From the Sunday Times:
ARE YOU PREPARED TO BLOW THE WHISTLE?Lack of protection and disdain for informers deter Irish employees from reporting fraud at work, writes Gabrielle Monaghan
AFTER Sherron Watkins sent a memo to her boss, Kenneth Lay of Enron, telling him that she was "incredibly nervous" the company would "implode in a wave of accounting scandals," she endured years of accusations, stress and court hearings. Watkins was subsequently named one of Time magazine's people of the year in 2002 for raising the warning on Enron's practices and co-wrote a book on what ensued - the second-largest bankruptcy in US history.
Fear of reprisal, public scrutiny and losing one's career is enough to deter most executives and employees from blowing the whistle if they come across fraud, corruption or other wrongdoings. This concern is particularly acute in Ireland, where, unlike Britain, there is no one-size-fits-all legal protection for whistleblowers and a history of abhorrence for so-called 'tell-tales.'
"Even if you know what to do in a moral [or ethical] dilemma, you have to ask yourself: am I risking putting the kibosh on my career?" said Rowan Manahan, the MD of Fortify Services, a career advisory firm. "If you go to court and point out that all is rotten in the state of Denmark, typically you will be viewed as a troublemaker by the corporate world."
... Figures are not yet available to measure Irish attitudes on this, but fraud experts suggest uncertainty about legal protection, concern about their careers, an historical disdain for informers and the country's nod-and-wink corporate culture would deter many.
"Here's a question that is being asked in job interviews fro graduates now," said Manahan. "Imagine you were away with colleagues on a business trip and, while you are sitting in the executive lounge in Heathrow, you notice a colleague seriously fiddling their expenses on their laptop - what would you do? The only correct answer I can envisage is 'report them on the spot,' because you have to show that you are on the employer's side. But when people are asked this question in interview and think back to a comparable experience, the only reference that seems to come up with any consistency is the code of the schoolyard - don't squeal."
Fear of reprisal, public scrutiny and losing one's career is enough to deter most executives and employees from blowing the whistle if they come across fraud, corruption or other wrongdoings. This concern is particularly acute in Ireland, where, unlike Britain, there is no one-size-fits-all legal protection for whistleblowers and a history of abhorrence for so-called 'tell-tales.'"Even if you know what to do in a moral [or ethical] dilemma, you have to ask yourself: am I risking putting the kibosh on my career?" said Rowan Manahan, the MD of Fortify Services, a career advisory firm. "If you go to court and point out that all is rotten in the state of Denmark, typically you will be viewed as a troublemaker by the corporate world."
... Figures are not yet available to measure Irish attitudes on this, but fraud experts suggest uncertainty about legal protection, concern about their careers, an historical disdain for informers and the country's nod-and-wink corporate culture would deter many.
"Here's a question that is being asked in job interviews fro graduates now," said Manahan. "Imagine you were away with colleagues on a business trip and, while you are sitting in the executive lounge in Heathrow, you notice a colleague seriously fiddling their expenses on their laptop - what would you do? The only correct answer I can envisage is 'report them on the spot,' because you have to show that you are on the employer's side. But when people are asked this question in interview and think back to a comparable experience, the only reference that seems to come up with any consistency is the code of the schoolyard - don't squeal."
0 comments:
Post a Comment