Goizueta Professor Ira Bedzow discusses how business can build or break communities—and the conversation has never been more critical.
A rabbi, a professor, and an ethicist all walk onto Emory’s campus…
But the joke is on us: They’re all the same person. Meet Ira Bedzow, associate professor in the practice of organization and management, and a true renaissance man. Bedzow joined Goizueta’s faculty in fall of 2025 and teaches both undergraduate- and MBA-level courses on business ethics and principles of leadership.
Bedzow is also the executive director of the Emory Purpose Project; an associate professor in the Department of Medicine; a core faculty member of Emory’s Center for Ethics; a senior fellow in the Center for the Study of Law and Religion, and the unit head of the International Chair in Bioethics at Emory University—as well as an ordained Orthodox rabbi. And although the connection between these disparate fields may seem elusive to us, to Bedzow, the relationship is readily apparent. When asked what topics ethics touches in his work, he replied, “everything.”
If that long list of responsibilities doesn’t make one pause for breath, Bedzow’s new spring course likely will: he will be teaching Learning in Motion: Exploring Holistic Learning, during which students will explore the dynamic relationship between the mind and the body and engage in guided discussions about major topics in philosophy, psychology, and social thought—all while riding stationary bikes. Bedzow trained for the course in fall, taking Peloton classes while on Zoom and Facetime, and confesses, “it has not looked pretty.”
Read on to discover what brought Bedzow to the business sector.
Describe your current research and teaching in six words (bonus points if they are in song lyrics).
It’s eight words and from one of the most popular karaoke songs ever to be written, “Don’t stop believin’ / Hold on to that feelin’.”
To become purpose-oriented and values-driven, you have to believe in what you are trying to do, and you have to feel it—it has to be important to you. While the lyrics may make this research sound cheesy, we all need a little cheesiness in our lives as we grow into who we want to be, both personally and professionally. Without a little cheese, it would be too hard to keep things fun as we put in the hard work.
Your professional career in ethics has led you through many academic fields, including medicine, philosophy, law, religion, and now business. What brought you to the business sector?
I’ve always been drawn to business ethics, ever since my first job out of college in real estate finance.
Business also pervades every profession—medicine, law, even the clergy—because success in each of these depends on how people organize, manage, and lead others toward shared goals.
Religious leaders, for example, also run organizations and face the same ethical and managerial challenges as executives or healthcare leaders. Also, for me, there’s never been a sharp line between personal and professional development. Professional competence grows out of personal strengths, vulnerabilities, and experience. So, teaching in a business school felt like a natural progression in the work I’ve always done—helping people connect who they are with how they lead and showing that ethical leadership begins with self-understanding.
What topics does ethics touch in business?
Everything. Every decision we make in business and life stems from a choice—what goals we pursue, what beliefs we hold, and what values we act on. Ethics isn’t just about resolving moral blowback when things go wrong; it’s about the ongoing process of reflection that shapes who we are and how we lead. Think about it this way: The way we respond to ethical challenges is really just the visible tip of a much larger iceberg of moral development. Beneath the surface are habits of thought, emotional intelligence, and self-awareness that guide our choices every day—how we treat colleagues, set priorities, handle pressure, and define success. In that sense, ethics doesn’t touch one area of business; it is the foundation of business, because it’s the foundation of character.
What role does the business world play in building (or hindering) community?
We spend such a large proportion of our lives at work that much of our social interaction—both in and beyond the office—happens through the lens of business. Moreover, many of the spaces where community happens—cafés, gyms, digital platforms, even neighborhoods—are created and sustained by companies.
In that sense, especially in the U.S., the business world shapes community in three ways:
- 1) As the creators of our communal spaces—designing where and how people gather.
- 2) As the people who make up our communities—since employees, customers, and leaders are also citizens, neighbors, friends, and family.
- 3) As the training ground for civic life—where we learn, every day, how to live and work together, how to collaborate across differences, and how to disagree without creating division.
When this is recognized and respected, the business world plays an incredible role in building community. When it is not, it plays a tremendous role in hindering community.
When workplaces feel “thin,” as you’ve put it, what are the early warning signs leaders typically miss?
When workplaces feel “thin,” the first signs aren’t loud—they’re silent.
People stop asking questions, stop caring why their work matters, and start confusing productivity with busy-ness. Leaders often miss these signals because everything still looks like it’s working on the surface—but vitality has been replaced by begrudging compliance. The cure isn’t more efficiency; it’s restoring connection, curiosity, and shared purpose.
You’ve been quoted in another interview as saying, “When you break the script, people become human again.” What scripts are we clinging to in business culture that we might benefit from re-imagining?
I like to break every script I can—not necessarily to replace it, but rather to see what the script takes for granted.
Scripts are like habits: we can pick them up intentionally or unintentionally, they’re shaped by our environments, and they often outlive their usefulness when our goals or circumstances change.
Scripts also let us perform roles instead of inhabiting them. When I encounter a script, I’m never sure if I’m seeing the person—or what they think I expect to see. That’s why I think we should regularly step in and out of the scripts we use, to check whether they still serve us. Personally, I try to rely on as few scripts as possible, even when it means more work—because approaching each interaction or idea fresh helps me stay curious, present, and real.
You’ve argued that authentic and open dialogue is crucial to building a better world for all. Can you share an example of a structure, ritual, or norm that genuinely helps people engage in productive conflict rather than retreat into their corners?
When disagreement arises, I encourage people to shift one simple question: instead of asking, “Why do you think that?” ask, “What in your experience has informed your thinking?” The first question asks for justification and debate—it pushes people to defend their position. The second opens curiosity. It invites a story, not an argument. You’re asking someone to share the experiences that shaped their view, rather than the bullet points that support it. That small change in framing can turn disagreement (or retreat) into dialogue. It helps people feel seen and understood. Even if you may not ultimately agree with them, you can understand where they are coming from.
Do you see generational differences in what students today view as their ethical responsibility within an organization?
In general, yes, definitely. For many younger professionals, staying at one company for an entire career isn’t a real consideration anymore—even if some ultimately do so. That shift changes how they see their ethical responsibility. They’re more willing to leave when they encounter practices or cultures that conflict with their values, rather than trying to reform them from within.
A useful background to this is Albert O. Hirschman’s Exit, Voice, and Loyalty. When loyalty is high, people tend to use their voice—they’ll speak up to improve things. Ironically, loyalty can also have the opposite effect of making people more likely to become complicit. When loyalty is low, however, people don’t feel the same sense of responsibility to fix what’s broken; they simply exit. So, for younger generations, their moral compass still matters deeply—it just points more toward integrity of self than endurance of system.
What’s one ethical dilemma you think business schools historically have not prepared students for, but is now unavoidable?
I actually don’t like the term “dilemma.” It frames ethics as a situation with only two possible responses—both of them bad or imperfect. I prefer to think in terms of ethical challenges—which are complex situations where incommensurable values are in tension. This allows for creativity, reflection, and innovation. That shift in framing matters.
When students see ethics through an innovation lens, they realize that values-driven solutions aren’t constraints on business decisions—they’re part of how good decisions get made.
So, if there’s something business schools historically haven’t prepared students for, it’s this: understanding ethics not as a separate or reactive part of leadership, but as a foundational dimension of strategy and design. In today’s world, integrating ethics into all aspects of how we do business is no longer optional—it’s unavoidable.
If you could redesign one common business-school practice to better develop ethical leaders, what would you change?
I would incorporate humanistic inquiry more intentionally into the business school curriculum. It gives students the breadth and depth to understand not just markets and organizations, but people.
Every business environment is, at its core, a human environment—shaped by relationships, values, and meaning. By engaging with philosophy, literature, history, and the arts, students develop the empathy, imagination, and moral insight that make leadership effective at every level.
Hear more from Ira Bedzow as he describes his people-first approach to academic inquiry.
Explore more of the faculty shaping thought and practice at Goizueta Business School.
