We Need You More than Ever…

Shakespeare tells us, “The truth will out.”  But, what do we do about this truth, and with those who tell it?

UPDATE 10/3/11 – When I first wrote this blog, the focus was on Julian Assange, spokesman and Editor-In-Chief for WikiLeaks, a whistle blower internet site and conduit for news leaks.

You can read that blog a bit further down this column if curiosity compells, but first let’s apply the important principles of whistle-blowing to the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations that are taking place just a short subway ride from my apartment here in NYC.

Having visited the site and talked with several of these people early on, it was – and is – apparent that PEACEFUL is the mantra.  As always, it draws up its opposite to show its ugly head as can be remembered from the marches of Martin Luther King and other demonstrations of non-violent demonstrations.  That came to a head with the infamous “Captain Pepper Spray” police official who – without provocation – visited justice on penned-in female demonstrators.

One of the key elements of “whistle-blowing” is that someone – from the inside – sees a wrong that needs to be righted.  Generally, there is an attempt internally to report this up the line.  Also generally, the complaint is ignored and the complainant is directed to mind their own business.  Worse, their is often a censoring of that individual and even termination.

Why isn’t he being aggressively investigated?  Why isn’t someone WITHIN the department blowing the whistle on this man and others like him?

We need someone brave enough – moral enough – within the halls of the NYC government to let everyone know what is being covered up.  Are there meetings or conversations in which strategies to provoke demonstrators are discussed?  Is there A Collusion of Blue which allows maverick officers to act outside acceptable boundaries to meet the “threat” of peaceful demonstrators?  Although that is nearly impossible at this point, has there been a subtle – or not so subtle – steering of the media away from  the Wall Street Occupiers – to deny them their day in the court of public opinion?

We need to see whistleblowers come forward – safely – early on. Whistleblowers, and what they reveal, are essential to transparency and the public good.

What if a whistleblower within the National Guard at Kent State had spoken up before they had been deployed?  What if a whistleblower were at the meeting where the decision to wage war on Iraq had been reached?  How many lives, how many billions of dollars, could have been saved?  Take a wild guess.

With that thought in mind, I return you to my blog and Assange…

Because of his ongoing centrality in the War Against Truth, let’s dig into what Wikileaks has wrought.

The first revelation to command attention was the release of classified details about the American involvement in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.  Then, along came the release of US diplomatic cables which the White House promptly called “reckless and dangerous.”  That from the very same office that touted Openness & Transparency.

But, it was Wikileaks’ foray into the den of the iniquitous that is drawing intense reaction – the threat to disgorge tons of incriminating files from inside the bowels of the Bank of America (which has not been done as yet).  Finally, the light of day is available by which we can truly determine the extent of greed and criminal behavior which this banking giant has perpetrated on the American public!

Or, not.  Perhaps these bastions of banking benevolence will prove to be lily-white and show up as modern day George Bailey’s of “It’s a Wonderful Life.”  Perhaps the moon is also made of green cheese?

So, I ask you as a fellow citizen of this great country:  what should be the role of the “whistle blower” in both the government and private sector?

I submitted this question to fellow LinkedIn members several months back, one I was compelled to ask given the rampant (no other world) growth – or at least exposure – of Ponzi schemes, corporate rip-offs, avaricious banking practices and other such insults to our financial system.  The list of civil and moral offenses are beyond counting – ranging from the BP Gulf disaster through mortgage fraud through credit card rip-off’s through the sale of bad debt to ruthless bad debt purchasers through … so much more.   How are we to be protected from back-room dealings?

That we have to add governmental systems to that list as well (some “watchdogs” they have been) is galling!  We don’t need less government, we need more (responsible) government and less corrupt actions when it comes to fending off and prosecuting the thieves and criminals among us.

The answer is clear and compelling.  We depend on the honest people within.  More people need to speak out and risk job loss – even job reputation – for the greater good of protecting their fellow Americans.

How important – even necessary – are “whistle blowers” anyway?

Consider; without them we would not have been made aware of:

• Nixon and his duplicity in the Watergate cover-up – Mark Felt
• The dirty secrets of the Viet Nam war via the Pentagon Papers – Daniel Ellsberg
• The lies and manipulations of the Tobacco Industry – Jeffrey Wigand
• Widespread misconduct of the IRS – Jennifer Long
• The corporate criminality in Worldcom and Enron – Cynthia Cooper and Sherron Watkins
• …and the heartbreaker…the abuse at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq – Joseph Darby

If only there had been a whistle blower on the BP Oil Platform!!!  Think of the lives, dollars and environment saved!

There stories are not well known, but here’s an example of a “hero” corporate whistle-blower who helped our government extract $23MM in penalties against a gas-and-oil (surprise!) company called Kerr-McGee.  For his role in making this possible, some $5.7MM of those penalties went to the whistle-blower, Bobby Maxwell.  Well earned, my friend.

Not that this was an easy road for him.  Bobby at the time of the discovery of this malfeasance was an auditor for the famed Minerals Management Service – the same government agency implicated in recent BP problems.

Bobby discovered that Kerr-McGee had been vastly underpaying royalties to the U.S. government (that’s us, kids) on 57 oil leases it held.  When Bobby brought this up to his superiors, they did the only logical and right thing – they let him go.  (Update note:  the same action-reaction happened when a Six Sigma Black Belt was fired by Chase Bank for questioning their sale of a portfolio of bad debt to bottom-feeders in the collections industry.  This blog at:  http://nyti.ms/bTettY)

Back to Bobby:  “I was fired, I was ostracized, I was threatened. I think I was on the right side of history, but I also paid a tremendous price for it,” he was quoted as saying.  Some seven years later, a jury recognized this price and extracted a well-deserved bounty from Kerr-McGee as compensation.

As part of that original question I mentioned above, I queried my LinkedIn respondents as to what they would do if they had that famous “magic wand” to wave and correct excesses.

Many of their answers are below and more will find their way into chapters in my upcoming book, “Written Off – America and Americans,” but I want to share some with you now.  Even more, I would like to hear and include your views and answers.  Check out the categories below, choose one in which you have something you would like to say, and respond here.

Some people would wish that many of these whistleblowers would simply have gone away; to others, they are true American hero’s.  The LinkedIn sampling reflects this, and I have sorted them into a few distinct categories.

Shoot the Messenger

“I personally doubt there’s one whistle blower in ten, if that, who are honorable.  The only whistle blowing I would ever indulge in is to report a murder, or something in that category.  Otherwise, quit the damn job if you don’t like what your company is doing.  (You probably don’t have P&L responsibility, so no great harm done.)”
-R.B., Chicago, IL

Voice of Experience

“It’s a good way to get your ass handed to you. I speak from experience.”
-P.L., Pittsburgh, PA

Reward them

“Give bonuses and Promotions for it!”
-W.J., Santa Barbara, CA

Hang the Evil-Doers High

“’Whistle Blowing’ would come easy to me.  It’s kinda like going to war.  No one wants to die, but those with integrity and honor are willing to in order to protect those they are fighting for.  I would not think twice about my job when it comes to exposing corruption, greediness, and downright theft…

The closest I can come to offering up a possible starting point…is to require across-the-board regulation on financial institutions.  Don’t just inflict fines on these cash flush robbers, but put there a—s in jail!

Another possibility is offer monetary rewards to anyone who suspects corruption and reports it in some kind of regulated way.  In the long run it would be cheaper to spend the money up front instead of at bailout.  Pay the employees and (the general) public to be the “Whistle Blowers,” and protect them when they man/woman-up!

…I’m not sure if I contributed or just ranted, but I feel a little better at any rate.  I so do wish I had a magic wand.  So many have been hurt, and I would love to wave it and have everyone employed again and living in the home they thought they would always have.”
-D.B., Seattle, WA

“I’ll volunteer for the job, for only $100K per year, plus health care benefits, a modest expense account, and a couple of “Body Guards”.  Then, I’ll start a campaign to question the intent of everyone I can find, who looks, walks, talks, and acts, like a ‘crook!’

After I recover from years of having been (personally and professionally) financially humiliated … in about 5-7 years, I may take a cut in salary.  The only problem with my plan is that no one would hire me … too risky!  I might question my boss … could be embarrassing.”
-C.S., New York, NY

“I agree to the idea of whistle blowing.  But against (Goldman Sachs) you better buy a major life insurance before you blow that whistle.”
-B.N., Orange County, CA

It’s all Mental

“I would like to offer a different kind of feedback and offer some quotes by Carl Jung:

Where love reigns, there is no will to power; and where the will to power is paramount, love is lacking. The one is but the shadow of the other.

The man who promises everything is sure to fulfill nothing, and everyone who promises too much is in danger of using evil means in order to carry out his promises, and is already on the road to perdition.”
-M.K., Orlando, FL

Hopeless

“Sorry to say that nobody could have a magic wand for this…the malpractices and manipulations are as universal and as all pervasive as god in the economy and industry.”
-D.G., Bengaluru, India

“There would be no need for whistle blowing if everyone did their jobs.  The political climate in corporate America today is “go along to get along.”  It is safer to act surprised when things go wrong than to attack the system.

I’ve seen too many examples of well intentioned employees being penalized for speaking up.  The so called malcontent may be the only one with integrity in the whole equation.

We’ve never had so many consultants, auditors and other so called experts, and (yet) we’ve never had so much corporate fraud.  (By) killing the messengers … the whole company ends up suffering.”
-W.S., Boston, MA

“One huge problem (deal with cases which) no lawyer will touch just because they will lose their long-term influence if they go up against the big powers.  These types of cases are everywhere. Justice is often not served.

…the only solution is to stick with people who can be trusted to be fair. There are not very many of them.”
-A.C., Dallas/Ft. Worth, TX

“Our Finance minister has promised that Whistle blower shall be protected. I am waiting for it to happen !!!!!!!”
-R.K., Bangalore, India

“I’ve been in a position a couple of times in my career where I was privy to matters where a whistle should have been blown.  I’m not proud to say that I did not blow the whistle.  Why? It would have ruined my life.  I would have been fighting a losing battle against a much, much more powerful entity.  I did, however, walk away from, and not participate in the activities that I believed were unethical.”
-W.F., – Madison, WI

“In these days of yes Sir and quite right Sir, what is the use of whistle blowing?  There are many who behave as if they never heard your whistle.  They, themselves want to snatch (the) whistle and throw it in a corner.”
R.K., Hyderabad, India

Do it from the Inside

“If I had the ‘magic wand’ – I’d charge by the second for my services.  On a serious note.

Whistle Blowing has to be managed within the realm on Corporate Security, Risk Management and Good Intelligence Practices in early warming systems.  It’s almost impossible to create a net that will catch all forms of whistle blowing, as the corrupt practices in financial industry was endemic. Before this we found creative accounting was the big bad guy, who knows what other malignant practices are hidden away from public scrutiny.

As a typical example, how would anyone deal with the likes of Wikileak [when it's back online], or the fact that Iceland is making moves to become a whistle blower haven.”
-J.B., Halifax, UK

“The term whistle blowing says it all.  It’s a wake-up call to those who (would) rather stay asleep and ignorant.

A critical mind and speaking out as such requires independence. A far cry from the position most whistleblowers find themselves in.”
-J.R., Amsterdam, Netherlands

“This really comes down to everyone being aware of things in their surroundings.  If you see something funny or not making common sense or suspicious then you have to make others aware of your findings.  Even if nothing comes out of it, you have done what you can and it is the responsibility of those in higher places to make a decision to address it or not.”
-P.P., London, Canada

“Whilst ethical compliance has many facets, Internal Audit is the means to monitor many of these within the general course of a standard controls audit i.e. standards of business practice, corporate governance and employee relations.

…overall, this monitoring activity helps to ensure that both managers and employees have a clear understanding of the group’s ethical standards of operation and the expectations of our stakeholders.  Managers are also given assurance on their compliance with group standards and any remedial action to be taken is identified.  The Internal Audit team also take a pro-active approach when it comes to educating businesses and management as to the importance of our ethical standards.”
-K.P., New Delhi, India

That’s what they have to say. Your thoughts?