What's the deal with Whistleblower Crucifixion Syndrome?

[John DiFool]

You'd think they'd be heralded as heroes for pointing out flaws in a system (physical or interpersonal) or corruption within an organization, but no. I've read a lot of stories lately where someone will call attention to a critical flaw of this sort, but TPTB will typically fire his ass instead of commending him and fixing the flaw. Sounds like they're shooting the messenger in a lot of cases. Anyone care to shed more light on this mindset?

[Airman Doors, USAF]

If you blow the whistle on something, one of two things are happening.

First, you're revealing something that embarrasses the organization. You do that anywhere and you'll be shown the door.

Second, you're disclosing some secret of the company, thus demonstrating that you cannot be trusted with items of a sensitive nature. You are therefore useless because they'll never be able to trust you again.

In any event, nobody rats on an organization to laud them for their greatness or benevolence. It's always something that puts the organization in a negative light. As such, you make yourself unwanted. Before you decide to blow the whistle on something you better be sure you can accept the consequences of your actions.

[Evil Captor]

If you blow the whistle on something, one of two things are happening.

First, you're revealing something that embarrasses the organization. You do that anywhere and you'll be shown the door.

Second, you're disclosing some secret of the company, thus demonstrating that you cannot be trusted with items of a sensitive nature. You are therefore useless because they'll never be able to trust you again.

In any event, nobody rats on an organization to laud them for their greatness or benevolence. It's always something that puts the organization in a negative light. As such, you make yourself unwanted. Before you decide to blow the whistle on something you better be sure you can accept the consequences of your actions.

So you don't think whistleblowers are sometimes good people who are punished unfairly for following the dictates of their conscience, Airman Doors?

[Captain Amazing]

So you don't think whistleblowers are sometimes good people who are punished unfairly for following the dictates of their conscience, Airman Doors?

I don't think he said anything about whether whistleblowers are good or bad people...just that they've shown they can't be trusted.

[The Tao's Revenge]

I say if someone exposes a company doing something illegal it should be a crime for the company to reduce benefits (including upgrading their salary every to match the purchasing power of the their salary when the blew the whistle) to that person or fire them.

What motivation does the person have to do their job, you say? None! That's part of the punishment. A useless employee they gotta pay till the person dies.

[The Tao's Revenge]

I don't think he said anything about whether whistleblowers are good or bad people...just that they've shown they can't be trusted.

Trusted to keep quite and let unethical things continue? Why is anyone who would keep quite trust-worthy? They've shown they've got no principles, no spine.

[Grumman]

In any event, nobody rats on an organization to laud them for their greatness or benevolence. It's always something that puts the organization in a negative light.
Only because the organisation is doing something that puts themselves is a negative light. Unfortunately many people care more about looking right than being right, so they'd rather everyone ignore the problem instead of being forced by public scrutiny to fix it.

[Captain Amazing]

Trusted to keep quite and let unethical things continue? Why is anyone who would keep quite trust-worthy? They've shown they've got no principles, no spine.

I don't know if you've noticed, but the mob kills informants. If I'm doing something illegal or even something that would be embarrasing to me if it got out, I don't want people around who are going to tell other people.

Anyone who keeps quiet about something like that is trustworthy, and they've shown that they put loyalty to me ahead of their own moral judgements. I can trust they're going to do what I tell them.

[Airman Doors, USAF]

So you don't think whistleblowers are sometimes good people who are punished unfairly for following the dictates of their conscience, Airman Doors?

I made no value judgments intentionally. The question as posed was answered. He wanted to know why it happened that way.

Now, if i am to assign a value judgment, most whistleblowers are following their conscience and are doing what you and I think is the right thing. Even so, doing the right thing has its own set of consequences.

Then there are people with other motivations who do things for their own purposes. Not every whistleblower has benevolence in their heart. Some do it to intentionally make their employers look bad, and the way they do it allows them to control the spin, make something relatively innocuous look bad simply by asserting that it is and relying on the general belief that ratting something out implies that it is negative.

Which takes me back to my initial response. Every case must be judged on its own merits.

[The Tao's Revenge]

Anyone who keeps quiet about something like that is trustworthy, and they've shown that they put loyalty to me ahead of their own moral judgements. I can trust they're going to do what I tell them.

Well IANACC (I am not a crooked company) but someone who ignores their moral judgments tells me they'll act amorally, and screw me over if it suits them.

[AClockworkMelon]

Well IANACC (I am not a crooked company) but someone who ignores their moral judgments tells me they'll act amorally, and screw me over if it suits them.Companies don't give a shit about your moral compass. They want you to do as you're told. Let's assume you're the type of person who would shoplift; are you going to get angry at your friends for not turning you in?

I don't understand your confusion at all.

[Acid Lamp]

Companies don't give a shit about your moral compass. They want you to do as you're told.

Quoted for emphasis.

A company is a machine that makes money. That is the goal above all else. While many are run with a sense of fairness and ethics, you get ahead by being a better competitor. That doesn't favor the ethical. Their interest is in your loyalty and performance, nothing more. It only makes sense to get rid of a troublemaker. If you can't perform as needed, then they will find someone who will. It's that simple.

[JRDelirious]

Yes, really - to go back to the OP, of course they're shooting the messenger: it's cheaper and easier than fixing the root problem. If the company were ethically and conscientiously seeking to do it right to begin with there probably would not be a whistle to blow. What's so complicated about that?

The management at DodgyCorp DOES presume that you will screw them over when the relationship stops being beneficial to your interests (of course, they count on that having a steady income and being able to "ever work in this town again" are very, very high on your value scale of what those interests are). Whether blowing the whistle or moving to another company with your best client accounts, to them it's the same, you made them lose money or lose face or both.

[wmfellows]

to respond to the actual question, as a corporate person -- responding without thinking my personal relative for the moment -- the fact that someone is going outside the organization and air whatever dirty laundry is automatically a sign that the person can't be trusted with sensitive information in the future.

From a moral compass point of view there is an argument, perhaps a strained one but it's a legitimate argument, that the "good people" in the organization should work through the organization to achieve change.or put another way will frequently unfounded, there is a sensation that "we could've worked this out, no need to go on public'" it is certainly difficult call to make once or twice in my career over 20 years I have had a niggling desire to go public for something I felt was wrong, but in the end we worked it out internally, perhaps not total satisfaction but enough to make me feel morally okay. I think that illustrates where the reaction comes from. Or at least part of the reaction, so one need not think that it's all evil corporate.

[The Tao's Revenge]

Quoted for emphasis.

A company is a machine that makes money. That is the goal above all else. While many are run with a sense of fairness and ethics, you get ahead by being a better competitor. That doesn't favor the ethical. Their interest is in your loyalty and performance, nothing more. It only makes sense to get rid of a troublemaker. If you can't perform as needed, then they will find someone who will. It's that simple.

And what I'm not getting is this corporate loyalty thing. How does it go beyond money? People don't work free, and jobs people do to feel good are generally ethical. So it's money based if they violate their ethics. If it's based on money why wouldn't they screw the company over the first chance it becomes profitable?

[The Tao's Revenge]

From a moral compass point of view there is an argument, perhaps a strained one but it's a legitimate argument, that the "good people" in the organization should work through the organization to achieve change.or put another way will frequently unfounded, there is a sensation that "we could've worked this out, no need to go on public'" it is certainly difficult call to make once or twice in my career over 20 years I have had a niggling desire to go public for something I felt was wrong, but in the end we worked it out internally, perhaps not total satisfaction but enough to make me feel morally okay. I think that illustrates where the reaction comes from. Or at least part of the reaction, so one need not think that it's all evil corporate.

Now see that actually makes sense. Thanks:)

[John DiFool]

Quoted for emphasis.

A company is a machine that makes money. That is the goal above all else. While many are run with a sense of fairness and ethics, you get ahead by being a better competitor. That doesn't favor the ethical. Their interest is in your loyalty and performance, nothing more. It only makes sense to get rid of a troublemaker. If you can't perform as needed, then they will find someone who will. It's that simple.

You get ahead by being more competent than your competitors, and that means fixing problems as they arise, not going into denial mode and shooting (be it figuratively or literally) those who attempt to point out problems and suggest solutions. In a rationally-run organization, those who expose such flaws should be lauded, not denigrated (unless of course the organization's raison d'etre is PR and little more). Thus the head honcho's interest would be in your competence and willingness to say what needs to be said, such that the company's performance improves once they act on fixing said problem(s).

Yeah, I know, I'm so idealistic and naive that it isn't even funny. Most bosses have egos too big to admit that they could be wrong about something and/or that there are problems that they have ignored-that's how they got to be bosses in the first place, after all. And a lot depends on whether the whistle was blown internally, or publically; in some cases I get the sense that internal solutions were attempted, but thwarted, and the whistleblower had no other choice than to go public.

[WhyNot]

It's a tautology as worded. A "whistleblower", by definition, is someone who is making trouble for the corporation, whether or not they've previously tried to work within the corporate structure.

If they work within the corporate structure and are listened to and successfully bring about necessary change, they're not whistleblowers, they're team players or innovators or Employee of the Month.

[Triskadecamus]

Whistle blowing generally involves someone who wasn't able to get his corporation to stop doing something that was a violation of the law. While corporate thinking should be that such an employee is saving the company from grave financial risk, that is seldom the case, not because of inherent characteristics of corporation, but the common characteristics of people. You broke the law because it benefited you in some way. You know that being caught and prosecuted will be highly damaging to your corporation, and, much more important to you, the guy who made the decision. So, you try to nail the whistle blower, and the corporation goes along because you are the decision maker, and your problems are the corporation's problems.

Blather about the value of loyalty to the corporation is just self justification. The corporation which is reported for committing crimes is not making any decisions on the basis of ethics. Profit to the managers themselves is the sole criteria by which those decisions are being made, and ethical stockholders would want thieves thrown out of the company, no matter how profitable their actions were. Unhappily the entire point of the structure of corporations is to limit the ethical consequences of business to the owners of that business.

Tris

[jayjay]

It also sends a message to future whistleblowers..."Expose us and we'll show you what Hell is."

[wmfellows]

Whistle blowing generally involves someone who wasn't able to get his corporation to stop doing something that was a violation of the law.

Yes, yes. However outside of simple declarations on message boards, often the world is grey and it is not clear that there is violation of law. One may have strong, or not so strong reasons to so suspect. Reality is less neat than easy message board analysis.

[godix]

You'd think they'd be heralded as heroes for pointing out flaws in a system (physical or interpersonal) or corruption within an organization, but no. I've read a lot of stories lately where someone will call attention to a critical flaw of this sort, but TPTB will typically fire his ass instead of commending him and fixing the flaw. Sounds like they're shooting the messenger in a lot of cases. Anyone care to shed more light on this mindset?

A lot depends on the specifics of the case. Not all whistleblowers are noble fighters for morality after all, some are just worthless assholes, Look at Bradley Manning for example.

But lets set those cases aside. Lets assume that there is a valid moral reason to whistleblow. Perhaps a company is spiking food with arsenic or something. In this case, by choosing to whistleblow, the employee is actively choosing to NOT work with the company to fix the problem. The employee is choosing to bypass whatever the normal chain of command and procedure the company has for dealing with problems. He has chosen to act, without authorization, against the companies interests. His actions have announced to the world that he is not able to be trusted in his job.

Now there may be good reason for it. Perhaps he tried to fix the problem internally and failed. Maybe it's a time sensitive thing where the public deserves to know, and quickly. Perhaps by knowing and not doing anything he would be making himself an accomplice to a crime. Still, whatever justification may be used, why shouldn't a company fire an employee who ignores their procedures, can not be trusted, and is actively working to harm the company?

Personally, if I was working somewhere that was doing something so bad I thought it was morally justified to whistleblow, it would be so bad that I wouldn't be able to continue working there and even indirectly aiding whatever sort of behavior was going on. I'd quit my job on the day I decided to release confidential information. Anything else is trying to have your cake and eat it too. Either the company is evil, in which case whistleblowing is justified AND working there is not. Or the company isn't all that bad, in which case whistleblowing wouldn't be needed to solve ethical issues.

[Magiver]

It doesn't have to be a whistleblower for someone to be set upon by higher powers. The pilot who recently posted videos of security flaws (that were mentioned in the news 10 years ago) was pounced on by the TSA and local authorities.

[Grumman]

Still, whatever justification may be used, why shouldn't a company fire an employee who ignores their procedures, can not be trusted, and is actively working to harm the company?
Because the company's portrayal of events is shallow to the point of being a deliberate fabrication. He's not "actively working to harm the company", he's actively working to harm a group of people who are deliberately poisoning people. Get rid of anyone who would sabotage the company's reputation by deliberately poisoning people, and the problem of the whistleblower solves itself.

[BigT]

Because the company's portrayal of events is shallow to the point of being a deliberate fabrication. He's not "actively working to harm the company", he's actively working to harm a group of people who are deliberately poisoning people. Get rid of anyone who would sabotage the company's reputation by deliberately poisoning people, and the problem of the whistleblower solves itself.

Why would you fire the people who are causing the problem, and lose that many people, when you could just fire one person? And why would you want to reward whistleblowing, when it would mean you'd have to fire even more people?

And you seem to be trying to say that the people causing the problem caused the bad reputation. You're acting as if the whistleblower had an obligation to tell. As far as the company is concerned, they didn't.

Let's say you did something technically illegal--drugs is good one around here. And lets say your friend called the cops on you. Even knowing that doing drugs is illegal, would you not be mad at your friend? You may have done something illegal, but it is your friend who caused you to be caught.

Businesses don't like being caught, so they punish the person who caused them to be caught. That way, when they do something illegal in the future, people will think twice before allowing themselves to be caught again.

[godix]

Because the company's portrayal of events is shallow to the point of being a deliberate fabrication. He's not "actively working to harm the company", he's actively working to harm a group of people who are deliberately poisoning people. Get rid of anyone who would sabotage the company's reputation by deliberately poisoning people, and the problem of the whistleblower solves itself.

Like I said, it depends on circumstances. There are times I fully agree with the whistleblower. They are times I think the whistleblower is a fucking moron. But see, from a companies standpoint, the whistleblow is not doing their job and they are undermining other peoples jobs. Companies have highly paid people to interact with the press. Companies have people responsible for procuring safe ingredients. Companies have policies on how disagreements or issues should be resolved. Some random yahoo who's job is none of those revealing company secrets isn't the ideal way to handle things, and the company has every right to nail someone to the wall who violates their procedures and undercuts the authority of people who are actually responsible for whatever it is the whistleblower is squealing about. Sometimes the press needs to be told anyway, but thinking a company is going to be glad or reward betrayal is just silly.

Plus, as I said before, if a company I worked for was doing something so horrible I felt it was needed to whistleblow, they'd be doing something so horrible I'd feel it was needed to resign.

[Noel Prosequi]

The question as asked tacitly buys into the assumption that whistleblowers = goodies, and government/corporations = baddies. If that is the situation, the OP answers itself. The villain continues on the course of villainy in a way that is entirely predictable.

But as others have observed, it is commonly not that simple.

In my experience, whistleblowers are very frequently difficult management problems with hair-triggers for self-righteous indignation. I recall one who simply had a different view from his (superior and more experienced) police officer supervisor about the best way to place radar speed traps, but in his rather brittle world view, it wasn't possible for reasonable minds to differ or for anyone but him to be right, so he took on himself the mantle of heroic whistleblower. But he was wrong.

Similarly, there is the entirely cynical whistleblower who is underperforming and knows he is about to be disciplined so he whistleblows on whatever he can (often some relatively harmless peccadillo that could have been sorted out internally) just to attract whistleblower protection. Same thing is common enough with pre-emptive bullying claims.

These things are not at all uncommon. Movies and the press tend to portray whistleblower cases in black and white terms, in the first case for narrative clarity and in the second out of self interest. But if a company is presented with a case that is grey, it is perfectly entitled to defend itself. Whistleblowers do not have a monopoly on being right. A predisposition on the part of readers of racy news stories to believe the worst does not mean that all allegations of wrongdoing are correct.

I make no observation that there are no genuinely heroic whistleblowers - clearly there are. Nor do I make any comment about whether genuinely heroic whistleblowers (as against the problematic ones) represent the greater proportion overall. But the latter are a significant species of the overall genus. That is why passing whistleblower protection laws requires pause for thought. You can wind up creating perverse incentives very easily.

[ecco477]

"Unfortunately many people care more about looking right than being right..."

(did you steal this?;) )What a spectacular quote for the ages!

Very sad. and unfortunately very very true. I guess the burning question is....why would you work for a man, company, or organization that asked you to compromise yourself? Doesn't that then say more about YOU than it does the company??

[Huerta88]

I say if someone exposes a company doing something illegal it should be a crime for the company to reduce benefits (including upgrading their salary every to match the purchasing power of the their salary when the blew the whistle) to that person or fire them.

They're working on it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower#Ceballos_case_and_the_Whistleblower_Protection_Act_of_2007

There are various state provisions of similar nature.

To the OP:

Several thoughts:

1. There's no such thing as acts by an "organization." The corruption or mis-management, if any, is carried out by individuals within the organization (albeit in the organization's name). Not shockingly, the corrupt acts are often/usually carried out/approved by "TPTB" whom you mention. Exposing corruption means exposing corrupt acts by, oftentimes, presiding senior management of the organization. Human nature is such that only a very small minority of people will want to reward someone who criticizes or exposes their possibly or definitely bad acts or omissions.

2. Few organizations crave bad publicity, and whistleblowing almost always has the potential to lead to bad publicity that will impair the credibility or profitability of the organization (or its leadership) going forward.

3. Organizations are or have the tendency to be clannish. "Airing dirty laundry" to the public or government, who "don't understand our business anywhere as well as we do," is seen as a betrayal, just as spreading family discord outside the family would be.

4. Many if not most people who go so far as to drop a dime on the organization are, at least by that point, disaffected to a significant degree from the organization's mission, culture, etc. I am NOT saying they are "just malcontents looking for petty revenge." They may well be disaffected precisely because of their legitimately-principled discomfort with the bad acts they've become aware of. But people have a way of knowing when someone is "not with the program," and in the weeks/months/years leading up to the whistleblower's final decision to report wrongdoing, it is very likely that he has gotten a reputation, or given an impression, as an outlier, not a team player, troublemaker, etc., esp. if he's raised concerns internally (which most people would do first) and been rebuffed. It's very easy for human nature to treat such an already-suspect team member as a turncoat when he takes the ultimate non-team step of reporting the organization to outsiders. The idea of killing the messenger was familiar going back to antiquity.

[HRoark43]

And what I'm not getting is this corporate loyalty thing. How does it go beyond money? People don't work free, and jobs people do to feel good are generally ethical. So it's money based if they violate their ethics. If it's based on money why wouldn't they screw the company over the first chance it becomes profitable?
Some people are loyal to the company. It's like a tribe to them. They'll do anything for it. They're as foolish as the liberals who hate corporations. A worker is a tool; and the company is nothing more than a vehicle for income.

Corrupt companies who do stuff that is truly whistle-blower worthy will collapse under the weight of their own internal problems. That said, if you clearly see corruption inside a company it is better to leave and work for someone else, or start your own business, than to get caught whistle-blowing and be branded a snitch. As most business owners will tell you, snitch rhymes with... well, you know.

Of course, if your employer is about to get someone killed, that's when things get a little messy.

[Beware of Doug]

Corrupt companies who do stuff that is truly whistle-blower worthy will collapse under the weight of their own internal problems.Not if they pick their battles and cover their tracks well.

That said, if you clearly see corruption inside a company it is better to leave and work for someone else, or start your own business, than to get caught whistle-blowing and be branded a snitch.Does your obligation to keep quiet end once you quit?

[HRoark43]

Not if they pick their battles and cover their tracks well.

Does your obligation to keep quiet end once you quit?
That depends on how well you cover your tracks. :)

[MOIDALIZE]

Insofar as whistleblowers should be considered untrustworthy for spilling dirt, it's useful to recognize that different stakeholders within a corporation may have different interests. For the crooked CEO leading the company into ruin for personal gain, whistleblowers are indeed people to be despised, but a pension fund that owns a significant chunk of the company's stock would see things differently. Unfortunately for the whistleblower, the shareholders (and the board of directors they elect) aren't in a good position to protect them from disgruntled executives.

[Beware of Doug]

That depends on how well you cover your tracks. :)Sorry, not getting you. Unless you mean that by exposing one company, you could ruin your rep with a lot of others.

[HRoark43]

Sorry, not getting you. Unless you mean that by exposing one company, you could ruin your rep with a lot of others.
That's what I was getting at.