B-School Will Poll Firms On Their Social Policies

Pollution, minority employment, and consumer protection are among the social issues a Business School questionnaire sent to 600 firms will cover.

The survey of businesses, sponsored by the B-School Student Association, will be sent out later this month after the S. A. approves a final draft.

John D. Pratt, a first-year MBA candidate who originally suggested the survey, said last night that the questionnaire would both "express our concern about these social issues as prospective members of the business community and gather information for people about to be recruited by these companies."

Pratt said that he got the idea of a questionnaire from the Law School, where three "Nader's raiders" organized a survey of law firms during the first week of October.

Pratt enlisted his friend Michael J. Farmer, a first-year student and a Student Association member, to propose the questionnaire to the S. A. and get that group to pay for it.

On December 4, by a 25-1 vote, the Student Association resolved "to poll major American businesses on the subject of social action and responsibility programs on behalf of the student body and to make available the results of the poll to interested students."

The mailing list, according to Pratt, will include all of the 400 firms recruiting annually at the Business School and therefore should be particularly helpful to second-year students trying to choose a job.

The responses to the survey will be kept on file so that second-year students, before their interviews, can brush up on the social policies of various companies.

Can't Wait

Pratt said that too often a businessman has to wait until he becomes a vice-president before he can deal with social action programs. He explained, "A lot of people want social action throughout their lives, not just at the end."

George Cabot Lodge '50, associate professor of Business Administration, called the survey "a good idea" and "perfectly appropriate."

Lodge, one of the faculty members who saw the first draft of the questionnaire, teaches "Planning in the Business Environment.