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What comes to mind when you hear the word, “whistleblower”? Usually, this term conjures up images of employees who put their jobs and livelihoods on the line in order to expose workplace improprieties like fraud or other abuses whether they be illegal, immoral or unethical. In one of my previous blogs, I wrote about having attended a lecture by Sherron Watkins, who was one of the primary whistleblowers in exposing the Enron scandal. It was incredible to hear how Ms. Watkins had gone from being among the inner circle at Enron, to then discovering how Enron execs were using fraudulent tactics to drive up the price of Enron stock and to manipulate the natural gas markets. Even worse was when these same executives had absconded with Enron employee retirement funds in order to cover up debts. When the house of cards collapsed, Enron went down hard and many within the Enron upper echelon faced prison time, while Enron employees (including Watkins) were left without jobs or pensions.
However, not all whistleblowers are alike. Take for example the work of Matthiesen, Bjorkelo and Burke (2011), who had written a work entitled: Workplace Bullying as the Dark Side of Whistleblowing. They provide a thorough description of both the altruistic whistleblower and those whistleblowers who are motivated by purely by self-interest. Miethe (1999) points out that while some whistleblowers can be seen as altruistic, selfless individuals who take action at “extraordinary personal cost” others can best be described as “selfish and egotistical” (often described as “snitches”, “rats”, “moles”, “finks” and “blabbermouths”. It is important therefore to look at the motivations of whistleblowers. For example are they motivated by a sense of moral conscience in order to right some wrong or to bring corrective action to situations where corporations, organizations or individuals are acting in illegal, immoral or illegitimately? This type of whistleblower usually is acting altruistically for the greater good. However, what about situations where the “whistleblower” does not act based upon altruistic motives such as exposing corruption, fraud or wrongdoing but rather acts out of greed, revenge, or to increase the likelihood of advancing themselves up the corporate ladder? What about situations in which the “whistleblower” lies or creates false information in order to bring down a supervisor, CEO or fellow employee and may do so anonymously however, under existing whistleblower laws these individuals would also be protected from retaliation, in the same way that those who expose fraud or theft for moral or altruistic reasons are protected. Most of us have no problem with true whistleblowers being afforded protection under the law when their cause is just and good, but what about fraudulent whistleblowers who lie and falsify information to advance themselves? Isn’t one of the Ten Commandments, “Thou Shalt Not Bear False Witness Against Thy Neighbor”? In other words, don’t make up lies about other people, right?
In an actual case of fraudulent whistleblowing that we are personally aware of, a State government division director who had been appointed by the Governor of that state for her expertise and 20 years of experience in her profession was vilified by a group of sociopathic state bureaucrats who had been passed over for promotions. The director finally was forced to resign when she was accused of giving grants to “her friends”, when in actuality, grant expansion was an acceptable practice among her predecessors. Plus every dollar of grant money spent was accounted for as it went to building projects and program service expansion. You can hopefully see from this example why many experts want no part of state or federal government because of the types of backbiting that we briefly describe above, along with red tape that prevents committed individuals from being able to do the right thing and actually get things done. Instead what most bureaucrats learn is how to play the game. What makes matters even worse is when “outsiders” to state or federal government are appointed to positions of authority without any staff to support them. Usually they don’t last long and the message they come away with is “experts need not apply”.
So what can we learn from this “whistleblower” story? First, not all whistleblowers are courageous, moral and altruistic like Sherron Watkins or the chemist, Jeff Wigand who exposed the tobacco industry’s lies to the public regarding the true harm of cigarette smoking. Not all anonymous accusers and whistleblowers have righteous motives. Some are out to advance their own careers and feather their own nests. When determining which is which, there are two suggestions: 1) determine who benefits from the whistleblower’s taking action and 2) follow the money…i.e. who gains monetarily.
To all you sociopaths-in-training out there, if you want to get rid of your boss, a co-worker or even a CEO, make up lies about them and sit back and watch the fireworks. Say they’re having sex with sheep or something equally as outrageous because by the time the dust settles and your boss or supervisor is exonerated, there will still be those who believe everything they read in the newspaper and will still be thinking, “maybe my boss was having sex with sheep”. Take for example the current Governor of New Jersey, Chris Christie. There have been two major instances where Christie had been accused of improprieties. The first and most recent is the Bridge Gate scandal, which is just beginning to gain some traction. Some say that Bridge Gate may have been a major factor why Christie was not chosen as Trump’s running mate. The other involved a story broken by the New York Times in 2012 which alleged Christie’s ties to multi-million dollar contracts being awarded to state-funded halfway houses for individuals coming out of states prisons. The Times reported that many of these halfway houses were poorly supervised and it was common for halfway house residents to leave prior to serving their time. In one such instance, one of these ex-cons, David Goodell, who took off from these poorly run halfway house, subsequently killed an ex-girlfriend. (Sounds similar to the Willy Horton case that plagued Presidential candidate, Michael Dukakis’ campaign?) But despite a multi-page story in the New York Times by reporter Sam Dolnick, the accusations make against Christie never gained traction. Many to this day, still question why?
So here’s something to think about. Why do some actual instances of impropriety, fraud or corruption reported by whistleblowers never result in any substantive changes (as in the case of Governor Christie) while in other instances false accusations made by anonymous whistleblowers can result in qualified people losing their jobs. This would make an interesting study to look at instances where whistleblower accusations get traction where in other instances they fall by the wayside.
References and suggested readings:
Toxic Coworkers: How to Deal With Dysfunctional People on the Job. A. Cavaiola and N. Lavender.
Babiak, P. & Hare, R. D. (2006). Snakes in Suits: When Psychopaths Go to Work. New York: Harper Collins.
Dolnick, Sam (2012, June 16). As escapees stream out, a penal business thrives. New York Times.
Krugman, Paul (2012, June 21). Prisons, privatization and patronage. New York Times.
Mattiesen, S. B., Bjorkelo, B., & Burke, R. J. (2011). Workplace bullying as the dark side of
Whistleblowing. In S. Einarsen, H. Hoel, Zapf, D. & Cooper, C.L.(Eds.) Bullying and
Harassment in the Workplace.2nd ed Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press/Taylor & Francis Group (pp 301-324).
Miethe, T. D. (1999). Whistleblowing at work: Tough choices in exposing fraud, waste andabuse on the job. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
