To maintain safe, fair, ethical business operations, companies of every size in every industry must follow laws and regulations as part of business operations.
You can’t just opt out of compliance. But the sheer volume of laws that companies need to follow make regulatory compliance challenging. In addition, regulatory compliance requirements for businesses are forever changing. It makes you feel like you’re spinning your wheels in your efforts to achieve compliance.
Failing to comply can prove costly as far as legal and financial penalties as well as the consequences of compromising customer trust and tarnishing your own reputation.
If you are wondering how to improve compliance in a company, it helps to know (and follow) regulatory compliance best practices.
- Determine Your End Goals
Start with where you want to end up and work your way back. In some cases, this could be a specific law or regulation you must comply with to operate as a business. In other cases, it might be a specific compliance area that is costing you, such as a certain fine or violation you want to reduce.
Identify those specific areas you want to see improved and establish clear metrics to measure how well you are meeting those goals.
Taking an end-game-first approach tops the list of compliance best practices.
- Know Your Industry’s Regulatory Environment
Not every organization has the personnel or expertise to stay up to date with every piece of legislation and its requirements on them. Can you relate?
While some companies are fortunate enough to have a Chief Compliance Officer, many businesses do not have a CCO. However, lacking a designated CCO is no excuse, as it does not exempt you from complying with the laws and regulations.
You might need to hire someone new to handle them in a full-time role. Or you might need to work with an outside consultant to make sure you do not put your company at risk.
- Create Effective Policies and Procedures
As the lungs of your company, policies and procedures reflect your organizational values, provide the framework for your business operations, and offer guidance to employees. Use your written policies and procedures as a tool to help reduce your regulatory risk.
- Hold Employees Accountable
Not every company requires employees to sign policies; however, if your employees are your first line of defense against non-compliance, being able to track that they received and acknowledged those policies can help reduce your risk.
You need a robust system that allows you to prove what your company has communicated to employees as well as what employees have acknowledged that they have received and understood.
- Compliance Training
If policies provide the first line of defense, training serves up the second. Especially when your compliance training aligns with your policies. By training to your policies, you reinforce the behaviors and processes that will be the most effective.
Doing so also helps increase comprehension and awareness in employees.
Did you know the right managed services provider (MSP) can help organizations keep up with increasing compliance demands? By providing around-the-clock monitoring and proactive maintenance, BSuite Cybersecurity can help organizations meet regulatory requirements while reducing the risk of cyber threats.
