Corrupt Manager 11

[bigbang]

Several years ago I worked for a manager who I believed was taking financial "kickbacks" from contractors.
I had no hard evidence to prove this but was told by one of these contractors this was occurring. He told me if I ever brought this up they would deny all knowledge.

This manager was not a nice person and was very "street wise". Being a young naive engineer I would have stood no chance against his cunning so at the time decided to keep quiet and not reveal my suspicions to senior management.

I have since moved on to another company but the manager has stayed with the original company and has been promoted to a senior management position. I often think about this
situation and wonder if I took the correct course of action by keeping quiet.

I have recently found out from previous colleagues that they also had their suspicions and also decided to remain quiet.

My question is:
Did I do the correct thing by keeping quite and how would other people have reacted?

 

[BobPE]

Intersting question bigbang. I am assuming that this was an "industry exempt" engineer. I am only assuming this to clarify my response. I am a professional engineer and if that person we a fellow professional engineer, I would have not choice but to report him, and he would know that. So all involved would know that it was not be trying to backstab, it was actually a set of ethics that we prescribe to when licensed that require me to report him.

Being industrial exempt as an engineer, there really are not ethical guidelines to follow. Being in your position I think I would also choose to be quiet on the issue since the ultime outcome could be loss of your job in the ensuing backstabbing defense carried out by the person you accused.

If you were an expempt engineer at the time, you would also share in not have ethical guidelines established for you to report the issue. You obviously have very high personal ethics from your post, but with no professional ethics for you to follow, the company need not benefit from your personal high ethics since that is not what they are paying you for.

I know its an odd response to your post, but I have had to give this a lot of thought when talking to my friends that are exempt, I think things like this are quite common in industry. As such, I tend to think of industrial exempt engineers as slaves to their employer since the employer and the employers management chain are what you respond to and not your professional status.

Now if you are a PE then I think it is duty to notify supporting agencies inside and outside the company to what you have learned and let them handle it.

Good post....

BobPE

 

[RDK]

A number of years ago I was in a similar situation. I was working for government and one of the mangers, my level not senior to me, had an interesting scheme. When the central purchasing agency put contracts on the street he would contact the bidders and tell them that he could fix things for them and guarantee the contract. He would then let the normal bidding process take its course (but with much higher prices since the bidders all thought that they had it in the bag and could make back the bribe and something extra) and then give back the money to anyone who was unsuccessful. The successful bidder would go on thinking he had bought the contract and the unsuccessful bidders had no option. How could they complain that they were unsuccessful in bribing a public official when they had got their money back?

This came to my attention through a friend who was a contractor, not bidding on our work, who heard it through a supplier who was complaining about the process. I contacted an acquaintance who was an RCMP officer in their commercial crime division and was told that this would be almost impossible to prove. I brought the matter to the attention of our mutual boss who assigned another manager at our level to investigate. Turns out the investigator was also involved. Needless to say the investigation “proved” that I was wrong and that everything was fair and above board. It did however put a stop to the practice.

I was then put through a couple years of on the job hell for making false accusations. They also tried to make some counter accusations but were not able to make anything stick. (I was accused of taking free lunches from a contractor. The contractor was a friend as well as a supplier and we took turns buying lunches, because of our friendship he had never been approached in this scheme. Good thing I kept most of my receipts. They had detailed records of when and where we had gone for lunch, the accuracy of their observations was confirmed by my credit card receipts.)

The manager took a lateral move to the same job at another location where he did the same thing. This time it was his boss who found out and conducted the investigation. Just before the boss was ready to make his move the manager took another lateral transfer to a third location where he once again did the same thing. This time his history caught up with him quickly and just before the police were coming to arrest him, he committed suicide. After that the first boss came and apologized to me for not supporting me since he said that he had had his doubts about the two managers involved.

If faced with the same situation would I blow the whistle? Yes just not in the work unit but outside to someone in authority to make a full and impartial inquiry. I would also get some better documentation and proof ready before I proceeded. If outside contractors are telling you about it then tape record them get a witness or do something so that they cannot deny it afterwards. Get one willing to go on the record and testify if necessary. Remember any significant amount of money is difficult to hide from the tax man.

Finally make sure that nothing that you have done can be misconstrued. Some of the suppliers would give us ball caps, coffee mgs etc. as advertising. I always passed them on to others in the organization. Since I had been generous and fair in handing them out it was easy to prove that I was not taking favours from the contractors. I would often take a half dozen or so and throw them on the table in the canteen for first come first served. I also always refused the offers of bottles at Christmas time. Any that were left behind went into the supply for the office Christmas party. The two involved managers claimed that they were never offered bottles and so had never donated them to the party fund. These practices helped my weather their counter allegations.

I do disagree with BobPE that the industrial exemption or even professional ethics has anything to do with your actions. Simple business ethics and your responsibility as a citizen require that take steps to combat a crime. If you came on a street mugging would your professional ethics be the main concern in cooperating with the police or would your normal civic duty be the reason that you cooperated? The only place that being a professional would be involved would be in where you would make your allegations. If both you and the accused are professional engineers then the engineering association would have to become involved. If one of you is not a P.Eng you would not have to contact the association.

Rick Kitson MBA P.Eng

Construction Project Management
From conception to completion

http://www.kitsonengineering.com

 

[DaveVikingPE]

RDK,

I'm hoping your ex-friends not only apologized by made up for the hurt they caused monetarily. Corruption in the construction business is nothing new, but it's still ugly. I don't like to receive anything from suppliers or anyone else. I don't like "hanging out" with vendors or contractors or whomever as long as there is a "you work for me" or similar relationship. They should respect this.

When it comes to a coworker taking a kickback or scamming in anyway once you find out, you're an accessory if you don't somehow report it. However, if you do not have solid evidence, you might be falling for someone else's game to get back at that person. Beware.

 

[BobPE]

That was a terriible strory RDK...It's great you made it through it ok.

I saw your comment on what I said. Everyone has personal integrety, even engineers....LOL Professional Engineers also have professional obligations that industry exempt dont have.. Our professional agencies wouldn't give a rats ass about things like this however, I don't answer to them, I answer directly to the State I am licensed in.

The point I was trying to make was that without professional licensure, all that a person has to fall back on is personal etchic, which in most cases is very high. But they will be persecuted in doing so. As a professional there are state laws that help me. Even though I may be outraged personally, I would file state complaints through my professional status, an option industry exempt engineers do not have by design. I can file on any person perceived by me to be acting improper or unethical in the engineering business which includes industry, construction, public and private. Don't discount professionals, we take a lot of heat and are faced with these problems every day, and we do not have the option of walking away.


BobPE

 

[JOM]

Dear bigbang,

Your question is "Did I do the right thing in keeping quiet?" I say yes.

I say that 'cos at the time you were a "young, naive" engineer. You could have seriously harmed yourself by taking action. I expect that today you'd be much better placed to sort the fellow out. It's not up to young people to correct these things, but more mature, experienced people.

We also have to be aware that innocent people have been seriously injured through false allegations or rumours.

Cheers,
John.

 

[etch]

I must have a much more cynical view of the world than the rest of you. Do you honestly think that senoir management do not collude to ensure people get contracts, and that work is "shared " evenly. I have seen bidders phoned up and asked to sharpen thier pencil and subsequently gewt the job/contract. I have seen managment wined and dined by companies trying to solicit thier business. Look at the cartels operating in steel. Price fixing by Hasbro with two main uk stores.

I think it is totally niave to think that kickbacks do not happen, and i think that at higher levels it is far more common, if not more subtle that first thought.

You have to ask what is a kickback, is getting a mug from a company that sits on your desk a kickback? no? what about a bottle of whisky at christmas? No, what about a case of whisky at christmas? I have had these all sent as gifts to me in the past simply for continuing to supply buisness to certain companies.

I have heard of directors handing over envelopes to buyers to secure jobs and have seen managers taken out to casinos on customer accounts.

 

[DaveVikingPE]

etch,

In some circles of industy (say, dredging), "sharing" the work is the regular order of business. Sometimes it's illegal, but bid rigging, insider trading, outright bribery, etc. is here to stay, as we cynics knew already.

I agree with JOM that it's not the place for "young people to correct these things." My reasoning is that inexperienced personnel might not have all the facts and can get themselves in a lot of trouble if they don't practice self control. If the "whole place is on the take," leave.

 

[PM]

BigBang you quite rightly and ethically remained silent. It is a scurrilous thing to make allegations or pass gossip without first hand evidence (and clearly you had none).

Couple of comments though.[ol][li]Inexperience, whether you're young or not, is no justification for inaction when the circumstances warrant. Just like in technical engineering matters, there are always experts available to offer advice how to proceed, and man this is a subject that even the experts should seek advice before taking precipitous action. So young engineers out there take note. While BigBang was right in this case, please don't remain silent if faced with credible accusations just because you're inexperienced.[/li][li]The apparent villain might (or might not be the Manager), but the clearly guilty party is your whistle blower. He's proved himself to be unethical by wispering accusations into the phone, but won't contact the proper authorities. Furthermore, he claims he'll lie if questioned on his accusations. This guy is real scum and should be avoided at all cost, even to the point of rejecting his bids. It might even be appropriate to notify your superiors of this guy's slanders against your Manager's good reputation (tongue firmly planted in cheek) so that they can deal with him. I'm aware of a few cases in my career where young engineers were "induced" by constructors to make unsubstantiated accusations against colleagues only to find themselves standing alone when it came to substantiating the accusations.[/li][/ol]
Actually BigBang, you not only were ethical, you were quite smart to avoid this obvious and clumsy attempt by your contractor "friend" to coopt, if not compromise you. Consider this. An engineer collegue of mine was found guilty of liable a while back and assessed a $300,000 fine for unsubstantiated accusations made against a contractor(originating from a wisper in her ear).
Regards,

 

[DaveVikingPE]

PM,

You make an excellent point about the whistleblower not being ethical. When rumors fly, I tend to ignore them. If something is fishy, be out in the open about it - but be smart about it.

 

[alan999]

Your responsibilities seem pretty clear to me. Without evidence to back up your suspicions, you did the right thing in not reporting to some authority. After all, you may have ben wrong, and you could have blackened the name of an innocent person. Only if there was a confidential and impartial ethics committee should you have considered venting your suspicions.

Had you uncovered evidence of wrongdoing, you would have been duty-bound to present it to your superiors, preferably someone senior to him/her. We all have a responsibility to behave with integrity; any manager taking bribes is acting illegally, and would give the profession a bad image.

The same would be true of any position, and many companies (and governments) have declared it a disciplinary offence.

 

[Watermelon]

In business there is no such thing as honesty, just varying degrees of dishonesty.

 

[buzzp]

I would not have said anything without first hand knowledge. If you have a reliable source then I would have considered it. If you have proof then you must report it. I think it is everyones responsibility to report illegal or unethical activities regardless of the consequences, newbie or seasoned veteran. How you report it is open for discussion. Unfortunately, the world is driven by dollars and what steps are taken to get dollars is irrelevant. This philosphy used to be rare but now it is commonplace. If more people were to speak out then we could turn the table on this trend. I happen to be a 'wavemaker' and I enjoy being the only one to speak up when it is required. This has gotten me places I probably wouldn't have gotten without this trait. Granted, sometimes this has caused head-aches. But if what I point out is right and the managers, CEO's or whatever don't appreciate this then I do not want to work for them anyway. If it is a good company, they will recognize this as a benefit to the longevity and profitability of the company. Don't be a 'yes man' as these guys stick out like fluorescent paint and are doomed to a limited career within a particular company. Real CEO's want managers who think for themselves, are not afraid to challenge superiors or question there decisions in a respectful way. Sorry, got off subject a little but your on the right track.

 

[kvram]

Dear Mr.Bigbang,
Let me add my feelings about your question with my experience. Honesty ,sincerity and hard work pay divedends any where. Regardless of senior or junior you need to notify the correption and take a measure. As your case happened to your senior , you could have informed to top management with proof so as to protect your followers since you made up your mind to come out from your present job. Opportunies are wide open for a talented person
Thank you

 

[plasgears]

I blew the whistle on a contractor-connected corruption many years ago. To make a long story short, action was taken on a high level in a large corp., and there was a shake-up in management. The facility was closed, and the function (R&D) was moved to another plant.

Do I regret it? No. I took action after I was fired for investigating an irregularity in my project. Delivered materials were marked with a strange company name. The corrupt manager created a ghost company that was acting as an intermediary between my contractor and the company. He was found to be an officer in the ghost company. I decided to act when I discovered that the culprit was spreading poison about me in my next job after leaving the company.

 

[GEPartal]

A few words about corruption. It really does not matter what is your profession or rank. Corruption is WRONG and needs to be reported and eradicated.

It’s a matter of conscious. A person without principles will be easily corrupted. But, keep you guard high if you think you are a person with high standards. The lure of money is very powerful.

The only way to personally fight this is to make a conscious decision… NOW, that you will not fall in such a trap – not matter what.

It all boils down to personal integrity. And it seems that this word, integrity, is one that many people do not have in their dictionary. Or they quickly forget when the opportunity presents itself.

I know this sounds like a sermon, and I guess it is.

My line of business has been sales and marketing in the petrochemical industry and I have seen plenty of examples of what we are talking about here. And, I need to remind myself of these principles often.

Just food for thought…

Gustavo Partal
gep@portraitreflections.com

 

[aknedy]

first i understand corruption as an agressive action against the company interests, that mean for some personal effort this people are ready to bring a big problems to company.
in this case i would keep quite and try to pass through other people undirect messages to the managment about corruption.
second i would not help in any activeties where he will make corruption.

 

[AlohaBob]

A contractor claims he would deny making the accusation if it were repeated. Why does he whisper scandal, then deny it?

It sounds as if you did the right thing for the wrong reason.

Pursuing it is like propagating rumors.

Not pursuing it out of fear isn't right either.

Perhaps the right thing to do is confront the contractor to stand up to his word, or stop the character assasination.