Jim Nortz is a nationally recognized expert and thought leader in the field of business ethics and compliance.
Jim spent the first 17 years of his career as a litigator trying both criminal and civil cases before becoming Crompton Corporation’s first Vice President, Business Ethics and Compliance in 2003.
Since then, Jim has served as a compliance officer at Crompton and for four other multinational corporations, as well as Corporate Compliance Director at Sutherland Global Services. Currently he serves as Chief Compliance Officer for Carestream Health.
Mr. Nortz is a frequent guest lecturer at the University of Rochester’s Simon School of Business, RIT’s Saunders School of Business, St. John Fisher College and Nazareth College.
Jim writes the monthly business ethics columns for the Association of Corporate Counsel Docket magazine and the Rochester Business Journal and is a contributing writer for Corporate Compliance Insights and The Business Journals.
Jim served on the Board of Directors for the Ethics and Compliance Officers Association (“ECOA”) for eight years. He currently serves on the Board of the Rochester Area Business Ethics Foundation and is a member of the Rochester chapter of Conscious Capitalism.
Contact info:
[email protected]
585-260-8960
For a Westerner, the experience of driving in the crowded streets of Mumbai is nothing if not chaotic. And yet, the vast majority of the people on the road – taxi drivers, pedestrians, cyclists – fare just fine every day. If there are rules of the road, they’re not often followed; instead, a universal expectation of cooperation keeps things moving. Could the...
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Some of the most ambitious and highest-performing professionals find immense satisfaction in overcoming challenges. Others are driven by chiefly by financial reward, but it’s important for employees to find meaning in their work beyond the size of their paychecks. There’s an important lesson here for leaders hoping to build a culture of ethics.
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Words matter. Responding to a colleague’s request or suggestion with a “no, because…” or a “yes, but…” effectively shuts down the conversation. As an alternative, Jim Nortz proposes a method used by improv groups to keep the dialogue open. And the exercise can do more than stretch your creative muscles – it may just strengthen your work relationships, as well.
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What’s your organization’s risk appetite? Some organizations rank way up there with surfers and stunt men. Others like to play it safe, taking on the level of risk you might associate with putt-putt golf, but most fall somewhere in between. To determine your company’s ethics and compliance risk tolerance, consider the direction provided by the Federal Sentencing Guidelines.
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For some reason, ethics and compliance professionals rarely participate in big picture conversations about employee pay. It’s a strange state of affairs, given how many legal and ethical risks are involved. The wage gap is getting more and more attention, and firms with significant executive-to-employee wage disparities will answer to the court of public opinion sooner or later.
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In the wake of a government investigation or prosecution, it’s expected for an organization to shore up their compliance programs. Closing the gap that caused the initial problem is only logical. What doesn’t make sense, however, is implementing overly restrictive controls and overblown processes that look good on paper but offer little substance in terms of results.
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When instances of corruption and cronyism come to light, it’s easy to point fingers and cluck our tongues at the guilty parties. What’s more difficult is looking inward at our own corporate motivations and business practices and uprooting the malicious or purposefully negligent behaviors therein. What harm are we doing on the long-term in the name of short-term gains?
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On a scale of 1 to 10, what’s your organization’s risk appetite? Now, toss that number out the proverbial window. That was a trick question, since your answer should be “it depends.” Some situations allow for potentially risky moves, and others require a more calculated approach. Neither circumstance, when considered alone, can define the company’s risk appetite.
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Despite the existence of the Federal Sentencing Guidelines (instated to allow for leniency toward corporations held criminally liable for the actions of rogue employees), for more than 20 years there were approximately zero instances of the federal government cutting businesses slack based on the merits of their ethics and compliance programs. Until 2012, that is.
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As satisfying as it may feel to point fingers when something goes wrong, finding a scapegoat only serves to focus a group's frustration; it does nothing to solve the underlying problem. Visit a boardroom in the wake of a corporate scandal or tune in to virtually any political discussion and you'll find the blame game isn't an exercise unique to children. How...
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Contrary to popular opinion, there are real, measureable financial benefits to running a “nice guy” business. Jim Nortz explains what it means to be a conscious capitalist, outlines the four tenets firms practicing conscious capitalism follow and provides a roadmap to the type of success its practitioners enjoy. Starbucks, Honda, 3M -- that's good company to keep.
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Most organizations espouse ethical practices, but it's the rare few that operationalize their ethical standards, weaving them into the very fabric of the organization so that their core values are reflected in all of their practices, from hiring and performance reviews to rewards and recognition and firings. Walking out these values doesn't happen by chance.
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