The row over MPs' expenses has given us all a good laugh. Most of us are astounded at the audacity of some of the claims, but perhaps not surprised.
Greed, despite what Gordon Gekko said, has never been good. Defined by the Oxford Dictionary as "the intense and selfish desire for food wealth power", it is universally accepted as a very unattractive quality.
In the wake of the banking crisis and so many stories about huge bonuses, our "greed" antennae are even more finely tuned.
So I found myself asking so where does success stop and greed start? Back to Ask Oxford and they define success as "the accomplishment of an aim or purpose/the attainment of fame, wealth or social status"
So it seems that there's a fine line: It's OK to accomplish wealth but not OK to have intense and selfish desire for it. Tricky, as I'm sure many of us really have a desire (often intense) for success - I for one am definitely hoping for our new product C It Now to be successful having spent months developing it...! I guess we need to constantly check ourselves to make sure that the success that we desire does not come at too high a cost, where we are in danger of sacrificing our principles or forgetting to be grateful for what we have.
The world of business seems to be evolving to reflect this. Open book pricing policy is far more common. Small start ups like us are often working from home to keep overheads down, being quite up front about that and no one minds. I remember the time when you were nobody unless you had a fancy office, with your name above the door and companies were judged by their over the top, no expense spared parties where excess was the name of the game.
And maybe that's the word we need to keep in mind. Excess - more than is necessary - is greedy and as we have witnessed this week and over the last few months, greed is a definite career limiting quality...
The row over MPs expenses will be, in the long term, a good thing and has lessons for us all. In the main they do a good job, work long hours and are away from home a great deal. I, for one, will definitely be trudging out to vote at the next election.