Written by Luz Marchena
Just because something is legal doesn’t mean that it is ethical.
That was the theme of former MCI vice president and chief audit executive Cynthia Cooper’s speech Thursday night at Harding University’s Benson Auditorium. Cooper, who led the team that uncovered theWorldComfraud, the largest corporate fraud case in history, spoke as part of the American Studies Distinguished Lecture Series.
Her 90-minute speech was about the importance of ethical leadership in business, based on her 20 years of professional experience as an auditor and now also as an internationally recognized speaker and author of the book “Extraordinary Circumstances.”
“What do you think about when I say the wordsethical dilemma?” asked Cooper, while leaving the microphone at the podium, walking along the stage.
After a moment of silence, the audience started participating in what became more like a teacher-student conversation than a public speech. Fear, greed and time constraints were some of the reasons people listed from their seats after Cooper asked why people cheat.Although some argue that only business men and women could understand the jargon Cooper used during her speech, her delivery of the information made evidence of her teacher-like style when sharing her experience as a corporate executive.”My book is written in present tense, because I like people to feel that they are with me and with my team while we were working on this case,” Cooper said.
Cooper, who was recognized as one of Time Magazine’s 2002 Persons of the Year, also earned the distinction of being the first woman to receive the AAA Accounting Exemplar Award and to be inducted into the AICPA Business & Industry Hall of Fame. After helping MCI move forward and successfully emerge from bankruptcy, Cooper left the company to launchThe CooperGroup, her own consulting firm.
The federal court of Mississippi sentenced the CEO and CFO ofWorldCom to 25 and five years of prison, respectively, because of the fraud. Emphasizing this, Cooper invited the audience to refer to the Bible as the source of all wisdom when making decisions.
Because Cooper answered questions from the audience during her speech, Bryan Burks, dean of the College of Business, decided not to have a segment of open questions at the end of Cooper’s speech, as is customary at ASI presentations. Instead, Burks invited audience members to buy Cooper’s book and get her signature at the auditorium’s lobby.
