Sackler Family and OXYContin: A Business Ethics and Success Analysis

This report analyzes the case of the Sackler family and Purdue Pharma, focusing on the unethical business practices surrounding the marketing and promotion of the highly addictive opioid drug OxyContin. It examines the impact of these practices on the company's financial success, brand value, and public confidence. The analysis covers various perspectives, including revenue generation, ownership members' views, board perspectives, and public perception. The report highlights how unethical behavior led to legal challenges, a decline in sales, and a damaged reputation. The conclusion emphasizes the importance of ethical business strategies and recommends that organizations prioritize both profitability and ethical considerations. It stresses the need for regular audits, transparency, and a focus on public trust to ensure long-term success and sustainability. The report also provides a detailed analysis of the case study, examining the ethical failures from the Sackler family and Purdue Pharma, including aggressive and manipulative marketing tactics, and the consequences of these actions.

Sakler Family and
OXYContin

TABLE OF CONTENT
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
ANALYSIS .....................................................................................................................................1
Success in terms of revenue and influence of unethical behaviour ............................................1
Perspective of different ownership members from Sackler family towards success .................2
Success from board perspective ..................................................................................................3
Success from perspective of public confidence ..........................................................................4
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................5
RECOMMENDATIONS ................................................................................................................5

INTRODUCTION
Business law and ethical principles are defined as the moral and legislative regulations
which govern the business practices. These principles ensures that all actions and decisions taken
by the firm are for the welfare of community and does not cause any harm to people. The success
can be defined as the accomplishment of organisational goals in terms of profitability, financial
gains, customer satisfaction, quality of services, ethics and legislative context (Sison, Beabout
and Ferrero, 2017). The negligence of ethics can make the success of organisation short term and
incomplete.
The study will discuss the case study of Sackler family which has been accused of
misconduct in various business practices such as marketing and promotion. Sackler family owns
Purdue pharma which has been facing legal suits against highly addictive opioid drug
OxyContin. Despite evidences of deaths and addictions, organisation followed aggressive and
manipulative marketing. This has deteriorated the brand value and success of organisation to
great extent. Sackler family has been facing huge criticism all over world for their unethical
practices. Thus the report will discuss the impact of unethical business practices on business
success. It will also provides an evaluation that how organisational success can be measured and
perceived from different perspectives.
ANALYSIS
Success in terms of revenue and influence of unethical behaviour
Sackler family conducted unethical practices at various stages of their business. For
instance when their controversial addictive drug OxyContin was launched organisation used to
pay all expenses of medical professionals so that their decision can be influenced. Similarly in
marketing, budget, public feedbacks and audits also all records and indications of unethical
behaviour were discarded (Ferrell and Fraedrich, 2015). These practices influences
organisational success financially. The OxyContin drug of Purdue pharma has been facing legal
challenges in 45 US states and in nearly 1500 cities. In addition to this Sackler family has been
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greatly criticised by the other competitors, families of individuals who are addicted to drug or
who died because of drug.
The criticism has greatly affected the brand value and trust worthiness of the
organisation. As a result of this its sales revenues for OxyContin drug has completely fall. The
unethical practices of organisation has landed organisation in legal trouble and huge damage in
terms of public image (Aßländer, Gössling and Seele, 2016). Thus people are not only
boycotting OxyContin but they are also avoiding purchase of other drugs or services provided by
Purdue pharma. It has caused significant decline in the revenues of organisation.
The controversy has also crashed the market share value of Sackler family. Along with
this Purdue pharma is also having tough battles with US courts and thus it is involving
significant financial penalties and costs. All these have contributed in reduction in the total
revenues of the organisation. When business practices are not ethical then in long term it affect
the trustworthiness of the organisation (Elliott and Salyer, 2018). As a result buyers used to
avoid the services of organisation completely in all dimensions. Thus it can be concluded that for
sustainable and increasing revenues business strategies must consider the perspective of people
and ethical approaches.
Perspective of different ownership members from Sackler family towards success
The perspective of ownership members is another element which can be used to measure
the success of business. The existing members of Purdue pharma seems to happy with the
practices of Sackler family. This can be claimed because even when Sackler's were conducting
unethical practices there were no issues raised by any of the members. Even during the launching
of addictive drug unethical practices were demonstrated in promotion, marketing and approval.
However the initial success influenced all the members of Sackler family and ownership
members to an extent that they did not find it necessary to evaluate the ethics in consideration.
Thus initially unethical practices may seem beneficial to ownership members because
they may bring attractive profits (Koslowski, 2016). However in long term when organisations
suffer from consequences of these unethical practices then it can make owners unhappy and
disappointed. For instance in the previous years when Sackler's were having huge financial
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success then the founders and board members of the pharma company were also satisfied that
they are getting appropriate return.
However at present the association with Sackler family is also been criticised by public.
Thus all of its members despite having negligible or indirect role in unethical decisions are
facing criticism and financial losses. The ownership members of the organisation are important
in business operations and related decision making processes (Boda and Zsolnai, 2016).
However with the consequences of unethical practices it is also possible that different owners
may also withdraw there support from the business. For instance with legal suits all the owners
have taken their support back from the Sackler family.
Without support and participation from the ownership or board members, the position of
the business has weaken to great extent (Sison, Beabout and Ferrero, 2017). Thus for the
increased profitability and long term success of business participation and success analysis from
the perspective of Sackler family member's is also necessary. Unethical practices can affect this
collaboration adversely thus it must be neglected.
Success from board perspective
The board members of the organisation has authority and capability to provide a direction
to the business. Sackler family has long history of great success in US market. The
pharmaceutical company Purdue pharma has board members from the Sackler family. However
the actions of the board fails to bring success. Organisation was indulge in misleading people via
aggressive marketing, manipulative facts and ignoring the evidences of addiction and death
reports (Mea and Sims, 2018). The board members of the organisation were also aware of this
information. However the glittering profitability made them unresponsive towards the unethical
practices going on within organisation.
In context of Sackler family it can be concluded that its board fail to achieve success. It is
the responsibility of the board to ensure that organisational planning and practices does not cause
any harm to the brand value and missions of the company. For this purpose they must review
each and every business decision and conduct regular business audit. However Sackler family
board did not pay attention to such ethical irregularities. Instead an indirect support was provided
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by board members which encourages the value and operational misconduct. This can be
considered as critical reason for the fall of Sackler empire. The unethical practices by board
members lead them to neglect the misconducts and inappropriate monitoring (Kochupillai and
Brinkmann, 2019). Contrary to this if board was concerned about health of community and
ethical principles were vital part of their business agenda then it could have been possible for the
Purdue pharma to prevent such huge controversy and ethical challenge.
Success from perspective of public confidence
The customer or public perspective act as major driving force for the success. It depends
entirely on people to make the brand strong or disappear. From the public point of view Sackler
family and Purdue pharma have proven to be completely failure and unethical. People are
considering them as criminals and self oriented organisation which has earned profit by selling
deaths and addiction to people (Davies, 2016). The people are considering organisation as
highly unethical and harmful for the society (Young, 2018). Due to this reason people are
decided to discard the entire brand of Sackler family.
The ethical misconduct in one of the drug or product of organisation has influenced the
public perspective to an extent that people have discarded the use of all other products of Purdue
pharma as well. The change in perspective of public influence the organisational success in
various ways. For example Sackler family has developed a negative image thus any stakeholder
of the organisation is also perceived as guilty by others. The negative perceptions developed by
public influences sales and future growth strategies as well. For instance since people have
developed extreme negativity for the Sackler family and thus in such situation it is almost
impossible for the organisation to plan for any new product or services. It will definitely lead to a
failure because people or the target customers will not accept the organisation (Trevino and
Nelson, 2016). Due to unethical practices in making claims, promotions and marketing in future
as well people will have strong opinion that Purdua pharma is used to make false claims so it is
not beneficial and safe to trust their products and services. The unethical practices can develop
strong negative feelings and opinion among people which is long lasting and even impossible to
change, making success questionable.
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CONCLUSION
It can be concluded that ethics are integral and necessary part of the business. They not
only assure the operational effectiveness of business but also helps to fulfil the legislative and
regulatory requirements of business. It has been analysed from the above case study that
strategies such as marketing, promotion, launching, sales analysis and budget consideration must
be reviewed and implemented ethically. These practices can influence the future success goals
and results of the business. If ethics are not incorporated in these practices then it may lead to
long term failure in business. It can also be concluded that when business practices are not
ethical then they not only influence success in terms of revenues but also affect public
confidence and trust of shareholders and boards.
RECOMMENDATIONS
It is recommended that for the long term and sustainable success organisations must
develop business strategies and practices which aims at both profitability and ethics. The
organisations which gives equal priority to profit earning and welfare of community gains huge
success in terms of popularity and sales. It is also recommended to organisations that they must
periodically review their policies and practices (Braithwaite, 2016). This analysis will help
service providers to understand the drawbacks and ethical consequences of their actions. When
organisation neglects the opinion of public or customer feedback then it results in breakdown of
the services and public reputation.
The stakeholders and board members of organisation are vital resources as they monitor
and guide team members and management to accomplish strategies and actions which are in
alignment with business goals and vision. Thus it is also recommended that when board
members and any of the stakeholders observe any kind of discrepancies then they must not
neglect it and raise their concerns (Crane and et.al., 2019). They must also regularly perform
audits to eliminate scope of ethical misconduct. For the improvement in quality of services
organisations are also recommended to understand that public trust is the key element for their
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success. Thus in any circumstances organisations must not adopt any practice which mislead
customers or causes any kind of harm to them.
REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Aßländer, M.S., Gössling, T. and Seele, P., 2016. Business ethics in a European perspective: A
case for unity in diversity?. Journal of business ethics, 139(4), pp.633-637.
Boda, Z. and Zsolnai, L., 2016. The failure of business ethics. Society and Business
Review, 11(1), pp.93-104.
Braithwaite, J., 2016. Book review: Law and corporate behaviour: Integrating theories of
regulation, enforcement, compliance and ethics.
Crane, A. and et.al., 2019. Business ethics: Managing corporate citizenship and sustainability in
the age of globalization. Oxford University Press.
Davies, P.W., 2016. Current issues in business ethics. Routledge.
Elliott, T.L. and Salyer, R., 2018. Ethics, The Law and Taxes: The Ethical and Legal
Implications of a Tax Shelter. Journal of Leadership, Accountability and Ethics, 15(4).
Ferrell, O.C. and Fraedrich, J., 2015. Business ethics: Ethical decision making & cases. Nelson
Education.
Kochupillai, M. and Brinkmann, J., 2019. Law, Business and Legitimacy. 2020), Handbook of
Business Legitimacy: Responsibility, Ethics and Society, Springer-Nature, Forthcoming.
Koslowski, P., 2016. Ethical Economy and Business Ethics: On the Relationships between Ethics
and Economics. Power and Principle in the Market Place: On Ethics and Economics,
p.11.
Mea, W.J. and Sims, R.R., 2018. Human Dignity-Centered Business Ethics: A Conceptual
Framework for Business Leaders. Journal of Business Ethics, pp.1-17.
Sison, A.J.G., Beabout, G.R. and Ferrero, I. eds., 2017. Handbook of virtue ethics in business
and management. New York: Springer.
Trevino, L.K. and Nelson, K.A., 2016. Managing business ethics: Straight talk about how to do
it right. John Wiley & Sons.
Young, C., 2018. Putting the Law in Its Place: Business Ethics and the Assumption that Illegal
Implies Unethical. Journal of Business Ethics, pp.1-17.
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