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
Frances McLeod: Yes, you really can (and should) audit culture
In a popular post last month for the FCPA Blog that stirred lots of discussion, Frances McLeod made the case why companies should audit culture change as part of their compliance programs.
Richard Bistrong: Good performance can hide destructive behavior
The New York Times published a harrowing story this month by Eilene Zimmerman about her ex-husband’s death from a drug overdose. He was a partner at Wilson Sonsini in Silicon Valley, practicing IP law.
Richard Bistrong: How should we share our core ideas?
“Don’t go it alone.” Simple words of both caution and counsel, as offered by the former chief of the FBI’s Global Crimes Task Force, Keith Slotter, in the anti-bribery training film Behind the Bribe.
Resource Alert: New real-world compliance training video
Companies often ask me to record video for internal training. They want real-world stories of corruption and commerce which they can embed into an existing on-line anti-bribery compliance training.
Richard Bistrong: I wanted to go home, the judge wanted me in jail
A few weeks ago, I read about an “exasperated federal judge” at the sentencing of Samuel Mebiame, the 43-year-old son of the former prime minister of Gabon, who was an intermediary for Och-Ziff.
Seven years later, Richard Bistrong is wheels up
My Federal Probation formally terminated on January 14, and with that termination came the return of my passport.
Richard Bistrong: When business leaders become compliance leaders
I’ve noticed a positive shift in corporate compliance events, especially during some of my overseas engagements. Compliance initiatives and ethical messages are coming directly from business leaders in addition to compliance executives.
Finding perverse incentives is hard, fixing them can be harder
Searching for perverse incentives that can become compliance land mines means messing with people’s pay.
How perverse incentives distort individual and corporate performance
Consider a salesperson that has reached his bonus cap three months before fiscal year-end. Any achievement after that is not only unrewarded, but is actually penalized in the sense of creating higher future performance expectations and targets.
Revisiting EpiPen: Steep incentive thresholds are corporate disasters waiting to happen
The root causes of perverse incentives often hide (in plain sight) in the most common variable compensation structures, which include payout floors, thresholds, payout caps, and stretch goals.