Managing Business Corruption: Targeting Non-Compliant Practices in Systemically Corrupt Environments (article)

This article focuses on strategies of ‘managing business corruption’ at the firm level and offers insights for practitioners in systemically corrupt environments. The authors' study of 110 CEOs and owners of companies operating in Russia tested a new, ethnographic approach to managing corruption at a firm level. The authors conceptualize ‘managing business corruption’ as devising and implementing strategies that mitigate corruption-related risks in an effective way. The authors argue that such strategies have to target specific non-compliant practices, identified bottom-up, yet also amount to a pragmatic, problem-solving framework at the firm level, implemented top-down. Leadership is a key factor which defines effectiveness of corruption management in systemically corrupt environments. While the latter are generally conducive to tolerance and passive attitudes to corruption among business leaders, the authors identify proactive modes (preventive and controlling) and possible channels (formal hierarchy and informal networks) for leadership action. The proposed approach can also be used for leadership training.