Compliance Executives Nervous as Regulatory Climate Shifts
DOJ and SEC statements driving CCO concerns over changes in compliance regulations and scrutiny
Eighty-one percent of compliance officers have increased apprehension when it comes to their personal liability in situations of corporate misconduct, according to a new survey released by law firm DLA Piper. This uneasy adjustment stems from shifts in tone from Washington, DC, including the appointment of Hui Chen as the Justice Department’s first compliance counsel, and the release of the Yates Memo outlining a plan to prosecute individual corporate employees and incentivize reforms, according to the 2016 Compliance Risk Report: CCOs Under Scrutiny.
“Between the DOJ’s memorandum and the SEC’s latest initiatives, there’s considerable rhetoric driving the government’s renewed focus on corporate misconduct and the prosecution of company executives,” says Brett Ingerman, co-chair of DLA Piper’s Global Governance and Compliance practice, in a DLA Piper press release. “The most revelatory parts of this survey lie in the specific feedback from compliance officers who are facing increased personal accountability for organizational misdeeds whether they perpetrated the wrongdoing or not.”