亲爱的大众：吹牛可以，但千万不要造假

    企业界，以及跑企业口的记者，总喜欢搞一点无伤大雅的夸张之辞。史上最好！全新升级！性能空前增强！

    实际上，不仅商界喜欢夸大其辞，全社会都如此。美国总统候选人唐纳德•特朗普眼下人气大涨便是一个最新的佐证，呃，那是来自现实、高于现实的吹牛皮大王。

    但正如大众公司这次的丑闻所示，我们也是有底线的。自9月18日该公司承认在汽车中安装软件，从而在美国环保局的尾气排放测试中造假以来，其股价一天下跌了近20%。

    没人知道这家销售额高达2210亿美元的全球最大车企接下来会发生什么，也没人知道这次造假的源头是否会一直追踪到首席执行官马丁•温特科恩。但如果大众选择的是对测试结果夸大其词，而不是彻底造假，那又会发生什么呢？

    不要误解我的意思：我绝不支持任何形式的性能标准造假，尤其是那些与安全和健康相关的。不过这次的举动实在是厚颜无耻，肆无忌惮得让人吃惊，大众的品牌和企业文化恐怕在很长一段时间内都难以恢复正常。

    这次造假远非一两个人躲在办公室格子间里能够实现，一定有多达数百人牵涉其中，才能构建这样的系统，并确保将它装进42.8万辆汽车中。如果这家公司把智商用在设法满足排放标准，而不是绕开它上面，它可能会非常成功。

    想象一下另一番情景：大众信誓旦旦地声称，该公司的柴油发动机能满足美国环保局的标准。然后，在经过一番尝试之后，他们还是没能满足标准。美国环保局（值得一提的是，该机构主要依赖各家车企的自测数据）测试了大众汽车的引擎（但愿如此），发现它没有满足标准，然后对该公司罚款。这种错误依旧代价很大，但不至于那么令人惊讶。大众的公信力也不会彻底垮掉。毕竟，吹牛不管好坏都是“潜规则”，而造假则完全破坏了游戏规则。（财富中文网）

    译者：严匡正

    审校：任文科

    The business world—and the journalists who cover it—have always rewarded a healthy bit of hype. Best Ever! New and Improved! Now with enhanced whatevers!

    Actually, the love of the big claim goes far beyond the business world and is interwoven throughout society. Donald Trump’s current popularity is only the latest example of bombast, er, trumping reality.

    But we do have limits, as the scandal at Volkswagen shows. So far, the company’s stock price has fallen almost 20% since it admitted on September 18 that it had installed software that allowed its cars to fake their performance on emissions testing in order to fool the EPA.

    No one knows what will happen to the $221 billion in sales car company—the world’s largest—going forward, and whether the deception stretches all the way to the CEO, Martin Winterkorn. But one wonders what would have happened had the company opted for exaggerating its results rather than falsifying them.

    Don’t get me wrong: I’m not advocating that any performance standards—particularly those that affect safety and health—should ever be presented with anything but the full truth. But this move was so brazen, so breathtakingly full of chutzpah, that it is hard to imagine VW’s brand recovering for a very, very long time; nor, one imagines, will its culture.

    The plot goes far beyond one or two people hiding out in a cubicle and must have involved hundreds of people building such a system and making sure it was implemented inside of 428,000 cars. One wonders what the company might have been able to accomplish instead if it put all that brainpower toward meeting emissions requirements rather than circumventing them.

    Consider the alternative: VW tried—and failed—to meet the EPA’s emissions standards, after saying that they believed they had diesel engines that did the job. The EPA (which, it’s worth noting, relies primarily onself-tested data) would have—hopefully—tested its engines, found Volkswagen deficient, and fined the company. It would have been costly, yes, but it wouldn’t have been all that surprising. And VW’s credibility wouldn’t have been destroyed in the process. After all, exaggeration, for better or worse, is just how the game is played.