Translations

GRUPO MIERES ANGOLA and SNC LAVALIN’s Joint Venture: From a concrete compliance structure to Angola CSR reference.

5. Fair Operating Practices

Anti-corruption campaign

Sector Energy / Water

Year 2017

Country Angola

Transmitter

Context

Grupo Mieres Angola is a multi-service company founded in 2013, in Angola (top 10 most corrupted country) that provides help for crew management compliance, investment support, work visas, and translation in the O&G industry. Entering Angola, with a joint venture SNC Lavalin, a Canadian MNC needed strong ethical partner as corporations are legally responsible of their suppliers. GMA was selected for the JV, but needed to establish a concrete compliance structure.

Objectives

The objective of the best practice was to transfer SNC Lavallin values to GMA to integrate the SME in the Corporate Value Chain.

For the company

Define a mature Compliance System
Get ISO9001 certification
Fight systematic bribery
Become a reference in Ethics and Compliance in the country

For the society

Reduce corruption
Gain investors in Angola

APPROACH

The difficulty of creating the program was to change the mentality about corruption, in a permanent way. Employees had to be taught, monitored, warned if not following the guidelines and fired in they did not act according to the best practices. The compliance program cost around 30 000 per year for a company of 50 employees, and includes setting up a hotline, training, monitoring, quality certification tests and much more.

GMA took the following approach to create their program:
Creation of a compliance structure
Creation of an ethic channel
Dissemination of compliance polity
Create an “in vigilando” for GMA suppliers and clients
Get compliance certification
Prepare for ISO 19600 certification
Get ISO 9001 certification
Get TRACE international certification
Become a member of the coalition for Ethical Operations
Become a member of the Cumplen Association
Introduce contract compliance and in-house training
Always have open communication with SNC Lavallin and supply chain

WATCH again this video Business Against Corruption : Creating a Culture of Integrity at World Forum for a Responsible Economy : HERE and Read all the other documents HERE

CONTRIBUTION TO COMPANY PERFORMANCE

Doubled annual income in only 2 years
Signed 4 new Joint Ventures
Dedicated group of clients who demand ethical business and operations
Opened a new department to train other companies of Ethics and Compliance (3 training centres)
ISO 9001, ISO 19600, TRACE international certifications

Benefits

Became the number 1 reference in compliance and ethics in the country
Work toward corruption end
Better treatment of employees and higher wages than the competition