Asset Protection Through Whistleblowing
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb025641 |
| Published date | 01 March 1994 |
| Date | 01 March 1994 |
| Pages | 121-131 |
| Author | Gerald Vinten |
| Subject Matter | Accounting & finance |
Asset Protection Through Whistleblowing
Gerald Vinten
Gerald Vinten
is Whitbread Professor of Business Policy
at the University of Luton and Director of
Research in the Faculty of Business.
Editor of the Managerial Auditing
Journal, he serves as Second Deputy
President and Chair of the International
Relations Committee of the Institute of
Internal Auditors, UK and Ireland. He has
over 200 publications, and is editor of the
book 'Whistleblowing — Subversion or
Corporate Crime?' due to be published
by Paul Chapman Publishers, London, in
the summer of 1994.
ABSTRACT
Considerable reliance is placed upon
whistleblowers in protecting assets and
detecting and avoiding financial crime. Des-
pite this, they suffer persecution and often
dismissal,
and find they are abandoned by
the organisations they thought they were
helping,
and by society at large whose wider
interests they imagined they were serving.1
There are some signs of recognition of the
contribution they make and the injustices
they suffer, but equally there continues to
be opposition. Internal audit whistleblowers
are highlighted in case studies to indicate
the ambivalent situation they find them-
selves in,2 and to highlight the problems that
any employee may face. There is an urgent
need to provide legal and other protections
to whistleblowers.
It is through whistleblowing
—
inform-
ing on the illegal or unethical practices
of one's organisation
—
that an organisa-
tion may discover where its assets need
protection, and minimise or avoid finan-
cial crime. Despite the positive benefit to
be derived, whistleblowers tend to be
regarded as disloyal rather than as com-
mitted employees. It is to be hoped that
there will indeed be a debate on the
ways in which whistleblowers may be
regarded as beneficial, and sustain the
least harm, and that reconciliation may
be achieved with their organisation
whenever possible. It is also possible to
suggest how the activity may be har-
nessed to the good of the organisation
and so become a positive asset. Internal
auditors are privy to much of what goes
on in an organisation, and will be in a
conflict of interest situation if they
encounter corporate wrongdoing that
impacts on the public at large.3 It is use-
ful to concentrate on the case of internal
auditors as a shorthand for other profes-
sionals who may need to think through
similar issues.
DEFINITION
Although frequently talked about, it is
rare to find a definition of whistleblow-
ing, beyond pointing to the football
ref-
eree blowing the whistle to draw
attention to an undesirable situation for
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