Ethical dilemmas not just for planners

I just received an interesting comment referring to this post about ethics, and thought it was too good to bury in an old post. Here it is:

As important as business ethics are on the planner side, they are also important on the property/sales side. During a recent round of site selection, I was contacted by a CVB contact for the city in consideration: One of her sales people was in town and wanted to get together in person to discuss their property etc. Due to tight schedules and other conflicts it became apparent that a dinner meeting was the only option. The venue that was suggested by the salesperson was a very expensive $100/person price-fixe venue. For all three of us. The real problem came when the subject of the destination, property and meeting needs only came up for 5 minutes over dessert!

It was clear to me within 10 minutes of my arrival at dinner that neither the salesperson or the CVB person had any real interest in helping me to see the benefits of their portfolio, I was just the meeting person they could use to justify a more than $300 business expense.

Don’t just blame the planners for unethical behavior, and don’t write this experience off as a valid sales tool - I came to the table with concerns that I was afforded no opportunity to discuss.