Walmart Supermarket case

In 2012, Walmart was caught is an international bribery scandal. Bribes had been paid to facilitate the building of supermarkets in Mexico and other overseas locations. Worse, the situation had – it appeared – been investigated internally and the results covered up by senior management. You can read about the case using the link below:

http://www.businessinsider.com/walmart-bribery-scandal-2012-4

When Walmart’s wrongdoing came to light, they faced a huge investigation which is still on-going into the extent of the issues. One of their responses was to invigorate their Ethics & Compliance program which is now one of the strongest and most well-regarded programs in place in the USA.

For your assignment, imagine you are back in 2012 only a few months after the allegations first surfaced and before remedial action was taken. The investigation is still ongoing so we don’t have a full report yet but some of the issues are clear. The Board of Directors at Walmart does not want to wait for the investigation to be finished before they take steps to start to correct the issues at the company.

Please write a paper (1500 words) explaining to the Board at Walmart on:

• ï‚·  The issues Walmart is facing and what has gone wrong
• ï‚·  In particular, what is it about the culture at Walmart that may have led to these issues
• ï‚·  You already know about the internal investigation being covered up. Please address this and explain how the results should have been handled. What steps would you advise are taken against those involved in the ‘cover up’?
• ï‚·  What steps do you advise Walmart to take to help ensure this never happens again (this should be your view of what steps they would take. You do not need to find out exactly what Walmart did in fact do)
• ï‚·  Anything else you believe the Board should know