Richard Bistrong | Contributing Editor
Richard Bistrong spent his career as an international sales executive and currently consults, writes and speaks on foreign bribery and compliance issues from that front-line perspective.
He was named to Compliance Week’s list of Top Minds in 2017 and was one of Ethisphere’s 100 Most Influential in Business Ethics in 2015.
Richard was the vice president of international sales for a large, publicly traded defense supplier, which included residing in the UK and extensive overseas travel.
In 2007, as part of a cooperation agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice and subsequent Immunity from Prosecution in the UK, Richard assisted the U.S., UK, and other governments in understanding how FCPA and other bribery and export violations occurred in international sales.
In 2012, after the collapse of the Africa Sting prosecution, Richard was sentenced as part of his own plea agreement, and served fourteen-and-a-half months at a U.S. federal prison camp.
He holds an MA in Foreign Affairs from the University of Virginia.
Richard writes about current anti-bribery and compliance issues at www.richardbistrong.com. Information about his consulting practice, Front-Line Anti-Bribery LLC, can also be found on that website.
Recent Posts
Richard Bistrong: Frontier-market compliance risks need special handling
In a prior post on the FCPA Blog, Alison Taylor said corporate culture is hard to measure and “has been largely neglected by regulators and the anti-corruption-consulting industry.” Reflecting on her work, I said bad behavior (including my own) can truly become a compliance lesson learned. But I offered no way forward.
Confronting corruption: My own perfect storm
In her recent post on the FCPA Blog, Alison Taylor said organizational and team culture and norms are overwhelmingly important in explaining why and how corruption occurs. “The person at the desk next to you is a far more important source of how things really work and how to get things done than the code of conduct,” she said.