Compliance

In April, as decreed by the Church of England, we commemorate the life of William of Ockham, an English Franciscan friar and scholastic philosopher who has influenced modern organizational theory—but not enough. Peter Drucker’s medieval counterpart offered the observation that “entities must not be multiplied beyond necessity,” although ...

I am married to a lovely Sicilian-born woman. One thing her family has taught me: the value of family loyalty and love. That same principle does not apply when it comes to the relationship between the Apple monitor and Apple.

Recently enacted state legislation that aims to boost hiring may actually jeopardize California employers who are trying to safeguard their existing workers and business assets.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) and Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) could not have been clearer in the FCPA Guidance about their views on the need for incentives to help drive behavior that is ethical and in compliance with the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) when they stated, the “DOJ and SEC recognize that positive incentives can also drive compliant behavior.”

A company in the midst of arbitration proceedings that discovers potential bribery related to the contract at issue faces inherently irreconcilable conflicts ...

Do you remember your childhood fears of a monster in your closet? You were afraid because the closet was a dark, cavernous space and you did not know what might lurk within it. The monster in your contracts closet ...

At the 9th WTO Ministerial Conference in Bali two months ago, 159 countries reached the first global trade deal since the creation of the multilateral trade organization in 1995.

Sometimes our experiences provide important lessons that we can apply in our current jobs. While I served as a federal prosecutor in the District of Columbia, criminologists were pushing the “broken windows” theory ...

Organizations have varied reasons for outsourcing information technology functions to third-party service providers. Companies that outsource may do so to reduce operational cost or for subject matter expertise.

During the holiday season, organizations give and receive more gifts from customers and vendors. Now is the time for companies to refresh employees’ memories about their company’s gifts and hospitality rules.

Reporting wrongdoing at work will never be easy. So why do whistleblowers go ahead?

I assess the effectiveness of the corporate compliance programs of the organizations I monitor. Interviews of company personnel have proven to be one of the most reliable and effective tools in making this assessment. While many of the people interviewed are chosen randomly from the company's employee roster, others are specifically selected due to their position, role or risk profile.