Corruption is costly for any enterprise and in any country, but it is especially destructive in wartime.

In Ukraine, improvement has come with justice system reforms, efforts to bolster the anti-corruption agency and a national anti-corruption strategy, according to Transparency International, a Berlin-based anti-corruption organization.

This has taken place even as the Russian war against Ukraine has posed enormous challenges that can heighten the risk of corruption, it noted.

Ukraine also has required public officials to declare their assets, and its public procurement system is competitive and won recognition from the World Bank, the organization said.

But the war has not only raised the risks of corruption. It has made the need for an effective, corruption-free business environment that can attract investment, access foreign funding and foster innovation for national defense an absolute priority.

To this end, UN Global Compact Ukraine has stepped up, publishing “Business Integrity Lessons from a War Zone,” a guide for companies seeking to eradicate corruption, and launched a video course "Anti-Corruption" as part of its Anti-Corruption Collective Action Program. 

War-damaged communications lines in Ukraine are restored by Datagroup-Volia

The uncertainty of conditions in wartime puts enterprises in the position of “doing business unusually,” making compliance and ethical conduct all the more important, the Global Compact publication noted, drawing on expertise from such companies and organizations as DTEK energy investors and JSC Farmak, a top pharmaceutical company.

“The restoration of Ukraine is not a return to the pre-war state, but a full-fledged development and integration into the European community based on sustainable development,” the publication said.

Contributing to the publication was Yevhen Kovalevskiy, Chief Product Officer at TECHIIA, a technology holding company, who wrote: “In times of war, people are tired of stress and their critical thinking is blunted.

“Remind employees which links you can’t follow, which messages to ignore, and what to do with suspicious emails,” he advised.

Datagroup-Volia technical specialists at work in Ukraine

Be resilient, added Marianna Rozumna, head of the Legal and Compliance

Department at Datagroup-Volia, a communications operator.

“An unsuccessful decision is not a reason to put ‘the end’ in the story of your strategic development. Remember that along with you many people also found themselves in this uncertainty against their will,” she wrote.

Datagroup-Volia specialists restore war-damaged communication lines in Ukraine

Tetyana Khutor, chair of The Institute of Legislative Ideas, an anti-corruption think tank, noted that the war has provided an impetus for businesses to enter international markets, as many restrictions have been lifted on Ukrainian products. 

“Take the opportunity,” she wrote, “and the transparency of your business, which you worked on before, will help. Because the world is open to those who play fair.

Global Compact Ukraine also shared advice on compliance with the principles of integrity with its video course "Anti-Corruption," launched in February 2023. 

Its aim has been to develop integrity principles for small and medium-sized enterprises and raise awareness of corruption risks at various operational levels in large companies. 

In development for two years, the “Anti-Corruption” course involved contributions and collaboration from more than 50 experts in the private and public sectors, with informational support from the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine and the country’s Entrepreneurship and Export Promotion Office.

So far, the anti-corruption video course has been included in the curriculum of several universities and internal employee training programs for companies participating in the UN Global Compact Ukraine.

One of these companies is Datagroup-Volia, a business and residential telecommunications operator that works in market segments of data transmission, international traffic transit and satellite communications.

“The course helped me realize that I’m not just an employee but part of a collective effort to prevent and fight corruption,” said Hlib Stryzhevskyi, a Datagroup-Volia employee in its Legal and Compliance Department who participated in the course. 

“My responsibility extends beyond performing my duties to being vigilant about corruption risks and reporting them appropriately,” he added. “I also learned more about the risks of corruption for the company and its impact on business.”

Hlib Stryzhevskyi, member of Legal and Compliance Department at Datagroup-Volia

The course provides ways to detect corruption and actual mechanisms for identifying risks and initial signs in business relationships, said Datagroup-Volia’s Rozumna.

It reflects the company’s principle of zero tolerance for any form of corruption and the importance of sharing such values with partners, contractors and other businesses, she said.

The course covers topics like business registration, honest tax payments, obtaining necessary permits and, reaching further, how to create mechanisms to protect ethical businesses from engaging with companies that fail to adhere to principles of integrity. 

Other topics include risk detection, prohibited practices, working with state apparatus, utilizing whistleblowers and attitudes from leadership. Far from being a dreary training course, the video was shot in a bright artistic style, inspired by filmmaker Lars von Trier's “Dogville.” 

“As part of the UN Global Compact and representing responsible business in Ukraine, we aimed to strengthen our group’s compliance culture and contribute to creating an ethical business environment,” Rozumna said.

“Each employee embodies the company’s culture when interacting with contractors and spreading ethical market practices,” she added. 

Marianna Rozumna, head of the Legal and Compliance Department at Datagroup-Volia

Datagroup-Volia has more than 2,000 employees and implemented the video course in December 2023.

Looking ahead, partner companies have expressed interest in integrating the course into their internal training systems to educate their own staff to strengthen compliance and promote ethical behavior, she said.

It has prompted several inquiries on the company’s compliance hotline for more details on some of the topics as well as questions from employees about procedures and signs of corruption, promoting its principle of “when in doubt, report," Rozumna said.

The Datagroup-Volia worker added that the course teaches how “everyone bears responsibility for corruption risks in both the company and society.”

“Leadership must create an appropriate corporate culture, and every employee must adhere to these cultural principles,” she said. 

“Everyone can contribute to this fight.”