The Role and Effectiveness of Ethics and Compliance Practitioners

Publication type: Report
25 September 2014

Tags: Ethics Programme issues, Training, Supportive Environment, Treatment of Employees

This report provides refreshing insights into the purpose and activities of this relatively new role. Based on interviews with practitioners, it considers the skills required and the scope and capacity of E&C practitioners to have strategic influence on ‘business as usual’.

Speed read

The report proposes a way of looking at E&C roles in terms of three distinct domains of activity:

  • Custodianship’ is defined as the safeguarding and embedding of current organisation norms and standards, delivered through traditional E&C programme activities.
  • Advocacy’ involves challenging corporate values and standards in practice, surfacing and debating difficult issues and encouraging more open dialogue around ethical issues at work.
  • Innovation’ is the work required to change business processes that present an unacceptable risk of legal or ethical failure.

Is it possible for business behaviour to be changed from within?

How do Ethics and Compliance officers work effectively to promote ethical conduct inside their organisations?

Where changes are required, E&C practitioners must be in a position to develop a more strategic role. This involves challenging the way business is conducted and/or working with leaders to address aspects of the business model that present unacceptable levels of risk. The report contains examples of where E&C practitioners successfully facilitated change in partnership with leaders inside their organisations.

It provides refreshing insights into the purpose and activities of this relatively new role. Based on interviews with practitioners, it considers the skills required and the scope and capacity of E&C practitioners to have strategic influence on ‘business as usual’.

It will give boards and senior executives an understanding of the value that the E&C function brings, how it can be aligned with the business model and the resources required to make the function effective. E&C practitioners themselves will be given perspectives on how others approach the E&C role in taking a values approach to ensuring high standards of business conduct.