Survey: Compliance, at leadership table, navigates uncertain risk landscape

 Business leaders are drawing on the expertise of compliance professionals to map out the risk landscape in President Donald Trump’s new world order. 

By and large, the compliance function is being embraced as a strategic partner to the C-suite and board in 2024, Compliance Week’s “Inside the Mind of the CCO” survey shows, a positive development for a profession accustomed to being shut out of leadership conversations. The vast majority of compliance professionals–74 percent–say they have a regular seat at the leadership table of their companies, indicating their area of expertise is gaining traction, and perhaps overdue recognition, as a strategic imperative for businesses. At a time when the Trump administration is rewriting many of the rules, businesses are turning to compliance to do what they do best: look ahead and identify the risks.  

Compliance has forged direct lines of communication with the tops of their organizations, the survey finds. More respondents reported directly to the chief executive (43 percent) than to any other governing body, C-suite executive, or business area in 2024. While custom has often dictated the compliance function report to legal, the share of polled practitioners who indicated their companies do just that shrunk by 5 percent year over year. And in a further testament to the rising influence of the function, more compliance personnel report directly to the board (21 percent) than they did a year ago (17 percent).  

Still, for the cohort of respondents who answered “no” to having a seat at the leadership table, two age-old culprits emerge: the twin perceptions that compliance is not a revenue-driver, and that culturally speaking, it need not be taken seriously.