Freeh’s conclusions were too brief because he did not show that Paterno tried to expose the scandal by reporting it to the authorities. Moreover, Paterno’s son insisted that his father was a good person despite the accusations made. The public has also supported this by insisting that he was human and did not deserve such criticism. For this reason, a celebration was held in 2016 in his honor, and all his 111 wins were restored after the state senator and treasurer sued NCCA.
Ethical Issues
The Penn State Scandal raises numerous ethical issues, as outlined in the case study. First, cases in which a moral conundrum develops and must be handled within an organization are ethical challenges in the workplace. Sexual harassment is one of the ethical issues involved in the case study. This is an unwelcome sexual advance toward an individual because of their sex (Sáez et al., 2019). It could include physical and verbal harassment of a sexual nature. It is usually done by coercion, force, or manipulation.
In the case study, it is evident that Sandusky has sexually harassed children. After opening the second-mile children organization, he was allowed access to Penn State facilities because most sporting events were held on campus. Therefore, Mr. Sandusky was seen in the showers that the Penn Football Team used with children. On 3rd May 1998, he picked up an 11-year-old whom he showered with after exercising.
Furthermore, the boy was upset with Sandusky holding and touching him. Mr. Sandusky told him he loved and cared about him and insisted they had a unique relationship. An interrupt by Detective Schreffler confirmed that the boy’s experience was sexual harassment (Phillips et al., 2019).In addition, a graduate assistant, McQueary, confirmed that he had heard clapping sounds from the showers at 9.30 pm.
Using a mirror in the showers, he confirmed that Sandusky was behind the young boy with his arms holding his waist. This depicted sexual harassment for McQueary. These extremely sexual instances that had been witnessed outline sexual harassment as an issue in the case study.
Secondly, leadership abuse occurs when a leader acts in a manner that does not promote equality. This affects the performance of official duties. In the case study, Penn State leaders demonstrated an inconsistent and total disregard for victims by covering up for Sandusky (Constandt & Willem, 2019). For instance, when McQueary reported what he had witnessed to Joe Petron, he did not know what to do. Later, the public fully accused Petron of being aware of the incident and keeping quiet regardless of its wild nature. Even though Petron had the authority to ensure that the sexual harassment did not continue, he turned away and forwarded it to other people because he was afraid.
Similarly, Detective Schreffler notified the Centre County and Youth Services (CYS) about the investigation, but he was referred elsewhere since there were connections between CYS and Mr. Sandusky. He also did not inform the Penn State officials, claiming he did not want to worry about Old Main’s involvement in the investigation-like experience. Most reports were not received by authorized personnel, questioning the processes undertaken. Penn State officials were aware of the issues but did not take a step to speak up about what was happening.
Lastly, in February 2001, Mr. Schultz, Dr. Spanier, and Mr. Curley demonstrated abuse of their leadership. After Mr. Paterno informed them about Mr. Sandusky’s child abuse case, they decided to report to the state’s Department of Public Welfare. However, later on, Mr. Curley proposed to Schulz and Spanier a different plan of listening to Mr. Sandusky before including any third parties because he was uncomfortable releasing such information to others before hearing Sandusky’s response (CNN, 2022). This also allowed Sandusky to reveal the information to the Second Mile board. However, this was not an excellent step to be taken at the expense of the children. The leaders neglected the safety of the young boys by still allowing Sandusky to use the showers with young children. This was a silent conspiracy that affected several other boys throughout the years. Leaders needed to address the issue before some other boys were affected.
Company’s Response
Penn State ignored the issue by holding onto the fact that they wanted to maintain the Second Mile organization and Mr. Sandusky’s support. It is noted that even though Paternoinformed his other colleagues of the issue, they all chose to keep quiet, claiming that it was an embarrassing moment for them(Schuck, 2020). This shows that the company feared negative publicity because of Mr. Sandusky’s behavior.
The board of trustees should have exercised oversight functions that could have led to the closure of significant functions. For instance, the football team lost most of its wins. It could have been essential for the board to communicate the law so that the required information could be collected and analyzed to affirm that Sandusky was indeed guilty.
Secondly, the board failed to demand details and reasonable inquiries regarding Sandusky’s criminal conduct, including the reputational risks it could pose to the organization. For instance, Paterno did not consider how the public would view him after knowing that Sandusky assaulted children, yet he kept quiet all the time (Ralston, 2020). After the case was written, individuals all over social media insisted that Paterno was a lousy coach since, even though he was aware that children were molested, he chose to keep quiet. Mr. Sandusky took this chance and molested another young boy. The company did not take a step to consult officers who could help them identify resolutions that are helpful to the organization.
Third, the company did not respond to the information given to them by the eyewitness. For example, the President decided to ignore the information given to him by discouraging dissent and discussion. This response forced Paterno to lack an option on how he could react.
Paterno had stated that he wished he could do something more before it was too late and his name was tarnished. He also stated that he backed away from the case after reporting it since he believed that the people he was assigned to had more expertise than he did. After informing the President, all the leaders followed his take on the case.
Lastly, the board leaders initially took a three-step process of telling Mr. Sandusky that he was not allowed in the facilities, then he would talk to the Second Mile board members, and a counselor would be assigned to him. Further, it is noted that Schultz and Spanier acknowledged this decision and stated that their organization would be informed if Sandusky did not cooperate. However, this response was not implemented since the board members decided on another resolution to keep quiet.
Conclusion and Recommendations for Stakeholders
In conclusion, the Penn State scandal is a situation that could have been avoided if various stakeholders involved had responded differently to the above ethical issues presented. These include: sexual harassment, poor communication, and leadership abuse. It is important to note that every leader should evaluate the lessons learned from cultural failures and governance. From the company’s response of ignoring the issue and assuming that it could never happen, the recommendations below could help leaders, companies, stockholders, and employees address the ethical issues they faced in the case study, hence avoiding the adverse outcomes of the story.
Leaders
Leaders should always have a plan for handling the unknowns in the organization. A good crisis management strategy should allow staff to plan for crises (Bishop et al., 2020). Penn State was unaware of the impact of allowing Second Mile to access most facilities. Leaders must prepare to ask challenging and uneasy questions to make the right decisions when serious lapses and scenarios arise.
Second, it is essential to understand the laws that apply to one’s organization and the risks that could threaten it. Regular reporting of conduct and active compliance monitoring present reputational and legal risks that an organization is unaware of. Differentiating between facts, ugly, reasonable, and nasty helps deal with the crisis effectively and responsibly. Penn State could have been aware that it is essential to report any sexual harassment in the organization to reduce blame for protecting its reputation.
Third, companies ought to have high ethical standards and demand accountability in all instances to foster security and safety in organizations. A strong compliance culture always begins with its leaders, clear rules and regulations, and encouraging accountability. Leaders must lead by example and hold everyone to the same standard regardless of their importance. This includes profit centers and corporate leaders. In the case study, it is evident that the board leaders chose to ignore Sandusky’s actions even after the mother reported how his son felt uncomfortable with his actions.
Employees
Fourth, companies should promote a culture of reporting potential problems employees face. Creating an easy system that workers can access and air their concerns is essential and can allow the organization to curb miseries that might impact the firm’s reputation. McQueary acted as a good employee by reporting the incident to the coach. However, there needs to be better dialogue and communication between the leaders.
Government and Consumers
Fifth, governments should encourage individuals to be whistleblowers to ensure that reports on ongoing illicit activities are recorded. Bureaucratic systems like those of Penn State University hardly allow freedom of speech. Lastly, the creation of awareness of sexual harassment in institutions could help most individuals to be aware of the steps they could take to guarantee their safety. The young boys were unaware of what needed to be done to ensure that Mr. Sandusky stopped harassing them sexually (Clifford & Feigh, 2022). In addition, one of the boy’s mothers did not know who the right people were to help him understand what Mr. Sandusky was doing with his son. Creating awareness could help parents to understand the steps that could be taken to ensure the sexual safety of their children. If the University had set up clear information about sexual harassment, then the young boys could have resisted earlier before Sandusky harassed them.
References
Bennet, D. (2021). Ten years after the Sandusky scandal, what did Penn State — and the nation — learn?
Bishop, D. G., Treviño, L. K., Gioia, D. A., & Kreiner, G. E. (2020). Leveraging a recessive narrative to transform Joe Paterno’s image: Media sensebreaking, sensemaking, and sensegiving during scandal. Academy of Management Discoveries, 6(4), 572-608.
Clifford, M., & Feigh, A. (2022). Sex crimes and offenders: Exploring questions of character and culture. Rowman & Littlefield.
CNN. (2022). Penn State scandal fast facts.
Constandt, B., & Willem, A. (2019). The trickle‐down effect of ethical leadership in nonprofit soccer clubs. Nonprofit Management and Leadership, 29(3), 401-417.
Jennings, M. (2018). Business ethics: Case studies and selected readings (9th Ed.). Cengage Learning.
Phillips, S. P., Webber, J., Imbeau, S., Quaife, T., Hagan, D., Maar, M., & Abourbih, J. (2019). Sexual harassment of Canadian medical students: A national survey. E-Clinical Medicine, 7, 15-20.
Ralston, S. J. (2020, January 12). Penn State…too little, too late.
Sáez, G., Alonso-Ferres, M., Garrido-Macías, M., Valor-Segura, I., & Expósito, F. (2019). The detrimental effect of sexual objectification on targets’ and perpetrators’ sexual satisfaction: The mediating role of sexual coercion. Frontiers in Psychology, 10, 2748.
Schuck, R. I. (2020). What we aren’t when we are Penn State: Dissociation strategies in the Penn State sexual abuse scandal. Journal of Global Sport Management, 5(2), 184-201.