News
Five lessons for bosses from the David Jones scandal 21 June 2010
This is an interesting article written by James Thomson, the editor of SmartCompany.com.au, who draws upon some interesting observations and commentary from Melbourne work place lawyer Andrew Douglas.
Mr Douglas comments “We are inclined to deal with problems when they percolate to the surface. What we miss is that performance management is a daily task.” Your-Call has been particularly successful in this area with its behaviour monitoring tool which operates 24/7 in the background as the regulator of acceptable conduct in accordance with the company or organisations code of conduct/ethics polices.
The independence, security and anonymity provided by Your-Call’s processes helps meet the objective Mr Douglas sees as imperative, namely “companies need to work hard to have a culture where particularly junior staff feel safe enough to actually make a complaint, regardless of the perpetrator’s seniority.”
Keeping compliance on Board 1 July 2010
Increasing the pace of small initiatives to integrate governance, risk and compliance is critical in helping Boards with their capacity to gather and manage real-time data on strategic risks – including compliance risks that can impact upon their legal and/or community license to operate, according to Alf Estaban, general manager of SAI Global.
Visibility of these strategic risks is essential for Boards to undertake their core functions, said Estaban, who noted that regular discussions about the adequacy and effectiveness of programs, coupled with an active review of compliance reporting, are key tools in ensuring Boards are confident in managing compliance risks.
He added that Boards also need to actively promote a culture of ethics and compliance through clear policies and other activities which inform staff about desired behaviours.
“Importantly, Boards should promote a culture of openness and provide access to independent whistleblowing services to reinforce that [they are] serious about wanting to know and address serious breaches or incidents,” said Estaban.
Whistleblowers get protection in federal legislation 18 March 2010
Chris Merritt, Legal affairs editor The Australian
The federal government has accelerated its push for a more open system of government by introducing the first federal law protecting public servants who reveal maladministration.
It plans to reverse decades of government secrecy by protecting public servants who reveal serious wrongdoing to the media.
The new scheme is intended to encourage whistleblowers in the federal public service by giving them the nation’s most extensive system of legal protection and support.
Cabinet secretary Joe Ludwig, who unveiled the scheme in parliament yesterday, was praised last night by whistleblowers and legal academics for delivering a scheme that goes beyond the more limited schemes in force in the states. “It is close to world’s best practice,” said legal academic A.J. Brown.
“It will change the culture of government,” said Peter Bennett, president of Whistleblowers Australia.
The scheme will be contained in a planned public interest disclosure act that will fulfil Labor’s promise to address the problems in the legal system highlighted by the case of convicted whistleblower Allan Kessing.
Workplace bullying still rife in Australian companies 8 September 2009
A recent Drake International survey of over 800 Australia-wide employees has revealed bullying is still rife in Australian workplaces . More than 50% of survey respondents had witnessed bullying behaviour and over 25% had been a target of bullying themselves. Poor management of the issue by Organisations was also revealed as only 30% of bullying targets and less than 50% of witnesses were satisfied with their organisations handling of the situation. More than 50% also noted the bullying behaviour had been going on for over 6 months.
Experts from 17 Countries Agree on Best Practices for Whistleblower Legislation 11 December 2009
Earlier this year, over 30 delegates from 17 countries gathered in Prague to develop a list best practices for whistleblower legislation. The results have just been made available by Transparency International (TI), the corruption-fighting group that organized the gathering, in the form of a document entitled “Recommended draft principles for whistleblowing legislation.”
The document provides recommendations for the scope, disclosure procedures, protection, enforcement, and legislative structure of whistleblower policy. The group agreed on 27 guiding principles for developing whistleblower legislation.
Accompanying the release of the draft principles is an analysis of the whistleblower legislation in ten European countries.