This transcript has been auto generated
00;00;02;29 - 00;00;30;11
Jonathan Porter
Welcome to another episode of Husch Blackwell's False Claims Act Insights podcast. I'm your host, Jonathan Porter. In earlier episodes, we talked about how serious False Claims Act investigations can be. They're an existential threat, if not handled properly. We've talked about some of the consequences of false claims at resolutions. Some cases gone awry. We told a story in our last episode about a company that was held responsible under the FCA for the actions of one of its employees.
00;00;30;26 - 00;00;52;08
Jonathan Porter
And we've talked about how the primary source of False Claims Act investigations is whistleblowers, often employees who sound a compliance alarm internally that may fall on deaf ears, or where at least that employee may think that their complaints have fallen on deaf ears. And how that employee can then file an under SEAL team that launches a federal investigation.
00;00;52;29 - 00;01;19;10
Jonathan Porter
Today we're talking about that first piece, that pre whistleblower piece. We're talking about how companies can avoid many of their false claims act problems by maintaining a culture of compliance. We'll talk about proactive checks. We'll talk about reactive investigations of reported shortcomings. We'll talk about how companies can be intentional about their corporate compliance. And joining me to talk about corporate compliance is my friend Adam Briggs.
00;01;19;26 - 00;01;55;11
Jonathan Porter
Adam is an associate general counsel with United Parcel Service UPS, where Adam handles a wide ranging portfolio of regulatory enforcement risk areas for UPS's global operations. Earlier in Adam's UPS career, Adam ran internal investigations into compliance issues for UPS throughout UPS's Asia Pacific operations, and he also worked at UPS headquarters here in Georgia. Adam took a four year hiatus from UPS to serve as chief compliance officer for the Mayo Clinic, running a large team of compliance professionals for Mayo Clinic.
00;01;55;25 - 00;02;07;25
Jonathan Porter
And what what better person to talk about creating a culture of compliance than UPS? Associate General Counsel Adam Briggs. Adam, welcome to the podcast. Thanks for joining me to talk about corporate compliance today.
00;02;08;08 - 00;02;28;18
Adam Briggs
Thank you, Jonathan. You're charitable as always, and I'm glad to be here. This is a topic I've come to know well, both compliance programs and the False Claims Act. I think probably the first major litigation matter I worked on as a junior associate ages ago in Wisconsin was in private practice, was was a false claims act matter learned a ton about it and it's sort of been a part of my life ever since.
00;02;28;26 - 00;02;45;24
Jonathan Porter
That's great. So let's make clear, Adam, at the get go that you're not speaking on behalf of UPS, you're not speaking on behalf of the Mayo Clinic. And so in order to do that, let's set the stage using an example that is far, far away from ups, far, far away from Mayo Clinic. So it's clear we're not talking about your current or former employer.
00;02;45;24 - 00;03;06;27
Jonathan Porter
So I want to go back to a noteworthy FCA settlement for a few years back that we talked about on this Podcast's very first episode is a prominent university that employed a researcher that was faking a large number of tests that were part of research being paid for by the NIH. So federal dollars for faked research, that's what we're talking about.
00;03;06;27 - 00;03;32;04
Jonathan Porter
Media reports on that case say that the whistleblower there who received over $30 million for blowing the whistle, that whistleblower blew the whistle inside the university for quite a while, telling people within the university that this researcher was faking results. But those allegations just fell on deaf ears within the university. Now, I don't know that that's true, but let's say it's true for the purposes of this discussion.
00;03;32;04 - 00;03;55;04
Jonathan Porter
Adam So only later did the whistleblower file a key item after alarms were sounded internally. So Adam, that makes me think that this university, which I'm sure did not enjoy the negative publicity that went along with settling allegations of grant fraud could potentially have avoided all of this if they had taken steps on the front end to investigate those allegations internally.
00;03;55;22 - 00;04;24;19
Jonathan Porter
To me, when it comes to False Claims Act defense, that old adage the best defense is a good offense. I think that rings true and the good offense here is a robust compliance program. So Adam, for those listeners who aren't familiar with corporate compliance, set the stage for us a little by talking generally about corporate compliance, its role in a corporation, and whether you agree with me about it, paying dividends in the form of fewer government investigations.
00;04;25;01 - 00;04;54;12
Adam Briggs
Thanks, Jonathan. Yeah. First, I want to say I appreciate the that disclaimer earlier. I am definitely here to share my own perspective today of not here on behalf of my current employer or my prior employers. And the views that I have here are my own. They don't necessarily reflect the views of the organization I work for now or used to, but with that, out of the way, yes, I think corporate compliance is critically important topic really for any business, but particularly for those who want to do business with the federal government.
00;04;54;12 - 00;05;26;03
Adam Briggs
And I'll come back to that. But when we talk about corporate compliance, I think it's important to differentiate between compliance program and compliance culture. I think in 2024, you really need to have both, even if you're not a government contractor. But what I mean, when I differentiate well, first, I think a compliance program is really there to define important things like the values, the policies, expectations, processes, guardrails that really encourage people to act legally and ethically and responsibly and provide clarity on what's expected.
00;05;26;03 - 00;05;43;18
Adam Briggs
When do you need to call someone in compliance? When do you need to go to legal? When do you need to go to H.R.? Trying to make it clear for any employee which things are empowered to decide on their own and which things need to be brought into a compliance person. Culture is really more about human behaviors. It's something that doesn't exist on paper, right?
00;05;43;18 - 00;06;07;00
Adam Briggs
It's the habits and rituals that people practice, even if they're not technically required to in a document somewhere. So that's harder to quantify, but it's no less important because I think in an example, like you talked about with a very large and sophisticated organization, there certainly was a compliance program there, but some things still went wrong. So let's take a step back to compliance program.
00;06;07;07 - 00;06;36;00
Adam Briggs
I see this as sort of a three legged stool, three key components. And I've always sort of analogize this to health care even before I worked in the health care sector. I like to think of it in terms of prevention, diagnosis and treatment. Prevention is one of the programs and processes that a company has in place to try to just prevent wrongdoing from happening in the first place, primarily through training the workforce and creating ways for people to raise concerns or identify small problems so that the company can address a small problem before it becomes a big one.
00;06;36;08 - 00;06;57;00
Adam Briggs
The second piece of this would be diagnosis. How does the company actually go out of check and make sure that policies and controls are being followed and honored? So audits are important here. Self-assessments, even things like exit interviews for departing executives to give them a chance to share anything they need to on their way out the door. All those things could be important components of that diagnosis, leg of the stool.
00;06;57;15 - 00;07;28;17
Adam Briggs
And then lastly, treatment that is about follow up a lot of companies can be really, really good about identifying things that need attention, but actually following through on it, deciding who owns what, who's going to get what done by when. That's not always something compliance programs define this one is much more intertwined with culture. So in a scenario like you described here, where a whistleblower is trying to tell people, probably multiple people in management, that there's a problem and the problem isn't being meaningfully addressed in that scenario.
00;07;28;17 - 00;07;46;19
Adam Briggs
That sounds like the treatment component is really what's missing. You can run into this a lot in any company, even outside of a compliance or legal context, where people say, Hey, I don't think that's my job. I understand you have a concern, but I think you've got to go to H.R. with that, or I think you need to go over here, you know, talk to risk management.
00;07;46;26 - 00;08;21;09
Adam Briggs
And so if you've got a cultural environment where people aren't necessarily sure what to do with bad news, it could be that there's no willful wrongdoing. There just isn't a good way for anyone to take ownership on how to fix a problem. So ultimately, effective corporate compliance is not just about policies or documents. It also includes culture and ultimately, it's really about a culture where people feel first that they want to do the right thing and that those who become aware of wrongdoing feel not just comfortable taking action, but even an obligation to speak up.
00;08;21;18 - 00;08;42;03
Adam Briggs
That, I think, is really, really important. So you want an environment where really everyone in management in particular feels as though at some level they're an extension of that compliance team. Now just lastly, getting back to the False Claims Act, that's an area where the risk really goes up for a company. If they're just newly entering the business of selling services or goods to the government.
00;08;42;19 - 00;09;02;14
Adam Briggs
I would say to anyone in a company that's considering sort of stepping into that opportunity, hey, that's great and good for you. The government is an outstanding customer, but if you have no compliance program, now's the time to start one. If you have a compliance program of three people, you may want to look about adding adding a fourth person, right?
00;09;02;14 - 00;09;28;06
Adam Briggs
Getting into the world of government contracting creates a whole new set of rules that people have to be able to keep track of, a whole new set of auditing obligations. And that treatment piece of follow up, which in this area you raised didn't really happen. So I think the False Claims Act in particular should always be an inflection point or maybe a reflection point, I should say, for leadership to say, does our compliance program need to grow or mature if we're going to step in to this new area of opportunity?
00;09;28;06 - 00;09;50;18
Jonathan Porter
Yeah. And Adam, I appreciate the three legged stool. I think our listeners certainly appreciate that concrete takeaway. So thanks for sharing that. What you just said there is it largely depends on the corporations role, exactly what you said. If you're a government contractor for doing business with the government, your risk is greater. And so the level of compliance, attention to compliance that you take, it probably depends.
00;09;50;18 - 00;10;13;14
Jonathan Porter
And part of what I think it depends on is also the size of the business. And I think that comes naturally. Obviously a business with one employee, they can't have a full time compliance officer. It just doesn't make business sense. And when you read federal law enforcement guidance documents on their corporate compliance expectations, you see that everyone acknowledges that solutions always depend on size and capabilities.
00;10;14;05 - 00;10;46;14
Jonathan Porter
But one of the biggest decisions I hear discussed for smaller businesses is whether in-house counsel can wear both the legal and compliance hats at the same time. The concern you hear around DOJ with that set up is that legal and compliance have two very different objectives. Adam, what are your thoughts on the objectives and motivations of the legal department and the compliance department and whether it makes sense for in-house counsel to just wear both hats?
00;10;47;05 - 00;11;18;00
Adam Briggs
Thanks, Jonathan. I'm going to give you the classic cop out lawyer answer on this. It say it depends. It really just depends on the people and the facts. I've seen this done different ways and very effectively. Where compliance does report up through legal or does not, I really think it can work either way. Certainly legal has a reputation for or an expectation, I should say, that requires them to not only help navigate risk and prevent harm, but also to help grow the business and knock down targets and get deals done.
00;11;18;17 - 00;11;44;08
Adam Briggs
And so there is an inevitable tension between gross and caution in that sense. And on the compliance side, you want some independent thought. Right. You certainly don't want your compliance team's compensation, for example, to be dependent on whether a deal gets signed. You don't want those kinds of incentives. They need to be able to think independently and act as a guardrail at a minimum to prevent against illegal or unethical or unsustainable approaches to growth.
00;11;44;27 - 00;12;05;00
Adam Briggs
And ideally, you'd want that compliance team to have some independent channel to the board or audit committee in some fashion. So even though theoretically there's a tension there, I don't think it has to rise to the level of what maybe a lawyer would call a conflict of interest. Right. To try to help a business grow while avoiding noncompliance simultaneously.
00;12;05;21 - 00;12;22;05
Adam Briggs
At some level, that's just a modern, practical definition of fiduciary duty. Right? A CEO has to think the same way. I want to help my organization grow. I also need to make sure that we don't make misstep and get in trouble with the law so I don't know that it has to be formally bifurcated, though of course it can work that way.
00;12;22;25 - 00;12;45;09
Adam Briggs
At the end of the day, I've never known an in-house lawyer who didn't see himself or herself as part of the organization's compliance program. And I really think any astute compliance professional is going to feel very committed to helping their organization not only achieve success, but sustained success. So while I know people who feel very strongly that compliance should never report up through legal, I've never had any philosophical objection to that.
00;12;45;09 - 00;13;10;17
Adam Briggs
I don't think there's anything intrinsic to that model that makes it fail. It really, like I said at the start of this response, it just depends on the facts. The other thing I'd like to say is that over thinking the org chart piece of it can actually create barriers to growing a stronger compliance culture, a compliance program that is rigidly separated from the business can often correlate with a corporate compliance culture that is not very strong.
00;13;11;01 - 00;13;33;16
Adam Briggs
As a compliance professional, if you want to be effective, you have to be influential, and if you want to be influential, you have to be trusted. And to be trusted you have to be known and to be known you have to be seen. So when I was a CEO, I wanted my team to be in on projects early and to try to embed risk savvy thinking in the DNA of a project from the outset and not just get called in at the 11th hour for a yes or no approval.
00;13;33;23 - 00;13;47;21
Adam Briggs
We don't want the compliance team to have to wait and be the voice of no at a late stage when they weren't brought in early. Something I used to say still do. Actually, I learned it from a colleague of mine earlier in my career was If you want us to help you land the plane, we need to be onboard for takeoff.
00;13;48;09 - 00;14;05;18
Adam Briggs
And if your risk or compliance or audit professionals are off an island somewhere reporting to the audit committee but not really getting to know business managers, they're less likely to be on board for takeoff and they're less likely to have the influence they need to shape a project or a strategic initiative in a direction that will actually enable and sustain that success.
00;14;05;18 - 00;14;28;12
Adam Briggs
So I know, Jonathan, you and I both heard stories going back to law school of legal executives that use their powers to cover up big issues and big problems. But honestly, I think a malevolent legal executive could still perpetrate similar harms even if the compliance team didn't report up to him or her. So ultimately, you've got to be thoughtful about reporting structure, but I don't think there's just one right way to do it.
00;14;28;27 - 00;14;50;15
Jonathan Porter
Yeah, I totally agree with you there, Adam. And that's why I think saying it depends is anything but a cop out here, because it's exactly what you said is right. You can have the right structure in place and still cross lines or you can have the structure in place. The DOJ seems to or some federal regulator should frown upon which to having them combined and still have the perfectly, you know, well functioning compliance systems.
00;14;50;15 - 00;15;09;22
Jonathan Porter
It's all part of what your culture is, and that's why I appreciate your answer. Adam You know, I think what DOJ is thinking when they talk about these things is, you know, what I think about is the Michael Clayton example. So in this movie, this George Clooney movie, great movie, by the way, which I'm about to spoil, it's a 20 year old movie or so.
00;15;09;22 - 00;15;12;16
Jonathan Porter
So if you haven't seen it yet, you know, shame on you.
00;15;12;25 - 00;15;14;19
Adam Briggs
I'm a fan. I love it. It's great.
00;15;14;28 - 00;15;38;19
Jonathan Porter
It's a great movie. So but in the movie, you have this corporate attorney doing bad things, trying to have George Clooney's character killed. That's frowned upon. That's tough. And I you know, I think that in creating policies or expectations, DOJ tends to go to the worst case scenario. Like in Michael Clayton, and say that if you create a structure that could lead to compliance failures, it's your own fault.
00;15;38;27 - 00;16;01;15
Jonathan Porter
I think that's why federal enforcers are skeptical of general counsel's wearing that compliance. Had they envision a worst case scenario of a whistleblower not having an outlet to someone outside of the executive suite? I know a lot of GQ's Adam, you're in the GQ. That's not remotely fair. But I think it's that worst case scenario that drives things like this sometimes.
00;16;01;15 - 00;16;17;06
Jonathan Porter
So, Adam, we talked a little bit about reporting structures in the compliance world, and I think having the right reporting channels is really important. When you hear senior DOJ officials talk about defective compliance programs. Why is that?
00;16;17;24 - 00;16;47;19
Adam Briggs
Jonathan? I think it mostly comes down to the effect of that reporting structure and what that reporting structure either enables or obstructs. I'm assuming, though I've never worked for DOJ, the DOJ will always look at the facts of how reporting structures work in practice and not just how they appear on an order chart. And I would say that just because a certain role has direct access to a CEO or a board or an audit committee on paper, it doesn't mean that access is meaningfully used to address risk.
00;16;48;15 - 00;17;22;14
Adam Briggs
So I think it's still an important consideration. But if I was coming in as an outside consultant, asked to advise on the health of a compliance program or compliance culture, I would be interested in the org chart for a few minutes, but then I would look to how the legal and compliance teams are actually enmeshed with business teams on a day to day basis, sales marketing operations to me, those details, that nuance is going to tell me a lot more about how good ideas get supported and how bad ideas get weeded out.
00;17;23;05 - 00;17;47;00
Adam Briggs
That said, obviously the more levels or walls you put between people and their compliance team, the more likely you'll have barriers or even intermediaries to silence complaints. So I think if a whole legal team or whole compliance team is buried at the bottom of your chart or sitting in a satellite building half mile away from business leaders, that is a problem, but it's more of a culture question at that point.
00;17;47;00 - 00;17;53;22
Adam Briggs
And you could have a compliance or legal team isolated from the business regardless of how tidy it looks on an order chart.
00;17;54;05 - 00;18;14;11
Jonathan Porter
Yeah, I think that's right. And so I think in years past, DOJ didn't really understand a lot of the inner workings of corporate compliance programs. I think maybe you could fill them with some good org charts, but I think that's that we're in a different world now. Merrick Garland has made a point of hiring, seasoned compliance professionals as senior DOJ officials.
00;18;14;22 - 00;18;37;24
Jonathan Porter
And I think with that comes this this new peak behind how exactly is a compliance program functioning? It's no longer just looking at the channels and structures. It's no longer just looking at or chart. It's trying to figure out, does this program actually work? And DOJ is getting a lot better there. Adam So yeah, it's I think DOJ is at a good spot now in that they are really trying to figure out is but let's not, let's look beyond the papers.
00;18;38;02 - 00;19;03;27
Jonathan Porter
Let's figure out is this actually working in practice? So Adam, pivoting just a little bit here. You know, I think about the biggest compliance failures that we've seen in recent memory, those big compliance failures. To me at least, they seem pretty intuitive. And he was clear it was wrong for Bernie Madoff to take client funds. It was wrong for Elizabeth Holmes to forge validation reports and give those fake, fake documents to Theranos investors.
00;19;03;27 - 00;19;28;24
Jonathan Porter
I think we all get that. The harder compliance endeavors are when you have multinational corporations as operating in places that have different norms than those required by U.S. law. Many parts of the world are somewhat accepting of pay to play arrangements, but paying to play in those parts of the world can get companies operating in the U.S. in a lot of trouble under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
00;19;29;04 - 00;20;10;26
Jonathan Porter
And so maintaining compliance with foreign employees who might not appreciate U.S. law is a unique challenge. So one of the parts of your background, Adam, that I find most fascinating is that earlier in your career, you lived in Singapore, you traveled around Asia doing compliance investigations. And I have a theory that those experiences investigating conduct for people who may not have intuitively known that what they were doing was wrong, those experiences have made you a better member of the UBS legal team now, but I'm hoping you can share with our listeners a little generalized wisdom about internal investigations in a nutshell a you know, a compliance investigation into reported wrongdoing.
00;20;10;26 - 00;20;33;10
Jonathan Porter
So, Adam, in your experience, once the compliance team gets the complaint, it's probably not wise to just do nothing. If there's a credible accusation of some compliance shortcoming, how do you go about figuring out whether it's true or not? How do you run a right sized internal investigation into the allegations?
00;20;34;06 - 00;21;11;20
Adam Briggs
Thanks, Jonathan. Great question. I think it is more art and science and every investigation has to be carefully calibrated to the unique circumstances of the allegation that you're facing. And I would say that's the same. Whether you're investigating something here in the U.S. or something 10,000 miles away on the other side of the world. And generally speaking, my instinct would be to keep those internal investigations lean and figure out what you have to solve for quickly so that the immediate questions I'm going to try to solve quickly, if something like that comes to be, would be first, does this work need to be protected under privilege in any way?
00;21;12;03 - 00;21;43;12
Adam Briggs
Right. If so, figure out who you need to work with in the legal department. Get that squared away first before you start generating a bunch of work product or starting a bunch of interviews. So, you know, always touch base with whomever your legal support is if you're a compliance officer embarking on an investigation. And then I think after you've sorted out the privilege issues, the next most important thing is to figure out how to discreetly and efficiently get the key facts you need right away if you don't need to interview 30 people and fly teams around the world to figure out what happened then, don't you know, Jonathan?
00;21;43;12 - 00;22;05;04
Adam Briggs
I think I even remember about ten years ago some speeches from from DOJ leaders even saying to in-house compliance professionals not to overdo it with internal investigations, that there aren't necessarily brownie points being given out for just adding 100 extra people to your interview roster just because. So I think getting at the facts, figuring out what happened very quickly is important.
00;22;05;07 - 00;22;20;03
Adam Briggs
Not letting these things drag on. Obviously, sometimes someone you need to talk to is going to be out on vacation or maybe on a medical leave, and you're going to have to figure out how to manage around that. But those should be generally more exception to the rule. And then what is the smallest need to know audience we can work with to get it done.
00;22;20;15 - 00;22;40;16
Adam Briggs
There really isn't any advantage in blasting an email out to people saying, Hey, we're doing an internal investigation, right? So I try to move discreetly, keep the audience small where possible, and then of course, consider who in leadership needs to be aware that the investigation is under way. That's something that's going to vary by one organization to the next, but that's always something to think about, too.
00;22;40;16 - 00;22;56;06
Adam Briggs
If there's someone who ought to be advised in an investigation of a certain nature has started and you missed that step. It's going to be awkward later to go back and say, Hey, I'm sorry, I should have told you this a couple of weeks ago. So overall, it's lean and efficient and tidy is the way I would like to run these things.
00;22;57;19 - 00;23;23;12
Adam Briggs
But I would also just like to say, and this is something I learned, really learned when I went first into in house life in those early years working in Asia that you were alluding to. Jonathan It's just so important to stay focused on the facts and your audience. Internal investigations are fundamentally a journalistic exercise. In the vast majority of cases, the deliverable you're working toward is a concise, tidy account of the who, what, where, when, and how.
00;23;23;12 - 00;23;45;23
Adam Briggs
And maybe a little bit on the why. As long as you're careful not to speculate on people's motives. And so it's really about being focused on the facts. Even if you have a legal background, the law is not necessarily the most important thing to be focused on as you're doing investigations to get the facts and get them solid and then turn to assessing risk in next steps.
00;23;46;02 - 00;24;08;13
Adam Briggs
You're the most important mentor, Jonathan, that I think I've ever had in my legal career, actually had a degree in journalism and worked as a reporter before he went to law school, and he made me a better lawyer, primarily by making me a more careful listener and a more disciplined writer and really thinking about my audience and focusing on just what needs to be in the report and not being distracted by extraneous tangents and so forth.
00;24;09;04 - 00;24;15;14
Adam Briggs
I really think that journalistic impulse is very helpful when you're trying to figure out what to do next in an investigation.
00;24;15;20 - 00;24;33;13
Jonathan Porter
Adam, I'm totally, totally on board with you there. You know, one of the things about law school is that very few of us get into internal investigations of the grand scheme of law students, very few people going internal investigations that law schools really don't teach. How do you run a right sized internal investigation? These are things that I agree.
00;24;33;17 - 00;24;53;04
Jonathan Porter
I journals of backgrounds probably are much more effective for people getting into internal investigations than anything else because you're learning, you know, you don't always need to find out all of the things. You can boil this down to exactly what you said. It's the who, what, where, when and how. And understanding that the why is a touchy subject at time.
00;24;53;05 - 00;25;17;09
Jonathan Porter
So that's excellent advice and I appreciate you sharing that with our listeners. The other side of compliance is creating the culture of compliance. We've we've mentioned that a little bit so far. Now that you're in more of an oversight advisory role instead of out in the field running investigations, how do you and your team set the tone and set expectations when it comes to compliance?
00;25;17;09 - 00;25;23;01
Jonathan Porter
What can our listeners learn about how to instill a culture of compliance within their organizations?
00;25;23;06 - 00;25;51;08
Adam Briggs
Well, first, Jonathan, going back to something you brought up earlier about the US based multinationals trying to grow overseas where cultural practices might be different, particularly around financial transactions, payments and so forth. Culture is even more important in that context. The corporate culture specifically, and I am very thankful and grateful that I've spent my career in organizations that really have integrity in their DNA.
00;25;51;09 - 00;26;14;18
Adam Briggs
Right. And so the corporate culture there, ultimately, if it's communicated correctly and repeatedly and diligently, is going to be a signifier and factor in mitigating those risks overseas. If the employees, even the ones who've never visited the U.S. headquarters, never set foot in the United States, understand what those companies values are around integrity and honesty and doing things the right way.
00;26;15;05 - 00;26;32;29
Adam Briggs
That has a profound effect regardless of what country or part of the world you might be operating in fundamentally, I think people want to do the right thing. The vast majority of people are going to be rule followers in the workplace and want to do the right thing. Who want to speak up when they see something wrong. I think that's a human condition.
00;26;33;03 - 00;26;52;02
Adam Briggs
Right. And so you can harness the power of that just by communicating that this is a place where it's really okay to speak up. We want you to speak up. We'd rather do the right thing than do the wrong thing for a short term gain and then have it become a bigger problem later. So corporate culture and compliance culture are even more important overseas than domestically.
00;26;52;02 - 00;27;18;15
Adam Briggs
But you know the scenario that you raised earlier, but I think with culture just more broadly, I would sort of begin with the end in mind on this and figure out, well, what's the end state you want to be at? And for me, the end state you'd want to achieve from a compliance culture standpoint is an environment in which every management employee can articulate the why of compliance, not just the CEO or the general counsel or run out of h.r.
00;27;18;25 - 00;27;39;08
Adam Briggs
But down to mid management or even entry level. Right. Tell me, why is it that compliance matters in your company? You want customers in public to trust you? Okay, cool. That's great. But tell me why in your own words, tell me what would happen to your company or your job if customers stop trusting you, if you cannot articulate that in your own words.
00;27;39;17 - 00;28;11;02
Adam Briggs
And if everyone in management is capable of articulating that in their own words, I think you've got a really strong culture. And so that's the end state. Like I said, I'm thankful to have worked in organizations that have had that kind of integrity in their DNA from day one. But for companies that maybe want to get there and aren't there yet, I think that's where leadership has to be even more habitually vocal, not just in our annual training video, but in staff meetings, town halls, social media posts, you name it, especially those leaders who are most associated with growth and revenue and strategy.
00;28;11;11 - 00;28;31;06
Adam Briggs
Because I still think in many companies there sort of an unspoken assumption that the revenue leaders and the compliance leaders are not really on the same team, or maybe not supporting each other. Anything you can do to sort of vocally counteract that, to visibly counteract that, I think is really important. That setting the tone, that compliance is not just out on an island.
00;28;31;06 - 00;28;56;26
Adam Briggs
They're trying to play gotcha. They're partnering with us to make sure that our growth is not only strong but sustainable. Right. Because to me, growth without concern for law or ethics by definition is not sustainable. Eventually, you're going to run into a cinder block wall that might really leave a mark. If you go into it full tilt. So I think it's also really important for legal and compliance teams to build what I would call a body of internal case law.
00;28;57;10 - 00;29;27;03
Adam Briggs
If you're doing growth and you're doing strategy, you're trying new things, you have a company that's trying to be disruptive and innovative. Inevitably, you're going to run into some gray areas with ideas that aren't obviously illegal, but might still be risky, or at least might introduce a risk that that organization hasn't had to consider before. And so as those gray area concepts and proposals get, either approved or negated, a strong compliance program, in my view, should document those conversations and document those outcomes.
00;29;27;13 - 00;29;52;25
Adam Briggs
Sometimes the answer might be a no, and here's why. In other cases, the answer might be yes and here's how. But either way, it's important to document that and build that body of case law, whether it's an electronic system or some memos you keep in a manila folder behind your desk, it becomes really helpful to be able to say to internal proponents, Hey, we've reviewed some proposals like this in the past and we haven't been able to approve them.
00;29;52;25 - 00;30;10;10
Adam Briggs
And here's why. Or actually, yeah, we've seen a few of these before and subject to these three conditions. You're okay to go ahead and do this. Just remember these three things and you're good to go and good luck building that body of case law to me shows internal business proponents that you're not just the office of no, you're not just being arbitrary.
00;30;10;29 - 00;30;47;21
Adam Briggs
I think it also shows the board that you have mature controls and it's not just a compliance program on paper. And I would hope that it can convince the government if they ever ask that you take this work seriously. So I would like to think that that sort of body of internal case law would matter to DOJ, to Jonathan, I think I'll have to ask you, but but my sense is if you're if you're trying to build that culture, repeated processes showing careful internal deliberation on risk with documented reasoning and documented conditions, to me that's a strong sign of a deep rooted compliance culture that goes beyond slogans to actual practice.
00;30;47;21 - 00;31;06;06
Jonathan Porter
Yeah, Adam, I totally agree there. You know, one of the cool things about the current DOJ leadership is that they're able to figure that out. They know to look at that what you called case law and to see is this a group? Is this a company? They're going to actually look at this and try to act consistent with how they've acted in the past.
00;31;06;06 - 00;31;43;21
Jonathan Porter
Are they adjusting things as they go to respond to newly identified issues or problems? It's all these things that DOJ is now knowledgeable enough to look at. Yeah, I think that's really great for those of us who are advocates for robust corporate compliance and everything like that. But out of your your sentiments are exactly right. You know, you don't bring in the compliance guy for a 20 minute session and then he walks out and you go back to business, the best compliance program, the most robust compliance cultures and systems that I see now really do integrate compliance into their every, you know, into their every decision.
00;31;43;21 - 00;32;06;05
Jonathan Porter
It's not, hey, we got to check a box. It's who they are. And that's why, Adam, I'm thrilled that you came on the podcast to talk about this because, you know, when we talk about the False Claims Act, this is something that happens when you get into a compliance failure, something that happened that really you could have prevented if you had thought about this and implemented that, intentional about your compliance program.
00;32;06;05 - 00;32;13;12
Jonathan Porter
And I'm so I'm grateful that you came on the podcast and share some of your thoughts and experiences with our listeners. I really do appreciate it.
00;32;13;19 - 00;32;18;17
Adam Briggs
Thank you, Jonathan. This was terrific. Really enjoyed the conversation and great questions. Thank you for inviting me.
00;32;19;00 - 00;32;44;28
Jonathan Porter
Absolutely. So for our listeners, we've got more great content coming. We're going to talk about some some cutting edge things in the False Claims Act world, some big settlements that happened recently. We will talk about that in the next episode. And so I'm excited about continuing to talk about the False Claims Act, but I hope for our listeners is that you can put me out of business with no False Claims Act investigations to defend by being intentional about your compliance programs.
00;32;45;06 - 00;32;55;00
Jonathan Porter
Thinking about what you're doing and why you're doing it. And I think that you're going to arrive at a lot of success if you go that way. So thanks for listening and I hope we see you again next time.