Philosophy Café - Why Good People do Bad Things

In the current environment of uncertainty and change, we all face a multitude of challenges which need to be navigated through with high levels of ethical integrity. Most of us assume that bad things are done by bad people and that the solution to ethical breaches is to increase deterrents and weed out the bad apples - but anecdotal evidence and research do not support the efficacy of such an approach.

History is littered with examples of good people who have unintentionally created unethical outcomes, who with the benefit of hindsight would have done things differently. This presentation will consider inter-disciplinary research from social psychology, criminology and neuro-cognitive science that shows why good people do bad things and, most important, how to avoid the traps and pitfalls that may derail your career and organisation.

Dr Alistair Ping PhD is an Adjunct Professor at QUT Graduate School of Business and a Visiting Research Fellow in the Philosophy Dept at Adelaide University. He is also a Colin Brain Governance Fellow and a recognised expert in Ethics and Governance having over 25 years experience in the field. Alistair regularly presents at Conferences, including the 2019, 2022 and 2024 Australian Public Sector Anti-Corruption Conference and the 2016 and 2022 Asian Conferences on Ethics Religion and Philosophy. He has worked directly with corporations, not for profit and government agencies in Australia, the USA, the UK and Africa – including the Prince of Wales Business Leaders Forum.

Alistair is an Australian-American Fulbright Scholar – his study considered Corporate Social Responsibility trends in the US and the report ‘Engage’ was submitted to the Australian Senate Enquiry into Corporate Social Responsibility in Australia. Following on from this study Alistair completed a PhD at QUT in Applied Ethics which investigated ‘Why Good People Do Bad Things’ – a key result of this inter-disciplinary research was the development of a causal factor model which considers behavioural and contextual cues that can lead to unethical outcomes. Insights from this research were submitted to the Victorian ‘Integrity and Oversight Committee’. Alistair is also the author of two business books on Ethics and Corporate Social Responsibility; six personal development books; and numerous magazine and newspaper articles.

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