Failure Whistleblower System
Even though Toshiba had implemented a whistleblower system according to the governance code, the effect and function about this system was questionable during the daily operation, and we do think that it is more important to get the effective implementation in practice.
The reason of Toshiba’s whistleblower system lost effectiveness is that the board of director (including the audit committee), board of supervisor, manger levels, internal audit department and financial department all keep silent when problems happen. The people in the company were lack of oversight role that they should play. In Japan, the whistleblower system of many companies were only established but did not inject soul.
Five Steps to Recover
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Firstly, managers should be required to investigate all allegations promptly and thoroughly. One of the important reasons for investigating allegations promptly is that If delayed action or inaction occurs in a case where a policy requires that any complaint received must be acknowledged or investigated within a certain number of hours, cynicism could arise about the seriousness of the organization’s ethics policy. And second, managers should also be required to report the origins and results of the investigation to an oversight body such as human resources or upper management and the audit committee.
Assessing the Organization’s Internal Whistleblowing System is the last step to build a whistleblower system. Find out employees’ opinions about the organization’s culture and specifically seek employee views on the organization’s commitment to ethics and values. Four Questions should be taken into considered when assess the internal whistleblowing system: a) Does the organization have a code of conduct? b) Are employees aware of it? c) Does the company train on what is an ethical breach? d) Have there been recent breaches and how were they addressed?
Besides, there are some potential survey questions, such as: “Do you believe unethical issues are tolerated here? “and “Do you know how to report an illegal or unethical
In addition, whistleblowers should be portrayed as being good in order for society to begin seeing them in a positive way. Furthermore, the government should make this type of crimes a public matter. Allowing the public to be able to see all charges and outcome regarding these cases could bring out other wrongdoings in other organizations. The government should also impose greater punishment such as jail time for these types of crimes rather than imposing fines that they are able to
Review “Just pucker and blow: An analysis of corporate whistleblowers” in Chapter 2. Please respond to the following:
Duska argues that whistleblowing is always justified. He claims that employees do “not have an obligation of loyalty to a company, even a prima facie one, because companies are not the kind of things that are properly objects of loyalty” (Duska, pg. 424). Duska denies one of Bok’s key conditions to blow the whistle, loyalty. This is because Duska sees the purpose of business is to produce goods and services and to make a profit. Duska’s view of a business’s purpose prevents the company, or in Case C the university, from becoming an object deserving of loyalty.
1. Describe the key characteristics of a whistleblower, and briefly summarize one (1) researched instance of whistleblowing in one (1) publicly traded company within the last 12 months. Include the details of the issue that the whistleblower reported and the effect of the whistleblower’s actions on both the whistleblower himself and the company.
You’re right Timothy. But sometimes it takes more courage for the employees to speak up about unethical conduct of their superiors. Probably because they’re afraid of being retaliated like getting fired from work or demoted. Nevertheless there are laws like Sarbanes-Oxley of 2002 and Dodd-Frank (Section 922) that would protect whistleblowers from the retaliation of their employers and even reward if the whistleblowers can provide the original information to the SEC .
Whistle blowing in organizations can be an outstanding source of needed information to the organization. On the other side, that same information that is delivered can have a negative effect on the employee that has decided to take matters in to their own hands and inform management of potential unethical behavior. An article called “Nonprofit whistle-blower employee nets $1.6 million retaliation award” written by Tricia Gorman is in reference to an employee whistle-blower that her place of employment violated the New Jersey Conscientious Employee Protection Act, which is part of the organizations policy for hostile work environment.
Jackson and Raftos (1997) referred to whistle blowing as an avenue of last resort. Employees find themselves in these situations when the authorities at their organisations have failed to take actions on reported issues affecting that organisation. Wimot (2000) likened whistleblowing to a spectrum. At one end of this spectrum whistleblowing would only cause minimal pain and scars on the stakeholders and organisation while on the other end is the worst scenario where the whistleblowing effects are turbulent and often experienced to be negative to all those involved (ibid).
In an age when accelerated communications contribute to growing perceptions of organizational improprieties, the ethical and legal implications of whistleblowing have become a major topic of discussion. According to Lawrence and Weber (2014), whistleblowing is an employee disclosing apparent organizational misconduct to the government or media; however, this reporting of information should come after attempts at going through proper channels in order to persuade the organization to take appropriate actions has been ineffective.
Several theories indicate why the whistle-blowing process has become more prevalent and characteristics or processes encourage individuals to come forward a report instances of wrongdoing or making organizational behaviors public knowledge (Lennane, 2012). The process of whistle-blowing often involves an individual being conflicted between loyalty to their organization or their belief that they have a responsibility to protect public interest above the practices of their organization (Soma & Nirmala, 2011). Individuals may attempt to initiate
The implementation of a new ethics program would involve a great deal of communication (Ruddell, 2004). Assessing the common ethical concerns within an organization helps to create a more tailored plan for the organization (Belhaven, 2015). Initially sharing the code of conduct, training employees on the steps to resolve ethical problems, and providing guidelines to report concerns could be communicated multiple ways (Belhaven 2015). Another task is to identify a group to investigate
Well, according to Miceli, Nearand and Dworkin (2008), whistleblowing is an act of revealing wrongdoings in an organization by the former or current employees of the very organization. As such, a whistleblower is an individual who reveals wrongdoings within an organization to the public or the senior management. The key characteristics of a whistleblower include, but are not limited to, dissent, accusation, breach of loyalty, altruism, sportsmanship courtesy, conscientiousness and civic culture (Miceli, Near & Dworkin, 2008).
The Dodd-Frank Act has allowed for more leniency when it comes to whistleblowing but this legislation was implemented after this story began. There are several industry protection programs for whistleblowers and the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) even promotes whistleblowing by giving out monetary rewards for certain cases. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) was supposed to make whistleblowers believe that they would not be retaliated against. However, making the determination of whistleblowing after hearing Tony Menendez’s story will make the weak squeamish and the strong possibly reconsider.
addition, as a leader, when a whistleblower reports activity to you, first gather all of the
The whistleblower him or herself must be carefully scrutinized. What are the personal and the professional reputations of the whistleblower? What is the motive driving the whistleblower? Is it to benefit the client or the organization, or is it a need for attention or revenge? Is the whistleblower's cause seen as legitimate and significant by trustworthy colleagues and friends? Is the whistleblower aware of the potential consequences of blowing the whistle and still willing to accept responsibility for actions taken?
The company faced issues related to the methods it used in investigating the unauthorized disclosure of nonpublic information to the press by the members of its board of directors. Apparently, Hewlett Packard hired some investigators in the case. The investigator used various techniques such as pre-texting- calling the telephone company and pose as someone else with an aim of obtaining that person’s information or records. The company and the board chairman, Patricia Dunn, were defending the company’s investigations about the director and the journalist. They cited that there were aggressive efforts to note the core source of leaks that were fully justified by the investigators