The Morning Risk Report: What is Corruption? in The Wall Street Journal In his ruling in a major Supreme Court decision issued two weeks ago, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that the only form of corruption under the law is outright bribery: money in exchange for an official act. Commentators have expressed concern that this is too […]
The Morning Risk Report: Investment Experts Can’t Spot Liars, And Worse, Think They Can, in The Wall Street Journal A recent study on lies in the financial industry found that although investment professionals “are just a little better than 50-50 in their ability to detect lies, they think they get it right over two-thirds of […]
Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness Richard H. Thaler, Cass R. Sunstein Penguin Books, Revised & Expanded edition (2009) (public library) Summarized by Erick Rabin Introduction Choice Architecture involves organizing any context in which people make decisions. Urinals, stairwells, alarm clocks, school cafeterias, retirement accounts—all of these can be made more efficient and […]
Conflicts of Interest Disclosures, Waivers, Recusals … and Fig Leaves, in The Conflict of Interest Blog Ethical Systems contributor Jeff Kaplan writes about two stories involving conflict of interest disclosures, waivers, and recusals. The key takeaway is that these measures are not sufficient to avoid ethical conflicts if they are treated solely as convenient formalities. Substantial […]
The Most Ethical Companies In The World, in Business Insider The Ethisphere Institute has released its eighth annual list of the World’s Most Ethical Companies. A total of 144 companies were selected, representing 41 industries in 22 countries. Ethisphere’s scoring methodology incorporates (1) ethics and compliance programs; (2) reputation, leadership, and innovation; (3) governance; (4) […]
The Morning Risk Report: DOJ Kleptocracy Initiative Roars With Record Haul, in The Wall Street Journal “The U.S. Justice Department announced on Wednesday a record-breaking asset forfeiture action, moving to seize more than $550 million of allegedly corrupt proceeds from the late Nigerian dictator Sani Abacha and his associates. Calling Mr. Abacha “one of the most notorious kleptocrats […]
Sidetracked: Why Our Decisions Get Derailed, and How We Can Stick to the Plan by Francesca Gino [Important context: this author has several publications retracted or under review] Harvard Business Review Press (2013) (public library) Summarized by Jennifer Fang Overview The adage “the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry” succinctly summarizes […]
The Morning Risk Report: Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be CCOs, in The Wall Street Journal Chief Compliance Officers are in high demand but short supply, and they often leave their positions within a year or two of taking them. One expert opines that “CCOs only last a short while because they either […]
Ethical Systems had another mention in the press earlier this week, courtesy of contributor David Mayer, who was interviewed for an article regarding the latest report from the Ethics Resource Center on the decline of workplace misconduct. The ERC’s National Business Ethics Survey is still making headlines, in part because some observers of business trends […]
#EthSys Insights is a video series where we have experts answer questions about ethical systems design. For our first installment, we turn to contributor Adam Grant, Professor of Management at Wharton. We had the opportunity to ask Adam the following questions and record his responses (the longest video is only 81 seconds): What immediate steps might […]
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