St.Louis Business Journal
PROTECT YOURSELF FIRST, THEN BLOW THE WHISTLE

By Anna Navarro

December 2007  

Author's note: Client stories in this column are based on actual situations fictionalized to protect privacy and told with permission.



Ted worked for an American shoe company that copied expensive shoe styles and made cheap knock-offs. He had no ethical problems with that. But on a recent trip to China he’d seen something that horrified him.

He’d stumbled on the fact that the plant handling most of their production farmed out much of its work to sweatshops that hired young children working in abysmal conditions.

He’d made the discovery while tracking down a quality defect. In response to his probing questions, the plant representative revealed some shoes were produced off-site. He’d tried to take it back. But Ted, who’d already triple checked the manufacturing process on site, realized it was the only plausible explanation for the problem.

Intent on resolving the issue, he asked to visit the place where the shoes were made. At first they insisted he had misunderstood. But he kept hammering away at it until they acquiesced. What he saw alarmed him.

Young children, many of whom he guessed were under 10, were working in a dirty, cold, poorly lit environment. He was appalled and immediately emailed his boss who told him to report home right away.

On return, he met with senior management. They seemed very concerned and promised to take care of the problem. But weeks went by and Ted heard nothing. When he inquired, he was told their Chinese partner was no longer farming out manufacturing.

He was reassigned to a job that didn’t require travel to China. Now he only communicated with the Chinese plant via email.

Ted asked several more times about what had been done about the situation. His boss continued to assure him the problem had been resolved.

Ted, the father of two young children, didn’t believe anything had changed. He was seriously wondering whether to blow the whistle. That’s when he came to see me.

I said I admired him for wanting to blow the whistle and urged him to follow his conscience. But I also said he needed to protect himself in advance of such a move.

I suggested he make detailed notes of what he’d observed, what he’d told management, and what they’d told him. And that he put those notes, along with any relevant documents that supported his story, (like records of the manufacturing problem he had been chasing down) in a safe place, away from the office.

I also advised him to make sure his personnel file reflected what he had reported, and list by date the number of times he had asked if something had been done. We decided that the best way to do that was to insert it in his response to his next performance review, which was due in three months. His manager would have to sign the review, and he’d have proof that he’d objected to the situation.

Most important, I asked him to consider getting out of the company before he blew the whistle. He needed to be in a safe place, with his future assured before he took management on. While there are laws to protect whistle blowers, hostile management can make life miserable. And finding new employment can be difficult.

My suggestions weren’t easy for Ted. He was so incensed that he just wanted to do something. But in the end, he followed the plan I outlined.

It took him four months to find a new job. It was a good position with a bigger company and he actually improved his situation. He did the best he could to check out that the new company had good policies regarding child exploitation and enforced them.

Then he came back saying he was out of harm’s way and wanted to blow the whistle. I asked if he wanted to be in the center of the battle and he said he didn’t, he just wanted the situation to change.

I outlined how to do some Internet research to find a reporter who might be interested in the story. Six months later the story broke. Ted’s name never surfaced. His former company suffered severe consequences both in the market and legally.

A situation like this requires you to exercise independent judgement. Just because your boss (or the board, or company auditors) say that they have taken care of things doesn’t make it so. You have to follow your own conscience. But it’s also important to protect yourself in advance because negative consequences can befall you for doing what is right.

Anna Navarro is the founder of Work Transitions, a nationwide career consulting firm that trains independent career strategists and consults with individual clients.

This column was originally published by the St. Louis Business Journal. The actual title of the column and date in which it appeared in the Business Journal may be slightly different from what appears on WorkTransitions.com.