Page 299 - Deception at work all chapters EBook

352 An HR Guide to Workplace Fraud and Criminal Behaviour

ENRONESQUE DEFINITIONS

Feudalism. You have two cows. Your Lord using letters of credit opened by your
takes some of the milk. brother-in-law at a Luxembourg bank,
Fascism. You have two cows. The then execute a debt-equity swap with an
government takes both, hires you to take associated general offer so that you get all
care of them and sells you the milk. four cows back, with a tax exemption for
Communism. You have two cows. You must five cows. The milk rights of the six cows
take care of them, but the government takes are transferred through an intermediary to
all the milk. a Cayman Island company secretly owned
Capitalism. You have two cows. You sell one by the majority shareholder who sells the
and buy a bull. Your herd multiplies, and the rights to all seven cows back to your listed
economy grows. You sell them and retire to company. The Enron annual report says the
play golf. company owns eight cows, with an option
Enronism. You have two cows. You sell three on one more and has securitized the income
of them to your publicly listed company, on all 12 cows.

Pay the closest attention to detail

If there are important documents of title which are central to the deal, such as share cer-
tificates, deeds to gold mines in Clapham, debentures, proof of asset ownership or custodial
receipts, inspect the originals and have their authenticity confirmed, possibly through your
bankers or professional advisers. Make sure you keep copies securely.

Remember that vital documents may be forgeries. So check them out

Over a series of correspondence, the liar may drop the topics he wishes to avoid, perhaps by
creating diversions, raising spurious matters or by feigning anger or humour. He may escape
if the reader fails to persist.

Recommendation: When involved in prolonged correspondence, list all of the topics in which
you are interested. Make sure you get a response to each; note the order in which they are
dealt with and the number of words devoted to each one.

At a lower, but equally important level, failure to answer a question or to address the critical
issue is a strong sign of deception.

Don’t be tempted

Do not be tempted into doing anything that is illegal and do not compromise yourself in any
way. In fact, if you are dealing with a suspected conman, don’t let your guard drop for a single
moment.

You can never cheat an honest man, but it is always worth a try