Education as a prevention of fraud

Abstract

A critical way of thinking developed by teachings of financial audit, accounting and taxation are necessary for any graduate in economics. Combined with ethics it is the essential prerequisite for increasing the resistance of the experts to embezzlement. The aim of this study is to ascertain whether the graduates of business schools in Czech Republic are ready to recognize and expose economic crime/fraud which they might encounter at their workplace. The readiness of the graduates is bilateral as it includes the ability "to recognize" which is discussed in terms of adequate knowledge - which should be obtained especially during the bachelor and master studies, and the willingness "to expose" which is discussed in terms of moral principles of the graduates - which should be augmented during their studies as well. The article summarizes the results of research conducted among Czech universities and their graduates. The research among the Czech universities was carried out as an analysis of the study programs provided by Czech universities and the corresponding syllabi. The research among the graduates was carried out via online questionnaire distributed to graduates through their alumni organizations. This questionnaire was accessible through the Internet from November 2014 to February 2015. During this period 264 respondents undertook the survey. We formulate two theses in this paper. First thesis states that Czech graduates are not equipped with knowledge necessary to recognize economic fraud at their workplace. Second thesis states that Czech graduates don't possess the moral incentives to expose the economic crime. While we were not able to confirm the first thesis unequivocally, we concluded that there is much to improve in the structure of the study programs of Czech universities providing business education. The second thesis was confirmed though. The suggestions we made in this paper based on the research were the following: firstly, to develop a syllabus of a new teaching subject which would incorporate the basic aspects of the advanced financial accounting, auditing, tax and business law and make such subject mandatory for all business graduates at Czech universities. Similar subject - even though less extensive/complex - shall be developed for the secondary business schools as well. Secondly, to eliminate the segmented ethics of secondary school graduates through education based on case-studies and demonstration and focus greatly on raising the ethics standards at both levels of business education.

This paper is not a traditional field-based research study. Rather it is a summary/conclusive report on two interconnected research projects. The aim of this paper is to summarize the results from the former research projects and to compare andto confront the findings of these projects in the attempt to find a “common denominator” of both issues raised in the preceding research projects.