Program and culture assessments -

Assessments have long been recognized as having a critical impact on the effectiveness of ethics and compliance efforts. Best practice programs have often employed assessments – formal and informal – to identify program weaknesses and in general to help identify areas needing improvement. In recent years the importance of assessments has been increasingly reflected in legal standards. For example, the US Sentencing Guidelines include as one of their elements of an effective program “to evaluate periodically the effectiveness of the organization’s compliance and ethics program.” In addition, the Guidelines note that organizations should incorporate and follow applicable industry practice, a requirement which points toward program assessment as well as benchmarking of program elements.

The Guidelines also call on organizations to “promote an organizational culture that encourages ethical conduct and a commitment to compliance with the law.” This emphasis on culture suggests that considering the impact of the ethics and compliance program on the organizational culture is important when attempting to answer whether is program is truly effective.