As it turns out, compiling a final list of the top articles on CCI for 2019 was a lot like planning my menu for next week’s holiday dinner. In both cases, I’m serving a few classic, reliable favorites alongside more recently road-tested fare, plus some new and innovative offerings that are sure to be crowd-pleasers.
In other words, both the year-end list and the holiday menu promise big portions, plenty of variety and maybe a surprise or two.
Am I going to stretch this metaphor to its absolute limits? Yes. Yes I am.
Readers, I hope you’ll sample everything. And if you’re coming for dinner, bring wine.
Traditional Dishing
When is a Frank Bucaro article like a classic Green Bean Casserole? When it makes a welcome appearance year after year, comforting as always. More than 45,000 people read What Would You Do: Ethical Dilemmas in the Workplace this year, and upwards of 92,000 people have read it since it originally appeared on the site in 2017. This timeless, top-performer is worth enjoying at least once a year, with or without cream of mushroom soup and those little crunchy onions.
And here’s a second helping from the archives: take a break from pretending to work today and enjoy The Best Compliance-Related Dilbert Cartoons of All Time. They’re at least a decade old, but they’ve aged pretty well and still manage to crack me up. Like some of my relatives.
Foolproof Favorites
Stick a fork into any compliance conversation, podcast or professional conference these days and you’re sure to encounter one or all of the next four contributors on this list. These GRC professionals are writers, speakers, pundits and podcasters, and they’re among the most popular (and prolific) commentators of the day.
I wouldn’t serve mashed potatoes without gravy, and I won’t fail to acknowledge their contribution to and influence on the greater GRC community, year in and year out.
The gang’s top-performing articles in 2019 included:
- Jay Rosen’s How to Reposition Compliance as a Revenue Generator
- Mike Volkov’s popular article, How the Chief Risk Officer’s role will change in 2019
- This whitepaper from Tom Fox about the OFAC Compliance Framework, which happened to be CCI’s most popular download on the site this year
- And finally, a thought-provoking guest post from Matt Kelly, What the Shootings Mean for Ethics and Compliance, which looked at the implications of the mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton earlier in the year.
Mixing it Up: New Recipes for Success
Bon Appetit Magazine describes this cranberry sauce as “Jiggly and fun, like the retro canned stuff, but with deeper fruit flavor and more nuance.” Does that mean you should always swap something new for whatever’s already working? Mercy, no. The clever hostess (and editor) serves both.
Making room on the site to welcome new contributors was one of the year’s unexpected delights. Notable among them is Sandra Erez, who now regularly writes passionate commentary for a growing audience. We particularly enjoyed Somewhere Over Theranos: There’s No Place Like Holmes and count it among one of the top-read articles of the year.
Margarita Derelanko’s debut this year is also of note. Her charming essay, Confessions of a Young Mom and Compliance Professional, compared a compliance officer’s daily challenges to the trials of young motherhood. The piece struck a chord with readers and was CCI’s top-performing post on social media.
Side Dishes Worth Sharing
CCI is always on the lookout for content that’s bright, topical and engaging – and we especially enjoy publishing the work of authors who are in the trenches and can share tactical advice or “lessons learned.”
These four articles meet that description and also were among the most liked, clicked and shared articles this year:
Leveraging What You Know About GDPR for CCPA Success, co-authored by Dominique Shelton Leipzig, Susan Fahringer and Anna Mourlam
5 Lessons in Data Governance from Games of Thrones, by Fahad Muhammad
How Leaders Make Decisions in the Face of Ambiguity, by Linda Henman
Cybersecurity Responsibility Extends to Corporate Boards by Jayne Friedland Holland
Sweet Endings
Had enough? I know — time for that nap. Thanks for joining us. Looking back over the year has been a pleasure today, and so has sharing the best of our best here. We do so with a heaping helping of gratitude to our authors, our listeners, our readers and supporters.
Wishing you and yours all the best of the season!
Sarah Hadden is Publisher of Corporate Compliance Insights and CEO of CCI Media Group LLC. Hadden has more than two decades of experience as a journalist, editor and marketing consultant. She previously was Lifestyle Editor for the Arlington News; a contributing writer for the Dallas Morning News; Managing Editor of the Collin County Business Journal; and Managing Editor of the Star Community Newspapers group in Dallas, Texas. Hadden also served as Senior Account Executive in the Atlanta office of Hill & Knowlton Public Relations, specializing in corporate media training, crisis communications and health care.
More recently, Hadden is Founder and Managing Director of Words & Pictures, a marketing agency offering SEO consulting and web design for lawyers, executive recruiters, consultants and other professional service providers. She has managed and overseen the daily operations of CCI since 2012 and became CCI’s owner and publisher in January 2019. 
