Under Penalty of (Financial) Distress, do NOT blow that Whistle!

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But, if you have a strong stomach and a driving need to do what is right, rather than what is expedient … and can afford to wait for a $3.8MM settlement … then you may wish to listen to this interview with Michael Winston.

By way of a quick background summary, Michael was awarded $3.8 million by winning a wrongful-dismissal and retaliation case against the Bank of America. That’s the good news. The bad news is that the bank is fighting back in a delaying tactic and has appealed the jury verdict twice.

Let me be clear that it is not Michael’s fortunes that is the subject of the interview (he has resigned himself to a long, grinding road to eventual vindication and success), it is the chilling message that is sent by Big Business and Too-Big-To-Fail Banks to every one of their employees: keep your mouth shut, or this will happen to you.

After all, if a man who has served at the highest executive levels of five Fortune 100 companies, including Merrill Lynch and Motorola, holds a Masters Degree from the University of Notre Dame, a Ph.D from the University of Illinjois, and a graduate of executive programs from Stanford and Wharton can be publicly harassed, fired and held at bay, what makes you (dear, valued employee) think you will fare any better?

“If a person can fog a mirror, we will give them a loan”

When Michael heard this pronouncement from a top sales exec at Countrywide Home Loans and had his concerns dismissed – in fact told that he was walking across a mine field if he continued to question the company’s ethics and processes – he began to search out allies and search for a way to be the true “change agent” his credentials call for.

The actual “whistleblowing” came about not because of their financial practices, but because Countrywide was housing his employees in a building that was – literally – toxic. (Listen to what transpired after he picked up his phone and called California’s OSHA.)

After hearing what Michael has to say, are you going to still be subject to the “Bystander Syndrome,” or will you be willing to support the Whistleblower? Will you be as willing to go to the wall as his trial lawyer, Ted Mathews? Will you seek to expose these wrongs as did the NYTimes reporter, Gretchen Morgenson? Will you be one of a few fellow workers and professional colleagues who stood by his side out of hundreds who did not?

Your answer…is your character.