Because of their trusted positions, it is often far easier for employees to steal from a company than any outsider. Also, once an employee begins stealing from their employer, it often continues over a sustained period and results in higher total losses.
Every year the U.S. Chamber of Commerce puts out information about how employee theft is the fastest growing crime, represents 60% of inventory losses to U.S. companies, and is the cause of about 30% of the business failures.
A client of mine gave one of his employees the afternoon off in exchange for the employee dropping off a small package of merchandise at the customer’s site not far from the employee’s home. Happy to get the afternoon off, the employee headed out the door with package in hand and his GPS searching for the customer’s address.
55% of the small businesses surveyed by the Ponemon Institute had suffered a Data Breach and 53% had already suffered multiple Data Breaches. Only one third of the business had properly notified the affected individuals about the exposure of their personal information.
For those of us that remember using carbon paper to create a copy of a document, technology is the greatest. Virtual offices, telecommuting, and all forms of working remotely have changed the face of the standard business model.