Cybersecurity, Innovation, and ESG Among Chief Compliance Officer Priorities

A new KPMG survey shows CCOs are feeling increased pressure from regulators and boards. Data protection/cybersecurity, consumer protection, and innovative technologies are all top-of-mind for chief compliance officers. Conducted in February/March 2023, the survey features insights from 240 Fortune 500 CCOs and chief ethics officers across six industries, including financial services.

“Compliance feels acute pressure to enhance—not only to be more effective and efficient—but in order to meet increasing board and regulator expectations,” KPMG’s Amy Matsuo said. “Technology and data analytic investment to the ethics and compliance function is no longer a ‘nice-to-have,’ it’s a necessity to help mitigate, measure and identify risk.”

Some of the key findings:

• 73% of CCOs indicated increasing regulatory expectations and scrutiny.
• 43% said that new regulatory requirements are the top compliance challenge.
• 45% said that industry-specific regulations top the list of key compliance focus.
• 48% said that they have not yet implemented an ESG compliance plan (56% said that enhancing the monitoring/testing of ESG metrics is a top priority).
• 53% said that they look to enhance technology and data analytics (63% expect an increase in the technology budget).
• 45% said that they have expanded ethics and compliance training, and 56% are to increase compliance full-time equivalents (FTEs).

View the complete report here. 

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