Investigations – where to start

It’s easy to overcomplicate and assume knowledge. For most of your colleagues, an investigation will be a rarity. They can be forgiven for being a bit confused. What’s harder to forgive (especially if you’re the courageous soul who’s spoken out against wrongdoing) is when the investigation goes FUBAR.

Most organisations (outside the larger multinationals) don’t have a full-time investigative capacity. Investigative teams are cobbled together, usually from audit, HR, maybe finance, and whoever else has a pulse and failed to have a plausible excuse not to be involved.

Developing a quick one-page checklist helps avoid some glaring errors. Something like this…

Much of my work is with mid-market, scale-up, and SME organisations, all of which lack full-time or experienced investigative capacity. Some investigative matters don’t merit outsourcing (at least at the outset), but they can’t be botched.

Simple steps like those above can avoid some more obvious tripwires. But, equally importantly, it starts to create structure, familiarity, and professionalisation – this, in turn, ensures the subsequent investigation is more thoughtful than the last. And so, we improve.