Compliance Officer: A Career in High Demand

Compliance officer? What’s that? Well, it may be the most interesting  job you never heard of.

Managing a business these days involves a tangle of issues regarding corporate governance, management of human resources (i.e., people), governmental regulations and ethics. A compliance officer oversees, reviews and evaluates these issues and keeps a company operating on the straight and narrow both in terms of internal policy and outside regulatory requirements.

It’s a career field that’s expanding, and positions are available in a broad range of industries including healthcare, telecommunications, manufacturing and the financial sector.

As an interdisciplinary specialty, compliance calls into play skills in the areas of business, technology, law and ethics, both of individuals and of a corporate culture. Because the primary responsibility of a compliance officer is to ensure that a company is being run legally, he or she also needs to be fully conversant with all of the applicable standards and regulations of the industry it is part of.

It’s an important job, and a challenging one. If you’re intrigued, here are the answers to questions you probably have:

What’s a Typical Job Description?

Specifics will vary depending upon the type of industry or governmental agency, but the basic duties and responsibilities of all compliance officers are similar. In general, they are:

• Analyze and understand the current regulations and ethical standards in the industry, and interpret them as to how they fit into the business operations of the company.
• Understand the underlying values of the company, establish and implement standard policies and procedures, communicate them to company employees via training and other educational programs, oversee their compliance and resolve violations of those procedures and practices.
• Continually review procedures, practices and documents to assess current and prospective risks facing the company, as well as the procedures to reduce that risk and effectively manage it.
• Collaborate with human resources, internal audit, legal and other departments for investigation and resolution of compliance issues.
• Serve as staff to top management and boards of directors or trustees to keep them informed and provide guidance on matters of compliance.

Where Are the Jobs?

Compliance officers are particularly in demand in financial institutions and within the federal, state and local governments. But working environments can vary greatly, from office settings to offsite fieldwork in outdoor and industrial plant settings. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, locations with the highest number of compliance positions are in the New York metropolitan area, the Washington, D.C. area and the Los Angeles metropolitan area, followed by the Houston, Chicago and Atlanta areas. Topping the salary scale are compliance jobs with tech firms in Silicon Valley.

What Education Is Required?

A bachelors degree is the minimum requirement for any job in compliance, but advanced degrees are generally required for positions other than entry-level. While an MBA or even a JD are appropriate grounding for the field, an alternative you may not be aware of is the master of legal studies (MLS).

Offered by accredited schools like Santa Clara University School of Law, the MLS program is designed for people who want to learn the law but don’t want to become attorneys. It’s a course of study that combines broad legal knowledge with competency-based skills training and business ethics and is tailor-made for people who want to pursue careers in compliance.

What Are the Personal Requirements?

Above all, an excellent compliance officer is ethical and principled. Professional recruitment firm Robert Walters describes the quintessential personality of a compliance officer this way:

• Fair and modest. Willing to scrutinize all the facts without making a snap judgment.
• Intelligent and willing to keep learning. Most industries that employ a compliance officer are subject to constantly changing legislation, so staying on top of things is vital.
• Level-headed, clear communicator. One aspect of the job is communicating often confusing or abstract compliance-related issues across all divisions of an organization, so a compliance officer must have great people skills and be able to communicate up, down and across the employee chain.
• A compliance officer must be willing to see an issue through to resolution. Every time.
• A strong constitution and extra conviction. Solid backbone and the strength to stand by difficult decisions and be more influenced by right versus wrong than by relationships. Willing to take the lead in setting the tone for corporate integrity.

There’s a great future in the field of compliance.  And it’s a career that is both challenging and rewarding.