ABSTRACT
While her boss was away, someone asked Ruth, the senior technician, whether the new computers had been ordered. She knew they hadn’t, but since her boss had obtained several quotations, she identified the cheapest that met the specification, and placed the order. Of the 11 computers delivered, all but two had faults in the operating software, which, it soon emerged, had been copied illegally by what was in fact a ‘rogue’ supplier. It didn’t occur to Ruth to consider which suppliers were reliable and which weren’t. But if her boss had been there, this problem probably wouldn’t have arisen.
