Being Compliant And Ethical

From time to time, I like to let you know of inexpensive (or sometimes free) tools that might help guide your thinking as you begin or continue to roll out new compliance processes. I noticed a couple interesting new Web-based survey tools that help assess employee attitudes and awareness of integrity and antifraud risks as part of an ethics program evaluation.

I found it interesting because it got me thinking about all the compliance-related products out there designed to document controls. Of course there is some urgency in doing just that, but how many companies truly understand what it is they are trying to control? Perhaps you have potential controls issues that are based on attitudes and beliefs that have been allowed to flourish unchecked.Working Values Ltd., Hawthorne, NY, a subsidiary of SmartPros Ltd., is making available the Ethics Risk Assessment Web-based survey tool, developed by the Metrus Group, and the Culture Risk Assessment survey, which is adapted from the Corporate Transformation Tools developed by Richard Barrett & Associates

The Ethics Risk Assessment measures employee perceptions and attitudes on 36 questions, providing guidance on how well the company is doing in meeting its compliance goals and where it needs to focus its training and communication efforts.

The Culture Risk Assessment helps translate soft qualitative data on values into quantitative data that can be reported internally and externally; provides a baseline measurement for monitoring changes in organizational culture; and helps measure the resources available to the organization to meet its integrity goals.

According to Working Values president, David Gebler, many of the organizations that have identified their legal risks and have implemented comprehensive controls and processes stop there, without the means of determining management's confidence level that their people will do the right thing when confronted with an ethical dilemma, and what the organization can do to create the necessary ethical environment.

The surveys are available in both online and offline deployment options, and can be customized to address topics and content that are unique to an individual organization. Pricing for the Ethics Risk Assessment is based on the number of the participants and the number of reports. For 1-500 participants, the survey is priced at $1,200 and includes one global report and 1 hour of consultation with a business ethics advisor who will review the results and provide suggestions for next steps.