Richard Bistrong

About

In the ‘pressure cooker’ of international sales, you might feel the ‘heat.’ Why? Because in any organization that is committed to growth, values can get challenged, & not all ethical decisions are easy. Employees can feel they are in the middle of competing corporate objectives, between the pressure to succeed, & the pressure to comply. As a former International Sales VP, I experienced such tension, but kept that debate about pressure to myself, enjoying all the rewards of commercial success for decades. ….until all that changed, when I was targeted by law enforcement agencies in the US & UK for violating international anti-bribery & trade laws. But now it’s a much different story. As quoted in The New York Times, The Financial Times, Forbes, CNBC, & The Wall Street Journal, I bring the front-lines of international business to life through 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥-𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐥𝐝 𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐤𝐬 & 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥-𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐥𝐝 𝐥𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐨𝐧𝐬. In my corporate keynotes & workshops, & through my award-winning e-learning training videos, I help compliance & business teams to bridge the inevitable gaps between ethics & compliance expectations & commercial realities. And by doing so, we can all help people make principled decisions in what’s a very complex, volatile & competitive world. My journey started as a successful international sales vice-president of a global corporation & ended with my pleading guilty to violating the FCPA & UK trade offenses. As part of my cooperation agreements, I worked in an undercover capacity with the FBI & City of London Police, before serving a 14-month federal prison term, returning home in 2013. Now my definition of success is to support existing ethics & compliance initiatives by helping people, teams, & organizations appreciate that no one is ever alone when it comes to ethical decision-making & that we never have to sacrifice integrity to succeed. Since 2014, I have been working with organizations through my consultancy, Front-Line Anti-Bribery LLC. In-person & virtually, I’ve presented to hundreds of diverse global multinationals, focusing on anti- bribery, ethics, & compliance challenges, sharing, my front-line experience & perspective on real-world corruption & compliance risk. My clients include Volkswagen, Novartis, Anheuser-Busch, Airbus, Kraft Heinz, & Microsoft, among other Fortune 100 companies & trade groups, & law enforcement training workshops, all on a global basis. I welcome the opportunity to exchange & share perspectives on real-world anti-bribery, ethics, & compliance challenges. Let's connect at .