Hello again, I hope you’re keen to learn more about ethics and transparency to ensure your business becomes increasingly “pure”. Do you remember we talked about juice production?
Now we have established a code of ethics, we can reap the benefits. But what if some apples are spoiled in the transport stage?
Bear in mind that one bad apple could ruin your whole crop.
You could suffer financial losses, for example fines, be excluded from bidding in tenders with government entities and, most important, your reputation could be permanently tarnished.
Although you have a good code of ethics, you may encounter issues in your day-to-day business that could lead to conflicts of interest. These arise when individuals place their personal interests above those of the company to gain undue advantages.
The association and relationship with public bodies is part of the company’s routine activities. From the payment of taxes to participation in tenders, the risk of the illegal payment of “backhanders” to gain advantages will always exist.
To avoid a conflict of interest, when scheduling meetings with government representatives or rival companies, you should advertise the meeting transparently and publish the agenda on your own website.
Send more than one employee to the meetings and document all the issues addressed in the discussions.
Many irregularities may occur in the company accounting procedures. A “second pair of eyes” accounting policy will also help you eliminate problems like unrecorded funds or parallel accounting. It’s not more bureaucracy you need, it’s transparency!
You should also apply the same care and attention when contracting third parties, and always conduct a thorough check on your business partners.
Never forget the saying: “people judge you by the company you keep.”
After all, you don’t want to pick a bad apple from your crop to ruin the end-product, right?
Even with your best endeavours, rotten apples can still creep into your production process.
In the next video, we’ll look at the mechanisms for reporting and fighting corruption to produce a 100% pure juice.
Integrity generates confidence!
Invest in integrity!
Alliance for Integrity
![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/NLKGVB3PNqw/maxresdefault.jpg)