As we close out the year, it is now time to begin the retrospective reviews and predictions for the New Year. I will try to keep them to a minimum but I find it important to reflect and look forward to new challenges. Compliance is a fast moving profession. More attention is being paid to the compliance function, and more companies are embracing the importance...

You know a company’s culture is suffering when you hear the CEO or senior executives say the best way to develop a “Speak Up” culture is to just tell all the employees “we want to hear from you.” I am an advocate for simplicity but sometimes simplicity can slip into stupidity. A “Speak Up” culture requires a commitment to a number of important principles and...

Lauren Connell, Managing Associate at The Volkov Law Group, joins us again for a posting about self-reporting FCPA violations.  Lauren’s profile is here, and she can be reached at [email protected]. One of the critical questions when evaluating a potential FCPA violation is to decide whether to disclose the matter to the Justice Department and the SEC. The SEC recently announced a requirement for companies to voluntarily disclose...

If your company is big enough and has the resources to consider establishing an internal ombudsman’s function, consider yourself lucky. When compliance professionals and lawyers use the term “ombudsman,” it is important to define how the term is being used. The most effective model for an ombudsman is the creation of an entire independent investigation and resolution function within a company. In this model, the...

Just when you thought things could not get any weirder, along comes the New York Department of Financial Services and proposes a new regulation that sets forth minimum requirements for anti-money laundering transaction monitoring systems and sanctions watch list filtering. The regulations include an annual requirement that the Chief Compliance Officer at New York banks and money transmitters certifies that the bank’s or money transmitter’s...

A Chief Compliance Officer can get so overwhelmed with risks that it is hard to keep their focus on priorities. Risks are everywhere and no compliance program can address every risk – the trick is keeping your eye on the ball and focusing on the significant risk. There are lots of risks surrounding a company’s supply chain. Unfortunately, vendors, suppliers and their respective vendors and...

DOJ’s compliance counsel, Hui Chen, pronounced this year as the compliance year of third party due diligence. This has been a good year for compliance, but I would not characterize this year as limited to third party due diligence. I am not sure why Ms. Chen focused on third party due diligence but frankly there have been a number of significant developments in compliance, including...

The Justice Department’s hiring of Hui Chen as the new Compliance Counsel is an important development in DOJ’s prosecution of corporate defendants. It is not clear yet what impact Ms. Chen will have. At a recent event at NYU (video here), Andrew Weissmann, the head of the Fraud Section, and Ms. Chen spoke about the new compliance position. The video provides important information. Ms. Chen...

For years, companies and compliance professionals have largely dismissed UK Bribery Act enforcement risks. Ever since the effective date for the UK Bribery Act, defense lawyers have been waiting for the SFO to begin serious enforcement actons. Last week may be the beginning of a new era in UL Bribery Act enforcement. First, a UK court approved the SFO’s first deferred prosecution agreement. Standard Bank,...