By Ted Banks

In many companies, the challenges facing compliance officers arise from an orientation of owners and managers that aren’t interested in taking a long-term view of company success. This gives rise to questions such as:

• Does our current financial environment encourage profit-making to the exclusion of other consideration (such as compliance and ethics)?
• Is there any way to penetrate the brains of managers and directors who seem to have no concerns about compliance and ethics – or who are actively opposed to “wasting money” on doing business with integrity?
• What should a compliance officer do when you perceive that the situation in your company is hopeless?

The External Culture

The first challenge to consider is how you would characterize the current corporate culture. Part of the ethos that confronts compliance officers (or lawyers, since many of these companies don’t have compliance officer) may be expressed as a belief that the company can fly “under the radar. Nobody will pay attention to us – we’re too small.” [Read more…]