Schooling + Values = Education

By Dr. Henry Wong Meng Yeong | Tuesday, January 29, 2013 at 6:18AM

In the prior post, we talked about reporting structures and how they promote or inhibit fraud. Ultimately, however, the best and most reliable predictor of future behavior is past behavior, which in turn is a function of moral character and values.

These aspects are often overlooked in selecting and recruiting staff. Paper qualifications, scholastic achievements and experience are all that employers seek.

In Confucius’ opinion, one is not considered educated or a scholar unless imbued with moral and ethical values, which he ranks above literacy and academic proficiency. This contrasts with our current-day practice of meritocracy.

The word for education in Chinese is 教育; 教 referring to being schooled and 育referring to being cultivated with ethics and values. One is not considered educated then, unless possessing both schooling and values. Confucius goes a step further to say that of the two elements,育 (ethics and values) is the more important.

Having only assumed public office for seven days, Confucius executed a senior officer named Shao Zheng Mao. Confucius judged him to be rebellious and dangerous, deceptive and stubborn, untrustworthy and arrogant, flagrantly disgraceful in his behavior, and openly tolerant of wrongdoing. Any one of these charges, Confucius asserted, would have been deserving of a death sentence, let alone five.

Confucius spent his life teaching the importance and development of ethics and values.

One such value is integrity

How do we define integrity? The discussion continues……..