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SCCE/HCCA

Tone to the Top

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By Adam Turteltaub
adam.turteltaub@corporatecompliance.org

At the 2018 European Compliance and Ethics Institute, Garrett Reisman, former NASA astronaut and frequent SCCE/HCCA speaker gave a fascinating talk on the wonders and risks of space flight.

One of the space shuttle disasters, he explained, had some of its roots in a problem with the tone to the top:  messages got watered down, and people were too deferential.

It’s a good reminder that, as we think of the role of leadership, focusing on tone at the top is not enough.  If compliance professionals don’t set the right tone when talking to leadership, support for compliance and a willingness of leadership to take difficult actions are much harder to achieve.

Speaking truth to power, especially when it is bad news, is never easy.  People are naturally hesitant to tell those more powerful than them unpleasant truths, try to put a positive spin on things, and are sometimes too willing to go along with a leader’s decisions.

That, though, is not the job of compliance.  And just as we must watch for the right tone at the top, we must also set the right tone to the top, especially when the situation is not a good one.

2018 European Compliance & Ethics Institute Guest Blogs: Chocolate or Culture?

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By Jane Mitchell
@JMitchComms

I am reflecting on my best take-away from Frankfurt and the 2018 ECEI. Tempted though I am by the cornucopia of wonderful chocolate Easter goodies that I have brought back to England, gratification will be short-lived, so my mind turns to more sustainable delights.

One of the most satisfying aspects of SCCE’s annual ECEI conference has been watching it steadily grow, and this year this particularly struck me, with the emergence of many new faces. At the same time, it was a real pleasure to meet up with old ‘friends’ and to know that the community of professionals that is building through the ECEI has a unique opportunity to support and nurture through connection and familiarity.

Many of the new participants said to me that it was ‘wonderful to feel that I am among friends, not alone’. This is the heart of the conference, and add to that the sharing, learning and development opportunities it’s a heady mix!

What of the learning and development? I was struck, and am struck every year by the ‘culture’ question. Increasingly compliance professionals are being ‘voluntold’, sometimes invited, to add this area to their workload. Sometimes this extends to adding ‘ethics’ to the title of the individual or the function, assuming that may be enough to signal that ‘we take it seriously’. Elsewhere ethics/compliance colleagues are grappling with what ethics and ethical culture really does look and feel like.

During our ‘Making the Intangible Tangible’ session we were lucky enough to begin to unpack that question a little. We had a lively and honest conversation which told us that people do have a very clear personal view of what constitutes an ethical culture; integrity, pride, behaviours, listening, organizational justice, transparency, consistent communication and leadership.

That’s all good I hear you say. Yes, it is. The snag, however, is that that is not yet what is being evaluated (or measured) well. The result being (and our microcosmic conversation is merely a reflection of the corporate world as a whole), that most organisations are finding it very tricky to establish with any certainty, the health of their ethical culture or culture of integrity.
The good news is that help is close at hand, and with the development of the thinking joining up with the science and the analytics, I am confident that there is light at the end of the tunnel! Onwards to Berlin!

2018 European Compliance & Ethics Institute Guest Blogs: Adventures in Networking

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By Sally Afonso

Networking is hard for me. Introverted by nature and workaholic by habit, I’m more at ease behind a computer or in a conference room. I’ve been guilty of calling networking a “soft” skill.
This year, however, I’m pushing myself outside of my compliance comfort zone – and venturing into networking has been a key challenge. I’ve learned just how “hard” networking is, both in terms of difficulty to master as a competency, as well as in how much concrete benefit there is in practicing it.

Some of the advantages I’ve gained from my adventures in networking include:

  • Collaborators – You are not alone! Meet people outside of your company, community, or business sector who are interested in the same topics as you are and might like to work with you, including researching, writing articles and blog posts, or even speaking at future events.
  • Challengers – Break free of habits and heuristics. Even the routines and choices you think are great could benefit from a refresh by chatting to someone with new best practices to suggest.
  • Opposing views – Beyond checks and balances, take the chance to meet people whose experiences or ideas totally differ. See it as an ambition to work through your divergent opinions to find shared conclusions.
  • Show and tell – We’ve all been there, done that, in different ways. Networking allows us to reach out to each other – up, down, and across. We’re giving back to the evolving compliance function not just as a reflection of individual seniority or interest, but in contribution to our collective development and expertise.
  • Get a clue – Be triggered in a positive way! Ignite new interests and curiosities by hearing about backgrounds and expertise of others. This can even include suggestions for other organizations to join or learning opportunities to pursue.

Although anyone who recognizes me from conferences or events would still find me reading a book during lunch sooner than table-hopping by the buffet, I appreciate how my small efforts in networking have already added greatly to my professional self-development.

If you’re hesitant, as I was, I encourage you to get out of your comfort zone just a little – you can start by saying hello to me!

Maintaining Compliance in the Former Soviet Union

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By Sascha Matuszak
Reporter, SCCE|HCCA

It’s been almost three decades since the fall of the Iron Curtain, and yet, doing business in the former Soviet Union can still be very challenging and exciting. The majority of the nations that make up the current Commonwealth of States which largely replaced the USSR, are emerging economies eager to participate in the global economy; there are opportunities in every sector, from energy to services to IT.

With all of that opportunity come risks. All eleven CIS nations have their own very specific, local conditions, and most attempts to unify the region under one economic rubric—be it a free trade agreement or some other economic alliance—have shattered against the geopolitical realities of a very complex part of the world. That means the rules governing, for example, bribery, contracts, and labor are often one thing in Kazakhstan, another in Moldova, and something quite different in Armenia and Russia.

“Compliance in the CIS region requires double the efforts from management in their implementation of controls and ethical principles,” said Alexander Pisemskiy, Executive Director at the CSI Group, which specializes in antifraud solutions and corporate investigations in emerging economies across the world. [Read more…]