For the last ten years, I’ve lived in Austin, Texas, which bills itself as the “Live Music Capital of the World” because of the hundreds of nightly music venues and the multiple, well-known annual outdoor music festivals like Austin City Limits and South by Southwest.
Maybe it’s because I listen to so much music, but I find myself discovering hidden compliance messages in a lot of song lyrics and then using these lyrics when speaking with my clients about compliance program development.
I was listening to the Rolling Stones’ song “Can’t Get No Satisfaction” recently when I tripped upon a wonderful, albeit unintended, lesson:
When I’m watchin’ my TV
and a man comes on to tell me
how white my shirts can be.
Well he can’t be a man ’cause he doesn’t smoke
the same cigarettes as me.
I can’t get no, oh no no no.
Hey hey hey, that’s what I say.
. . . I can’t get no satisfaction . . .
You see, I am often asked to explain what a best practice compliance program actually looks like and, more importantly, how one even begins to get started – i.e., what’s the most cost-effective way to design a program that organizes and prioritizes the seemingly endless and disparate risks and legal requirements?
The problem is that insiders are flooded every day with an endless stream of phone calls and emails from consultants and vendors selling the latest and greatest best practice solution. It sometimes seems like consultants and vendors have become a de facto fourth branch of government by taking the vague and conflicting laws, regulations, and judicial decisions and opining as to their meaning for the regulated community.
Attend any compliance-related conference or webinar and you walk away thinking that the government is poised and waiting specifically for you to slip up so they can throw somebody in jail or levy a multibillion dollar fine.
Those of us who’ve been leading compliance efforts for a long time know that this simply isn’t true. What is true, however, is that the government benefits greatly by having consultants and vendors telling us what best practice means so that they do not have to take a position themselves.
The hidden compliance message in the Stones’ song “Satisfaction” is that you will never be satisfied if you blindly chase these carefully crafted sales pitches. You cannot spend your way to compliance because no outside solution provider can ever really anticipate your unique inside reality.
In fact, spending money duplicating the wheel or pushing incompatible processes decreases your chance for long-term sustainable success. In my experience, you need to first survey the existing ethics and compliance landscape at your company.
Working from a prepared outline, have conversations with key business and corporate function leaders, and with the internal subject matter experts.
Strive to understand the company’s management and decision-making culture – i.e., is it centralized or decentralized; is it business unit-based or geography-based; is it formal or informal, etc.
Next, try to figure out what activities are working and not working, and what the company’s risk appetite is going forward.
Then, step back, and synthesize the responses and organize the captured activities into distinct buckets – e.g., Ensuring a Proper Governance Structure, Building a Culture of Integrity, Ensuring Compliance with Laws and Increasing Credibility with Stakeholders.
Finally, prioritize the activities in each bucket so you know what you will need to work on first, and develop a realistic project plan for each activity – complete with reasonable and defensible milestones and metrics.
By completing this survey exercise first, you will likely make better choices about your resource needs. And you will be able to effectively craft and argue for the necessary budget.
In the end, a well-designed plan of action, free of fear-based marketing clutter, will yield the most effective – and cost-effective – results.
It’s as Mick Jagger reminded us in another classic Rolling Stones’ song:
You can’t always get what you want.
But if you try sometimes,
You just might find,
You get what you need.
Mick Jagger photo via Gonzalo Andrés under Creative Commons 2.0.
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About the Author
Paul F. Liebman is of counsel for Ladner & Associates PC in Texas. His practice focuses on corporate ethics and compliance, bringing extensive in-house and private practice experience and recognized thought leadership spanning more than 20 years. His clients historically include large and small companies, both public and private.
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