Accountability

The Growing Costs of Incivility Are Negatively Affecting Business Performance

The Security Executive Council’s Analysis Recently, I read a study by The Security Executive Council that identifies increasing incidence of incivility and related negative behaviors, including rule breaking, disorder, and violence, that is costing U.S. businesses billions of dollars in lost productivity and absenteeism attributable to incivility. The report identifies environments such as retail floors, […]

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Trump is Accelerating the Removal of Agency Heads: Should We Be Concerned?

Trump Removes Top Government Ethics Official By now you have likely heard that President Trump removed the head of the Office of Government Ethics (OGE) from his post in one of many executive orders issued since he took office just three weeks ago. The agency’s director, David Huitema, was confirmed to the post by the

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Undetected Material Weaknesses in Financial Reporting Controls: Who is to Blame?

Is it a Personnel Issue? Recently, a reporter from the Wall Street Journal, Mark Maurer, asked to interview me about the question: “Are companies picking a new finance chief after detecting a material weakness in their financial reporting controls, at least in part due to a shortage of skilled accounting staff?” The idea is that the two

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Does ESG Reporting Matter?

Measuring Sustainability Performance I have previously blogged about the link between ESG reporting and sustainability. In this blog, I will briefly address the question of whether gathering and reporting ESG data really matters. ESG reporting provides a specific framework for evaluating and measuring a company’s sustainability performance. It assesses a company’s ESG-related risks and opportunities by providing

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Regulatory Actions Taken Against Boeing: The Problems with 737 MAX

Ignoring Quality Controls to Maximize Profits The case of Boeing and its manufacturing deficiencies and production flaws is a tale of what can happen when a company puts profitability over safety. Most readers will be aware of the Boeing airplane crashes between 2018 and 2024 that threatened the very existence of a manufacturing company whose

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Boeing: Putting Profits Ahead of Safety

How Corporate Culture Drove Decision-Making The story of Boeing is it placed profits ahead of safety and the result has been a series of crashes/mechanical problems that have led to inspections by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and litigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). In this blog I will address the culture

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When Should You Blow the Whistle?

02/29/2024A Cautionary TaleI’ve always been intrigued by the philosophy of whistleblowing. It is an act of conscience and notmotivated by self-interest.A broad view of whistleblowing is the disclosure by organization members (former or current) of illegal,immoral, or illegitimate practices under the control of their employers, to persons or organizations thatmay be able to affect action.

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Words of Caution for Educators Using ChatGPT

A Mixed Reaction From Students It is becoming clear that ChatGPT is not a fad and will continue to be used increasingly in colleges and universities. The use of ChatGPT and other AI in education can be met with resistance because its use can walk a fine line between questionable integrity and employing a valuable

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