Abstract

Whistle-blowing has long been an important organizational phenomenon that improves organizations in the long-run. Online whistle-blowing systems are becoming increasingly prevalent channels for reporting organizational abuses. Given that the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and similar financial laws throughout the world require multi-national firms to establish whistle-blowing procedures and systems, whistle-blowing research is even more important (Ernst & Young 2009). Existing whistle-blowing theory does not explicitly predict risk, trust, cross-cultural considerations, nor use of anonymous, online whistle-blowing systems. Yet, all of these are key considering in the whistle-blowing act and whistle-blowing in general. Furthermore, unless these systems are further understood, they may not be used, or they may not be used properly. This is a particular problem for multi-national financial firms that increasingly need to comply with whistle-blowing regulations.

This research-in-process paper details our plans to create and extend baseline whistle-blowing theory, by uniquely considering anonymity, risk, trust, and cross-cultural considerations in using whistle-blowing systems. The model will be rigorously testing using working professionals in the USA, Middle East, and China. We propose our design and measures for testing the model.

Download

Share

COinS