Software tracks ethics and legal violations in SMBs.
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Press Release Summary:
Designed for solo and occasional users in smaller businesses, TrakBasic® tracks and manages cases involving reports of ethical and legal violations. Software lists all open cases and indicates those needing follow-ups. Facilitating compliance with Sarbanes-Oxley Act, it incorporates data checking features that make sure all required fields are entered. Entries are accomplished through dropdown menus, and reporting features include narrative and statistical types.
Original Press Release:
Devesys® Ships Sarbanes-Oxley Software for Smaller Companies
Madison, WI, January 26, 2005 - Devesys, Inc. today announced the availability of TrakBasic® for solo and occasional users in smaller businesses. Adapted from the Devesys flagship product, TrakEnterprise®, which serves the needs of large corporations, TrakBasic fits the budgets and working styles of users in small and medium sized companies. Both products track and manage cases involving reports of ethical and legal violations by companies and their employees.
"Particularly Important" for Smaller Companies
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) has both financial and ethical compnonents. Although most people associate scandalous ethical behavior with large corporations such as Enron, the reality is that smaller companies suffer the most problems. According to John Steer, Vice Chair of the US Sentencing Commission (USSC), "A great majority of the convicted organizations...have 100 or fewer employees. Because most of the organizations sentenced each year are smaller companies, it is particularly important that they have compliance programs." SOX and the USSC Guidelines now require all publicly traded companies to have an ethics officer (smaller companies may add the responsibility to job descriptions of existing staff members).
SOX and the Single User
Responding to the special needs of smaller companies, Devesys has modified its TrakEnterprise software for executives in areas such as Human Resources, Ombuds Offices, Internal Audit, Legal, or Security who suddenly find that ethics compliance has been added to their job descriptions. TrakBasic runs on the executive's desktop workstation or laptop, using almost the same software as TrakEnterprise, but without the networking capabilities. For the single or occasional user of TrakBasic, the software provides a familiar framework at every session to preserve consistency in policies and procedures. This framework also provides all of the user conveniences of TrakEnterprise, a factor which becomes even more important to intermittent users. At the beginning of each session, it can present a list of all the open cases and a list of all those needing follow-ups. The ethics officer then can work through those lists during several sessions, completing cases and meeting deadlines. Most of the entries are accomplished through dropdown menus, making data entry fast, and also consistent. Data checking features prompt users when they attempt to close an entry screen without providing all of the required information.
Measuring Compliance
The reporting features of TrakBasic include the same reports available to TrakEnterprise users, including both narrative and statistical types. For intermittent users, the reports are especially useful in informing the Board about the operations of the ethics and business conduct program. The narrative reports give a clear sense of the nature of the cases handled and how they were resolved, without revealing the people involved. Statistical reports show the volume of cases opened and closed each reporting period, how many of each type of violation occurred, in what division, and by what type of employee (union, management, professional staff, etc.). Comparisons reports show differences in performance over various time periods. With TrakBasic, smaller companies have the same software tools that large companies have to protect themselves from ethical and criminal violations, and subsequent prosecutions.
Ethical Requirements Under SOX
SOX and the guidelines developed by the USSC have caused profound changes in the ways publicly traded companies do business. Many commentators observe that these changes are as far-reaching as the legislation passed in 1933 and 1934 establishing the Securities and Exchange Commission. Along with stronger accounting requirements, SOX introduces the expectation of ethical behavior and a culture of compliance in all publicly traded companies. It requires that they adopt a code of ethics, or explain why they have not. It requires that companies provide adequate resources for an effective program, and designate a member of senior management as the ethics officer. The USSC, recognizing that smaller companies do not have the financial resources nor the personnel available to Fortune 500 companies, makes provisions for using existing personnel as ethics officers, and for less expensive systems, suited to the size of the company.
Industry Leader Since 1995
Devesys has been providing case management solutions to large corporations for ethics and business conduct since 1995. TrakBasic now offers the same capabilities to solo and intermittent users in smaller companies which do not need a full-time ethics officer.
