Everyone has jumped on the corporate culture bandwagon.  For some new converts, they like to espouse corporate culture as a recent discovery, or a new-fangled approach for compliance programs.

The story of corporate culture as a talismanic tool for ethics and compliance is really nothing new.  Chief compliance officers knew the importance of corporate culture from the beginning.  A number of companies separately called out ethics, either as a part of the chief compliance officers’ responsibilities or by creating a stand-alone chief ethics officer position.

The question is still unclear if business organizations are ready to make the commitment and invest in their culture.  Most companies, however, lack true leadership and commitment to a corporate culture of compliance.  In this regard, few companies (if any) have invested sufficiently to match the requirements, stakeholder demand, and tangible benefits from attending to corporate culture. 

In this Episode, Michael Volkov reviews the practical steps needed to make a culture of ethics and compliance a reality. First, a company has to define its culture.  Second, a company has to embed its culture through messaging, actions and accountability.  And finally, a company has to monitor, intervene, remediate and maintain its culture.