I have been studying the legend of King Arthur and thought it would be good idea to have a week of blog posts around the legend of King Arthur, the Roundtable and his knights. I conclude this week’s series with King Arthur and some leadership lessons that might apply to a Chief Compliance Officer (CCO) and compliance practitioner. I should note parenthetically that there are many fans of King Arthur out there who have reached out this week so I am planning another King Arthur week next month where we will take up some of his knights and other legends around England’s most famous king.

According to the legends, King Arthur achieved quite a bit in one lifetime. He, established a kingdom, ruled his castle, Camelot, and brought peace and order to the land based on law, justice, and morality. He founded an order known as the Knights of the Round Table. Nicole Lastimado, in a blog post entitled “Characteristics of a Good Leader”, identified five characteristics that she believed made Arthur a good leader.

Adapting Lastimado, King Arthur was (1) Honest, in that he displayed sincerity, integrity, and candor in his actions. (2) Intelligent, because he read and studied. (3) Courageous, because he had the perseverance to accomplish a goal, regardless of the seemingly insurmountable obstacles. (4) Imaginative because he adapted by making timely and appropriate changes in his thinking, plans, and methods. Finally, (5) Inspiring, through demonstrating confidence, he inspired his knights and those in his Kingdom to reach for new heights.

These qualities come into play for CCOs. Obviously a CCO must be honest both to those who work for him or her and those above the CCO position. You have to have trust throughout an organization. This means a personal relationship with your peers and others throughout your organization. Louis Sapirman calls this 360 degrees of communication, Russ Berland advocates pizzas and I would just add that as a CCO you are always being judged on honesty.

You have to be curios and intelligent. You must continually study, not only on compliance issues and Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) enforcement actions but on all the key corporate functions. This means that you must be able to read a spreadsheet and talk to the business folks in their language, i.e. business. Moreover, compliance is advancing as fast as any other corporate function and you need to stay in front of where our discipline is going.

Courage is not something often discussed in compliance but you will have to maintain the courage of your convictions. I grew up in the corporate legal department where the business guys made the final call but sometimes as a compliance professional, you will have to say a very firm “No”. When you do, it must be done with courage.

Next is imagination. I often say that as a compliance professional you are only limited by your imagination. The scope of compliance can be as broad as you can imagine. You can be creative (hence a podcast in the Compliance Podcast Network called ‘Creativity and Compliance’) through a variety of means and mechanisms. Yesterday I wrote about using agile in your compliance program. Anything which will make your compliance program more effective will make your company’s overall business processes more efficient. Use your imagination.

Finally, your inspiration. As a CCO you should be seen to do the right thing, even when no one is looking but only you know about it. The best example I can give you comes from a Chief Executive Officer (CEO) I once worked for. He and I were in China closing a transaction. On the drive to the airport for our departure, we were stopped by local police who clearly were trying to shake us down. My CEO absolutely refused and we literally sat by the side of the road for three hours. They finally gave up and let us pass. (They never pulled their guns so we were never physically threatened.) But the CEO made an inspirational decision that he was a part of and it influenced me to this day.

What are the lessons from for the CCO or compliance practitioner? You should channel your inner King Arthur and lead. I hope you have enjoyed reading this series as much as I have enjoyed researching it, reading some stories and bringing them to you.

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