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The problem is, many still see compliance as an after-the-fact audit function, solely focused on legal

Operational Compliance” they often think of it in the same way as “Operational Risk” - a siloed function to audit

one standard, Operations follows different procedures, HR trains to yet another protocol, and Quality audits This creates obvious waste—multiple audit schedules, overlapping training requirements, redundant documentation They can produce impressive metrics about training completion rates, audit findings closure, and policy

However, many organizations are caught in a prescriptive, reactive, and reductive trap where audits,

introduced by old-factory thinking, reactive behaviours, and traditional training, inspection, and audits

Compliance often imagines non-conformance or audit findings as low hanging fruit or more specifically We look for them using audits, we pick them from the ground and take corrective action to pick them from rather than all commitments Relying on best efforts rather than best results Focusing on Inspection / auditing

This will, of course, be verified by internal and external audits. Organizations might be in compliance today or at the time of their last audit.

number of compliance issues open The number of hours of training per employee The number of internal audits completed on-time The percentage of outstanding post-audit issues The number of complaints And so on As a result, companies have become experts (or now require hiring them) to support the business of auditing They have created the equivalent of an America's Cup yacht optimized for one purpose - winning the audit The compliance function is now so optimized around passing audits that it is unable to adapt to changes

Make sure we pass the next audit. This isn't a character flaw. It's a role definition.

They might even have all the boxes checked and able to pass an audit.

full compliance with all legal and regulatory obligations measured by conformance as evidenced by zero audit regulations, and standards ( state them here) with an ultimate goal of zero breaches verified by third party audit Instead of audit being the primary function, compliance assurance, risk and performance management will

how to identify risks embedded in quality, health and safety, and environmental programs may require additional changes to risk management: Risked-based thinking requires companies be proactive instead of waiting for audit You cannot audit your way to better compliance.