Ethics, Integrity, & Leadership

Funny how my mind always goes to song lyrics.  For this topic the “I always feel like, somebody’s watching me..” comes to mind.  We all like to talk about ethics in procurement and ensuring our solicitations and evaluations are performed in an ethical manner, but what about our actions.   While no one is perfect and everyone slips up now and again, as a leader, public employee, parent or in general just a human being we should keep in mind that even when we don’t think it is happening, someone is watching us.  They watch what we do, what we say, how we act around our peers and especially they watch how we act when we are not in the office.

So let’s talk about perception when attending events away from our normal workplace.  Tax payer monies pay for us to attend professional development events with the expectation that we actually attend and participate in those events. Participating attendees go to gather knowledge to help them in their profession and progress their careers.

Now the story behind this post.  At a recent conference it was observed that a couple of individuals from a well known jurisdiction checked in to the conference but did not attend a single professional development part of the conference.  One of these individuals showed up for all the meals but not any breakout session or other session of the event.  The second individual wasn’t even seen at the meals.   My first thought was, “how dare they!” The rest of us are sitting here through these sometimes boring sessions to gain recertification contact hours and these guys will get the same and not attend!!  The second thought was, “wow, all that money spent to send them down to this event and they will not be taking a single thing back to their job that would not only benefit them but their organization, glad I don’t pay taxes in that jurisdiction!”  Then my third thought was, “I should contact their boss!”  Rather than take action on my third thought I chose to put my thoughts out to you, after all this is about a day in the life is it not?  Our responsibility to our organization and who they serve is the foundation of what makes our country so great.

As what I hope is a good leader, I sat through the boring and not so boring events.  I encouraged participation and hope that I set the example of how the money spent for us to attend should be used.  It is sad to see the lack of ethics and integrity of others.  Yes we are all public employees but we are here to do what is best for the PUBLIC which sometimes means sacrifices of time to ensure we can give our public the best we have to offer.

I look forward to your thoughts on this….  till next time.

P-Cards Part 3 – The conference

Yesterday I had the pleasure of attending the Bank of America Annual P-Card conference for my state.  Yes the Commonwealth of Virginia has a contract with them for government credit cards and they cohost an annual event.   Since I am new to being a P-Card administrator I went to the conference to gain ideas on how to better utilize the resources available through BofA, best practices on audits, compliance issues and in general learn how others were managing their programs.

I have to say while it was a long day (2.5 hr drive each way with 8 hrs of conference in between) I learned a lot and made some new connections!

First lets talk about the things I learned to look for when I start auditing the spend of my organization.

• Check for vendors that by pass the MCC restriction tables
• Sort transactions by MCCs to see if any others being used are questionable
• Search by key words
• Get used to pulling 3rd level data

The next item that was hit on a lot at the conference is using the audits/compliance checks as a means to build relationships with your end users.  (Who would have thought that policing transactions could lead to better relationships?!!) Communication between you and the end user builds rapport and can lead to them asking permission rather than forgiveness. Being consistent in asking questions then makes it easier later on when you do see something that just doesn’t look right.   Have monthly meetings to stay in touch.

Fraud Happens!  It happens to all of us, so reassure your end user and help them to resolve the issues.

Violations – personal use and other known violations, work with HR/Management to address as appropriate.  (Management Support is key here and not all of us have it… if you don’t, Document, Document, Document!!!)

Continuing with the Audit topic don’t forget to look for split transactions!  Train and retrain as often as possible to ensure there is no confusion on what they can and cannot do.  Reconcilers and Account Managers are people too, don’t assume they know everything, training and retraining them is important so that they can help you to help them.

Use your reports!  Declined Transaction reports can show you if levels need to be increased, attempts at fraud, and other issues.  Single Transaction limit reports can show you if someone is splitting a transaction.  Audit reports by vendor can let you know if you may need to go out to bid for that commodity.  Use the 13 month report to help find cards you may not need anymore…

Needless to say the wheels are turning and plans being formulated to improve and grow our program… hope this helps you with yours too!

 

End Users ARGH!!

Did you ever have that one end user who thinks you are psychic and can read their mind?  After all we are sitting right next to them right?  Getting end users to respond at all or in a timely fashion can be a challenge.  How about that “emergency” they have now because they didn’t communicate to you months ago that they were working on something that had a strict deadline! (Lack of planning on your part doesn’t constitute and emergency on my part, I WISH!!)

For anyone who knows me I am a stickler for on time and on schedule.  The military taught me that being early is on time and being on time is late. I stress when I have to drop everything and work on something because someone else didn’t plan well. However the last 5 years have allowed me to grow, have patience, and understand that not everyone works like I do.  Now I am not saying I do not procrastinate with the best of them, (doing so right now to get these thoughts out!) but I also have learned that we don’t know what the other person is dealing with, what their workload is, nor what their degree of competence is in their line of work.

So how do you combat the end user who is always late, rarely communicates, or only gives you pieces of the information?

COMMUNICATION!!  Yes I might call them, but I always follow up with an email to reiterate what we discussed.  If they are in the same building with me, I have been known to camp out in their office till I get a moment to get the information I need to help them and then again follow up with an email.  And yes finally if there is no other choice, I cc their boss.  Once they know that I if they don’t respond I will cc their boss, they usually become much more communicative!  Document, document, document to not only cover yourself but also to help them out.

Now I am not trying to get anyone in trouble here, it is just I want to do what is best for our organization and I cannot do it alone.  Just like raising a child, it takes a village to ensure that a public jurisdiction has everything it needs to be successful.

 

Happy Friday everyone!