Restoring Trust in WorldCom 1. What are the three or four central objectives that Breeden hopes to achieve with the proposals in “Restoring Trust”? Why is reform needed? What are the benefits? What are your concerns regarding the reform? The WorldCom Corporate Monitor, Richard Breeden, believed that in order to correct the ills that faced the company, WorldCom needed to adopt a strong Corporate Governance structure. The central objectives of his proposal “Restoring Trust” included improving the composition of WorldCom Board, eradicating financial misconduct, correcting executive compensation and enhancing shareholder influence and involvement. According the Breeden the WorldCom board seemed to have a decent combination of backgrounds …show more content…
To correct the financial pitfalls of the company, Breeden required members of the Audit Committee to have strict financial expertise and demonstrate appropriate behavior. He proposed that the committee hold eight meetings per year, two of which included the General Counsel. Previously, the Audit Committee spent only three to six hours a year overseeing the financial activities of the organization with annual revenue in the tens of billions. Breeden sought to bring the internal audit department; the CFO and the finance team together in the same physical location where they were previously geographically separate. These changes would be beneficial, as it would improve internal communication and increase the involvement of the Audit Committee in the financial operation and reporting of the company. The Audit Committee would be responsible for reviewing the performance of the CFO as well as the external auditors. Breeden believed the more transparency the Audit Committee had the more accountability it would be able to place on the Financial Team, leading to better financial reporting practices. One of the more direct mandates given to Breeden by the court was to prevent excessive executive compensation. Ebbers was able to buy the loyalty of the board members by issuing retention grants as well the issuance of
Communication was, and is, necessary in all wars, especially in World War II. Messages between troops were attempted often, however, when strived, the translation was disrupted by German Militia trying to acquire information about American troops’ location and battle plans. During World War II, The United States allied forces utilized American Indians from the Navajo tribe, to hypothesize, fabricate, and execute, a government cipher for communicating between military forces that would remain undecipherable until legally released by military officials.
The technology of World War II, which lasted from 1939 to 1945, was a big part of the determination of the outcome of the war. Much of the technology was developed during the interwar years. Some of it was developed because of failure and hindrance in war progression, obviously because of inefficient technology. Still some was in the beginning stages of development as the war ended. Though earlier war greatly utilized science, mathematics, and innovation, World War II had the largest impact on the innovation in technology of the current lives of Americans. Furthermore, no war, preceeding or succeeding, was as profoundly affected by science, mathematics, and technology as World War II. Science and technology have always made
World War II World War II was a pivotal event of the 20th century and a defining
World War II was partly caused by the Versailles Treaty. The Treaty infuriated Germany by taking their money, land and resources, and blaming them for World War l. All of this made Germany want to rise to power and start another World War. One of the reasons Germany was so mad about the Treaty of Versailles is it blamed Germany for the war. The Treaty stated, “...Germany accepts the responsibility of Germany and her allies for causing all loss and damage.” (Doc D) Germany did not agree that they were responsible for all the damage of the war; they thought this was extremely unfair.
I believe that the “War of the Worlds” is an classic because H. G well make an exciting plot , standard character an old fashion setting to make “The War of the Worlds” a story for the ages. This story is a great read it has every an great book has climax ,betrayal , emotional conflict ,physical conflict and drama .This is the original alien invasion story “Wells” show how the Martian are more advance then earth an how they planned to take over earth with such great detail. He put conflicts between some of the characters so not everyone in the story gets along he gives the characters concision he show the human nature in people .In the story the narrator borrowed a cart for a guy but instead of him just escaping he returned the cart and ended
“A missing German U-boat is lost no longer”(Washington Post). This recent headline appeared in the Washington Post on 19 September 2017. A once lost German U-boat was found off the coast of Belgium at the bottom of the North Sea. This U-boat contained the bodies of the twenty three commanding men of the submarine. Authorities say the submarine was hit and sunk by a naval mine on the upper deck. Throughout the course of World War 1, U-boats were used to their full capacity sinking more than three hundred and fifty ships, while only 13 U-boats were destroyed. According to the Washington Post, they have over seventy six million months users. As a result of these monthly subscribers, seventy six million
The stakeholders in this fraudulent case of WorldCom consist of Bernie Ebbers, Scott Sullivan, Buford Yates, David Myers, Cynthia Cooper, and Betty Vinson belong to the company. While the other stakeholders would consist of the creditors, Andersen (accounting firm), investors, and the public. This fraudulent act committed within WorldCom impacted every single stakeholder in a way. Either in a negative or positive way, most of the impact was caused with harm to everyone. The main individuals such as Ebbers, Sullivan, and Vinson all had major consequences as resulting with the fraud. Criminal trials were a major result with their fraudulent acts within WorldCom. Cooper was a lifesaver by most of the community. Aside from these individuals, the rest also got affected by the fraud. Investments conducted by the investors were all lost within the fraud process. The impact towards much of the image for Andersen was ruined. Many of the public lost their trust on the honesty and professionalism of Andersen and other certified public accounting firms. The entire employees from the top management to the smaller group of workers stayed unemployed and some with criminal punishment.
“The world must know what happened, and never forget.” (World War 2) General Eisenhower reflecting upon the world war II, and acknowledging it as a pertinent event in the history of the United States of America. War is war, it is not pretty or humane, but what it is, is a diplomatic way in which to settle disputes and aggressions between countries. By analyzing these wars of the past, the people of the country can learn many things, be it mistakes made by one side, strategy from someone else or battle field etiquette. And it is through this analysis that the human race is able to further itself to not repeat the mistakes made by their ancestors. There are many lessons to be learned from looking at the
It is highly recommended that the CFO does not interfere with the CAE’s job to provide feedback directly to the audit committee. Moreover, the company’s strategy should be discussed to assure that COO, marketing and sales VP and general counsel do not take passive roles. Additionally, the CFO should not focus so greatly on opposite strategy as presented by the CEO, as now the CEO wanted to maintain secure growth via acquisitions, securing gap in production and more geographic coverage, and on the other had the CFO wanted only more and more new acquisitions, which was not the right approach because his subordinates may have been confused about company’s strategy.
On March 15, 2005 former CEO of WorldCom, Bernard Ebbers sat in a federal courtroom waiting for the verdict. As the former CEO of WorldCom, Ebbers was accused of being personally responsible for the financial destruction of the communications giant. An internal investigation had uncovered $11 billion dollars in fraudulent accounting practices. Later a second report in 2003 found that during Ebber’s 2001 tenure as CEO, the company had over-reported earnings and understated expenses by an astonishing $74.5 billion dollars (Martin, 2005, para 3). This report included the mismanagement of funds, unethical lending practices among its top executives, and false bookkeeping which led to loss of tens of thousands of its employees.
The Audit Committee is comprised of the following five members from the Board; F. Duane Ackerman, Ari Bousbib, J. Frank Brown, Karen L. Katen, and Mark Vadon. This group is tasked with assisting the Board with the oversight of The Home Depot’s financial statements, ensuring that they are in compliance with legal and regulatory requirements. They also review and monitor the Company’s Compliance program, making changes when appropriate to ensure that the Company remains compliant. This committee must be comprised of three or more independent directors from the Board and they cannot receive any compensation other than directors’ fees from Home Depot. A requirement for this committee is to have a basic understanding of
WorldCom was the ultimate success story among telecommunications companies. Bernard Ebbers took the reigns as CEO in 1985 and turned the company into a highly profitable one, at least on the outside. In 2002, Ebbers resigned, WorldCom admitted fraud and the company declared bankruptcy (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart, &Wright 2007). The company was at the heart of one of the biggest accounting frauds seen in the United States. The demise of this telecommunications monster can be accredited to many factors including their aggressive-defensive organizational culture based on power and the bullying tactics that they employed. However, this fiasco could have been prevented if WorldCom had designed a system of checks and balances that would have
The audit committee is responsible for the following. It is responsible for reviewing the financial statements, for reviewing the company's compliance and control systems, for monitoring the effectiveness of the internal audit function, assessing the independence and objectivity of the external auditors, and ensuring the employees have the opportunity to raise concerns about matters of financial reporting. The audit committee supports the Board. Ultimately, because the audit committee is comprised of members of the Board, they are elected by the shareholders. Should the shareholders decide, they can replace these members at the annual meetings.
P., & Coulter, M. K., 2012, p. 152), although it seems none of WorldCom’s executive management team seemed to feel this way. Many steps could have been taken to prevent the collapse of the WorldCom empire, but only a few key managers held the power and none were willing to take action. One control that did not exist in WorldCom’s culture was allowing both internal and external auditors access to all necessary documents and statements. Without full disclosure of these items no one could see how many risks the company was taking by making fraudulent entries against their books. Also the external audit team, Arthur Anderson, held WorldCom as one of its best customers which was a major conflict of interest. This relationship lead to many fundamental mistakes from Anderson not keeping pressure on WorldCom and getting all vital information that would prove how poorly the company was being run. Had they been operating transparently, auditors and employees would have seen the accounting deception and could potentially have stopped it prior to the company’s collapse. In addition, by employing multiple auditing firms many of the mistakes being made may have been caught and discontinued from the beginning.
Does the Board or audit committee understands and exercises oversight responsibility over financial reporting and internal control?