...Whistleblowing and Sarbanes-Oxley This document will describe the key characteristics of a whistleblower and briefly summarize on researched instance of Whistleblowing in one publically traded company within the last 12 months. It will include the details of the issue that the whistleblower reported and the effect of the whistleblower’s actions on both herself and the company. Next, it will evaluate whether or not the whistleblower was justified in reporting the company’s actions. Lastly, it will examine the extent to which the whistleblower would be protected under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. Characteristics For many years, individuals have raised concerns about misconduct, unethical or illegal practices observed at their place of employment to reporters/media, employers’ ethics hotline, management, via labor law posters, or the Office of the Whistleblower. This included employees from private companies, non-profit organizations, and governmental agencies. Employees can report unethical actions regarding public safety, health, business practices, fraud, waste, and abuse. Keep in mind that is does not have to be an employee; it can also be a supplier, contractor, client or any individual who somehow becomes aware of the illegal activities. Despite the fact that unethical behavior occurs within the workplace, there are still several employees that are loyal to the law, the community and society as a whole. These people are known as whistleblowers. Publicly Traded Company One...
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...misbehavior and incidents to their immediate supervisor, union representative, or human resources department) or external means (i.e., going outside their organization to, for example, a third party ombudsman, an external hotline, or an applicable government regulatory agency related to the type of wrongdoing behavior. Internal whistleblowing mechanisms for public companies must comply with the provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX). Two of the many corporate governance provisions of SOX place whistleblower-friendly requirements on issuers. SOX section 301 requires the audit committee of every issuer to establish procedures for the receipt, retention, and treatment of complaints regarding accounting, internal control, or auditing matters, and to maintain the anonymity of employee complaints regarding accounting and auditing matters (i.e., the establishment of a whistleblower hotline). SOX section 806 provides protection for employees who blow the whistle against their employer, an anti-retaliation provision subsequently reinforced by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. Programs to encourage external whistleblowing typically provide an incentive to the would be whistleblower, either in the form of monetary awards, protection from retaliation, or both. Researchers have identified various issues that are most...
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...Week 3 Assignment 1: Whistleblowing and Sarbanes-Oxley Act Michelle M. Webb Dr. Boneita Campbell LEG500 Law, Ethics, and Corporate Governance April 20, 2015 . Week 3 Assignment 1: Whistleblowing and Sarbanes-Oxley Act Who are Whistleblowers and what do they do? Could you be a Whistleblower? There are several definitions for the term whistleblower. The most accurate and significant definitions to the subject of this paper are the definition given by the Black’s Law Dictionary and the one by the Whistleblower Protection Act (WPA). The Black’s Law Dictionary defines a whistleblower as a worker who declines to participate in and informs on the unlawful and/or unjust actions of his co-workers or his employer ("The Law Dictionary", n.d.). The WPA defines whistleblowing as the disclosure of facts an employee deems proof of unlawful acts of, blatant misconduct, exploitation of authority, and could jeopardize public safety (Molzen, 2002). Over the years many U.S. workers have observed unlawful transgressions within the workplace and have come forward to report these actions. The actions of these noble citizens (whistleblowers) have been instrumental in saving enormous amounts of money and countless lives over the years. However, these whistleblowers fail to receive the recognition and admirations they deserve for doing the right thing. More often than not they are badgered, bullied, demoted, and terminated from their jobs for their efforts. Therefore, the act of whistleblowing...
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...Week 3 Assignment 1: Whistleblowing and Sarbanes-Oxley Shirmere N. Gardner Dr. Susan Gerber LEG 500: Law, Ethics & Corporate Governance January 25, 2015 Abstract This text will examine the key characteristics of a whistleblower, as well as the details surrounding the JPMorgan whistleblowing event. The extent to which whistleblowers are protected under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) will also be elaborated. Key Characteristics of a Whistleblower Whistleblowers are individuals who choose to report unethical and illegal activities. Some may work for various organizations such as non-profits and government agencies. Whistleblowing empowers employees to adhere to ethical principles and speak up for things taking place that are unethical, which may affect consumers, citizens or other employees. Such information may be disclosed to company officials, government authorities, and the media. Some of the key characteristics of a whistleblower are that they are altruistically motivated, utilitarian, uninterested in altering their behavior and they allow their own attitudes and beliefs to guide them. Most whistleblowers are often well-educated and hold professional positions (Wines, 2005). JP Morgan Whistleblower According to a Reuters article a JPMorgan whistleblower was compensated $63.9 million in a mortgage fraud deal. “Keith Edwards, a Louisiana resident, had worked for JP Morgan or its predecessors from 2003 to 2008, and had been an...
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...Whistleblowing and Sarbanes-Oxley Assignment 1 LEG 500/Professor Augustine February 3, 2014 A Whistleblower by definition is someone who exposes a person or organization engaged in an illicit activity. Whistleblowers expose those that commit misconduct or an alleged dishonest and/or illegal activity within an organization. The infraction must be a violation of a law, rule or regulation and/or a direct threat to public interest, like fraud, health and safety violations and corruption. In almost every part of society the way information is given becomes the most important objective in the fight against misconduct and malpractice. Obtaining information can be difficult as those involved often make it their best interest in hiding the information from the public and authorities. It really helps to receive information regarding the wrongdoing from someone who has actually witnessed the incident, willing to come forth with intricate details. Whistleblowing can provide resolutions to certain situations by opening thought to be nonexistent and disclosed information sources and connections. Reasons behind whistleblowing can vary. Such as, when someone observes the wrongdoing within their workplace and requests to speak to a figure head of the organization to their morals. Whistleblowing becomes a much stronger case when it involves a large portion of the public. The publicly traded company that I researched was the whistleblowing of Bernard L. Madoff Securities LLC. The company...
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...Assignment 1: Employment-At-Will Doctrine Shanekia Jordan Professor Kimberly Ford LEG 500: Law, Ethics, and Corporate Governance 10/29/2013 Employment-At-Will is a policy that most states in the United States conform to in terms of employment. “At-Will” is when an employer can end a relationship with an employee at any given time, for any reason with the exception of an illegal one, for no reason without having any legal liability. At the same time, the employee is also free to leave their job at any point, for any reason, without any legal consequences. “At-Will” employment does not have a definite period of time, and can be altered by a written contract from the employer. There are exemptions to the doctrine: * Illegal Discrimination: An employee can be protected from an adverse employment action because of their membership in a legally protected class (race, sex, age, disability, etc.) * Retaliation: An employee can also be protected from an adverse employment action if the employee engages in protected activity (whistleblowing, opposing unlawful discrimination practices, etc.) Common law has also created exceptions to employment-at-will. Courts in some states have set limitations by grounds of contract law. Those two approaches include: * “Imply a promise of good faith and fair dealing in the contract of the employment.” * To contractual terms from a handbook, policy statement, or behavior...
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...Assignment 1 – Whistleblowing and Sarbanes-Oxley Tialia Booth LEG 500 – Law, Ethics, & Corporate Governance Strayer University Professor Lateefah A. Muhammad July 20, 2015 Whistleblowing and Sarbanes-Oxley Peter Buxtun. Linda Almonte. John Kopchinski. Edward Snowden. Everett Stern. J. Kirk McGill. The commonality in each of the individuals listed is that they have been identified as a whistleblower. This paper will review the key characteristics of a whistleblower, examine an example of whistleblowing from recent history, provide an opinion on whether or not such whistleblowing was justified by the individual, and finally review the current Sarbanes-Oxley Act to determine to what extent the individual was protected. A whistleblower can be most basically defined as an individual or persons who report and make known unethical and illegal actions taken by their employer. The employer could be a publicly traded or privately held company or a not-for-profit organization. The whistleblower may choose to release their findings and information uncovered within their own company or to outsiders such as the news media, law enforcement officials, or federal regulators. In every case of a whistleblower coming forward there is a shared desire to stop the unethical and possibly illegal behavior or acts being committed and to ensure those who have been affected are identified and hopefully compensated or righted in some way (Halbert, Ingulli, & Frey, 2015). In 2003...
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...Assignment 1: Whistleblowing and Sarbanes-Oxley LEG500030VA016-11 (Law, Ethics & Corporate Governance Professor Timothy Griffin Strayer University Jan Jones July 19, 2015 Describe the key characteristics of a whistleblower, and briefly summarize one (1) researched instance of whistleblowing in one (1) publicly traded company within the last 12 months. Include the details of the issue that the whistleblower reported and the effect of the whistleblower’s actions on both the whistleblower himself and the company. A whistleblower is a person who exposes any kind of information or activity that is deemed illegal, dishonest, or not correct within an organization that is either private or public. The information of alleged wrongdoing can be classified in many ways: violation of company policy/rules, law, regulation, or threat to public interest/national security, as well as fraud, and corruption. Those that become whistleblowers can choose to bring information or allegations to surface either internally or externally. Internally, a whistleblower can bring his/her accusations to the attention of other people within the accused organization. Externally, a whistleblower can bring allegations to light by contacting a third party outside of an accused organization. He or she can reach out to the media, government, law enforcement, or those who are concerned. Whistleblowers also face stiff reprisal/retaliation from those who are accused or alleged of wrongdoing. One whistleblower-related...
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...J Bus Ethics (2015) 131:107–119 DOI 10.1007/s10551-014-2271-z Authentic Leadership and Whistleblowing: Mediating Roles of Psychological Safety and Personal Identification Sheng-min Liu • Jian-qiao Liao • Hongguo Wei Received: 26 July 2013 / Accepted: 22 June 2014 / Published online: 8 January 2015 Ó Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015 Abstract The issues of organizational wrongdoing damage organizational performance and limit the development of organizations. Although organizational members may know the wrongdoing and have the opportunity to blow the whistle, they would keep silent because of the interpersonal risks. However, leaders can play an important role in shaping employee whistleblowing. This study focuses on discovering the mechanisms of how authentic leaders influence employee whistleblowing with a sample from China. Results demonstrate that authentic leadership is positively related to internal whistleblowing. Team psychological safety partly mediates the relationship between authentic leadership and internal whistleblowing. Personal identification partly mediates the relationship between authentic leadership and internal whistleblowing. The study contributes to the extant theory by filling the gap between leadership and whistleblowing. Keywords Internal whistleblowing Á Authentic leadership Á Psychological safety Á Personal identification S. Liu Business School, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Jungong Road...
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...Week 2 Assignment Question /Answers HRM320: Employment Law Professor: Justin Lawrence DeVry University Michael Nealy January 16, 2015 1. What do you think are some of the factors in the modern workplace that contribute to a theft of time? How can those factors be managed? * There are many factors that can contribute to theft of time in the modern day workplace, for instance should you decide to take an extended coffee break, or if you search the internet a little too long when you should be working on other projects that’s considered to be theft of company time. Should you find yourself using the company phone for personal use such as talking to family members and friends rather than staying on task with the work that is at hand then you are guilty of the offense of theft of time. You are in fact stealing the employer’s money by not managing good use of the time that you have. * Here are some way that can best manage those scenarios. Where I work there are three bells that ring that at different times that lets you know when it is break time and when to return from break. The first bell lets you know that’s it’s time for break, the second bell lets you know that you should be returning from break and finally the third bell lets you know that you should be at your workstation. Should be caught too many times not at your work station you could be disciplined. That is one way to manage your time. As for the second scenario the best way to manage the internet...
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...BAC4664 – Internal AuditingSection B01DTrimester 3, 2014/2015 | Internal Auditor and Whistleblowing Policies | Group Assignment | | Prepared by:Gabriella Rena Vanessa Darmadji 1121116458Nur Aida Binti Mohd Jasmin 1121118345 | | | Multimedia University Cyberjaya 2015 | INTRODUCTION Fraud negatively impacts organizations in many ways including financial, reputation, psychological and social implications. According to various surveys, monetary losses from fraud are significant. Thus, the organization has to establish an effective fraud management program that also covers the organization response to the whistleblower in the company. It is clear that corporate have major responsibility in their response of complaints regarding accounting, internal accounting control or audit matters where they have to establish audit procedure for the receipt, retention and treatment of complaints. Moreover, the organization has to build appropriate structure of line of reporting for the internal audit to support the effective fraud management program. The report discuss in deep on the Sarbanes Oxley Act 2002 in relation with bursa listing requirement. Furthermore, the whistleblowing also become the main issues on this report. The thorough discussion about what whistleblowing is and the key characteristics to support good whistleblower hotline also is conferred. REPORT Summary and compare the requirements of section 301.4 of the Sarbanes Oxley Act 2002 and compare those...
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...A Case Study of the Illegal and Unethical Behavior in Corinthian Colleges, Inc. Benancio Varela benancio.varela@yahoo.com GM 591 Leadership and Organizational Behavior Professor Horst August 10, 2011 Introduction Corinthian Colleges, Inc., (CCi) by way of more than 102,000 students enrolled as of March 31, 2011, is one of the leading post-secondary education companies in North America. Their duty is to change students' lives. They present diploma and degree programs that prepare students intended for careers in demand or for advancement in their chosen fields. The corporation operates 105 schools in 25 states and 17 schools in Canada. CCi has 122 Everest, Heald and WyoTech campuses nationwide. CCi serves the great and growing segment of the population seeking to acquire career-oriented education. They propose programs in areas that include health care, business, criminal justice, transportation technology and maintenance, construction trades and information technology. CCi in addition offers students the chance to take classes online through Everest College in Phoenix and Everest University in Florida. Their business was founded in 1995 and they completed an preliminary public offering in 1999. Historically, CCi has developed through acquisitions as well as through organic growth. Organic growth consists of opening new division campuses, remodeling, escalating or relocating existing campuses and adopting curricula into existing colleges. As of December 31, 2010...
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...organizations. A student who is absent from four consecutive class meetings, excluding holidays and emergency cancellation of classes, will be withdrawn automatically from that course. A student will be withdrawn automatically from a mini-session course when he/she misses two consecutively scheduled class meetings. Students not attending scheduled on-ground classes will receive zero points for the weekly discussions. Students arriving to class (or leaving class) more than 30 minutes late/early will receive a 2 point deduction for all discussions. Students arriving (or leaving class) more than 1 hour late/early will receive a 5 point deduction for all discussions. Late Work Submissions If a student anticipates the need to submit work after the due date and the reason for the late submission is covered by the illness/exceptional circumstances policy, then the late policy for academic assignments covered herein does not apply. Students who submit work after the assigned due date that is not covered by the exceptional circumstance...
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...In this assignment I am going to explain my understanding of working practices and strategies that are used to minimise abuse within the health and social care contexts. The caring professions provide some examples of what people thought may have been a good practice of care then but actually is poor or even abusive practice. The main reason why this happens is due to the changes that occurs within working policies. Within my workplace we have different policies that safeguard vulnerable adults, here are some of working practices that I believe help safeguard: • Complaints Policy Effective communication • Record-keeping Policy Risks Assessments • Confidentiality Policy Recruitment procedures • Data Protection Policy Induction • Protection of Vulnerable Adults Policy Training • Whistleblowing Policy Codes of conduct • Care plans – Person Centred Care Reflective practice • Anti – discriminatory / Anti – oppressive practice • Organisations safeguarding policy & procedures Each resident is assessed before arriving at the home, once assessed our nurse manager produces a careplan for that resident. The resident and their family have the right to be involved in developing a meaningful and effective care plan. The nursing home must work with the resident to develop an individualized, written care plan and must update it at least quarterly and any time your condition changes. Each resident important right...
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...Assignment 1: Whistleblowing and Sarbanes-Oxley Yvonne A. Jackson Professor Redman Strayer University Legal 500 October 27, 2014 Whistleblowing and Sarbanes-Oxley There are several characteristics of a whistleblower and they work for a vast number of publicly traded companies. A whistleblower is one who reveals wrong-doing within an organization to the public or to those in positions of authority or one who discloses information about misconduct in their workplace and they feel violates the law or endangers the welfare of others, or one who speaks out, typically to expose corruption or dangers to the public environment. Some whistleblowers are altruistically motivated utilitarian if they feel their company is doing something wrong to hurt the environment they feel they must communicate that with executive members. Another characteristic of a whistleblower is they are uninterested in altering their behavior. They see things in their own light and want the corporation to feel as they do and if the company does not the whistleblower are willing to tell. Whistleblowers also allow their own attitudes and beliefs to guide them. In the case of LAWSON ET AL. V. FMR LLC ET AL, FMR LLC was charged with fraud. They were giving their shareholders bad numbers. The employees felt an obligation to bring the wrong doing to the Board of Directors which pushed them aside telling them they were incorrect. Plaintiffs below, petitioners here, are former employees of respondents...
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