Combating Corruption – Yes, that’s an IG Issue!

Information governance best practices play a crucial role in helping companies comply with Principle 10 of the UN Global Compact (not to mention a slew of other laws, ordinances, regulations, and guidelines like the United Nations Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC), the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), the UK Bribery Act, the Canadian Corruption of Foreign Public Officials Act (CFPOA), etc. AND virtually every complex commercial contract)! 

Companies that either run afoul of these laws or that the failure to monitor their supply chain partners’ compliance with them not only run the risk of significant sanctions but become known as corporate bad actors and breaching their most important contracts! None of this is good. 

And, in today’s interconnected world, where even a regional company can have hundreds of vendors and business partners, ensuring that your staff continually has the right information at the right time is only becoming increasingly critical!

Here are a few ways that you can apply IG best practices to enable and improve your anticorruption compliance strategy:

Supply Chain Governance: Regularly audit your compliance process to assess partners’ anti-corruption policies and practices, using standardized procedures that prevent disparate naming of records (robotic process automation/RPA and other similar technologies should also be deployed to reduce the risk of human error).

Metadata and Search Management: Use metadata tagging and advanced search capabilities within your document management system to enable the quick identification of sensitive information related to your financial transactions and improve your transparency and accountability.

Training Programs: Regularly review your training materials to ensure that they address current laws and standards, allow staff to identify and report corrupt practices, and reporting mechanisms, and educate your staff on the consequences (personal and organizational) of non-compliance.

Accountability Measures: Implement robust access controls and accurate audit trails to monitor and trace modifications made to sensitive data.

Data Accuracy and Verification: Use both information governance best practices and automation tools to ensure that data presented in regulatory submissions is accurate and verifiable

Anticorruption compliance is everyone’s issue, and IG best practices combined with the right suite of technological solutions, strategies, and training are a critical part of the solution process!

#informationgovernance #supplychain #anticorruption