People who work in compliance and ethics roles play an essential role in GRC. They help the organization address both mandatory and voluntary obligations, including the underlying risks those obligations intend to address.

Learn about the other roles involved in GRC

By using a sophisticated approach to compliance and ethics, mandatory and voluntary boundaries can be managed in a way that reduces drag on the organization and inspires higher levels of Principled Performance.

But compliance and ethics are needed at every level in the organization. Every department and team needs to address obligations related to their activities.

So doing your job in compliance and ethics includes helping your peers understand what you do, how you do it, and how to apply it in their departments.

Modern compliance and ethics management facilitates integrity at all levels and in every area of the organization.

Goals of Compliance & Ethics

The goals of compliance, a compliance program, sometimes called a corporate compliance program or regulatory compliance program, include:

• Compliance with legal and regulatory requirements
• Compliance with internal policies and contracts
• Management of related compliance risks
• Establishment of an ethical culture

The role of compliance is more than just the "C" in GRC

Roles in Compliance & Ethics

It is essential that those with compliance management responsibility understand the current and future strategy of the organization. Ideally, these individuals should also be involved in strategy discussions to ensure that compliance is factored into strategic decisions.

Similarly, compliance and ethics officers must communicate about requirements, how best to stay within the boundaries or affect where the boundaries fall, and how compliance requirements affect risk analyses.

Communicating with human capital and operating executives to establish and teach ethical decision-making is also important.

People in compliance and ethics often have titles such as:

• Compliance and ethics officer
• Ethics officer
• Business conduct manager
• Compliance Manager
• Compliance Analyst
• Ethics Manager
• And More!

Others play a role in Compliance & Ethics and vice versa.

Compliance & Ethics Everywhere

It is essential for people who are NOT in compliance and ethics management roles to understand the needs of their colleagues who ARE in compliance and ethics roles.

At the same time, it is important for people in other roles to understand how to apply compliance and ethics management concepts to their work.

This means that everyone should understand and apply the following:

• Compliance concepts & frameworks
• How to incorporate compliance into operations
• How to address both requirements and the underlying risks