Compliance in a Global Economy
Compliance should not be viewed as a cost of doing business. If you think of it that way, you are missing out on many of the potential benefits which include increased funding opportunities, risk mitigation, better business opportunities and lower operational costs. That’s right, if you view compliance correctly, your organization can reap the benefits of being compliant.
Unfortunately, if you view compliance purely as a cost of doing business, then that’s all it will ever be. For many organizations governance and compliance translates into adherence to various laws, government regulations and procedures. Using this somewhat narrow view of compliance, the main challenges are: • Adhering to mandated practices
• Documenting policies and actions • Reporting This still requires a fair amount of work to be performed to ensure compliance.
1. You must determine which regulations your organization is required to comply with.
2. Your internal controls or operational processes must ensure that your
organization is compliant with government regulations.
3. Your processes must be defined and document all actions your transactions associated with the regulated function.
4. You must be able to report on any and all of your regulated activities immediately.
For some organizations, this includes everything they do. For others the list may be shorter but still require accurate record keeping with appropriate document and record retention policies. Failure to comply with government regulations can result in increased operational costs, fines,and in some cases, being shut down. Organizations that are out of compliance have been known to suffer through increased government audits that disrupt their operations. In some instances operations are shut down while these audits are conducted. The cost to these organizations can be enough to close them permanently. Given this, there is no valid reason not to place compliance on the top of your “to do” list. Now it may seem that compliance is a lot of work. When planned for, and implemented correctly, it becomes an automatic part of your business and operational processes. It does not become burdensome and can help you improve your operational efficiency. Once you accept that you have to monitor and report on your compliance issues, it becomes easier to review your processes for both compliance and efficiency. Further, many compliance issues can help ensure that you have valid processes and have the documentation needed, not only for government reporting, but also for resolution of normal business or operational issues. So if ensuring that you are in compliance has some benefits associated with it, let’s expand our definition of compliance to include: • Compliance with multiple governments for multi-national organizations;
• Compliance with funding sources such as Donors, Financial Institutions, and Investors, • Contractual compliance with other organizations. In today’s global economy, more often than not, you have multiple compliance requirements. Whether you are a small company that ships internationally, or a nongovernmental organization that delivers programs worldwide, your compliance requirements are not insignificant. By becoming proactive with your compliance requirements, you can minimize the cost of compliance and virtually eliminate the penalties of non-compliance. The more countries you operate in, the more contracts you have, and the more diverse your funding base is, the bigger your compliance exposure is. To ensure compliance, you should start by looking at the big picture and documenting the “who, what and where” of your organization. From here look at your operation and create a list of where you are compliant and where you are not compliant.
This list can form the basis of your ongoing compliance strategy. Getting started may be the hardest part. Once you have begun, the entire process becomes easier to manage. The three main issues outlined in the beginning still apply regardless of how big your compliance burden is. • Are your processes in compliance? • Are you documenting your actions and keeping good records? • And can you provide reports and information immediately? Compliance in a global environment can seem complex. Once you understand the basics of compliance and become proactive, you can ensure that you are compliant across funding sources, other business entities, and multiple governments. You can even ensure that you are compliant across continents. The benefit of being a compliant organization translates into increased opportunities:
• Funding sources are much more willing to commit to organizations who can
demonstrate compliance with government regulations and previous funding requirements.
• Government agencies are easier to work with when you can demonstrate compliance. This leads to both grants and/or contracts.
• Other organizations will be eager to work with you when you can demonstrate
that you document your processes and are compliant with applicable regulations. You become a no-risk partner. • And last, but not least, compliant organizations have documented processes
and know exactly when, how and why they need to make changes to improve their efficiency. So compliance viewed as a cost is just a cost. But compliance viewed as a strategy helps organizations grow and prosper. Interested in reading more about the various aspects of compliance? Then please visit the compliance news and articles section in our blog. Have a thought to share about compliance? Become one of our guest writers and be published in our blog or our newsletter. Send us a note info@docuvantage.com to request more information.
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Conditions Change, Most Businesses Don't, That's a Problem
For any business to remain effective and profitable, business leaders must continually evaluate their organization and its processes. If you understand your business processes clearly from a day-to-day operational standpoint, you have increased your chances of success and will have greater results.
For this reason, business process improvement, a systematic approach to help companies optimize their core processes for the most efficient results, must be a priority in operational planning. Business process analysis, the first step in business process improvement, discovers and defines existing business processes and will assist in identifying which processes are problematic.
The next step is business process mapping, which will help you understand the process visually, defining the business process inputs, outputs, connections to other processes and each process participant.
All organizational documents should include each related business process maps for not only efficiency and for managing labor resources, but as a knowledge management tool for mission critical documents showing how the business functions internally.
Research often finds that most managers do not realize the amount of income potential the business is losing because their processes have not been evaluated for potential inefficiencies. Furthermore, most organizations have little or no documentation describing their processes and procedures; opening a myriad of compliance issues.
To make your business more efficient, build capacity, cut operational cost and increase customer satisfaction, here are some suggestions: 1. Invest in Business Process Analysis: this will allow you to understand how
your business is currently running, where it can be improved and aid your decision making in the future to maintain consistent results. 2. Understand your Business Process Maps: resulting from the analysis, you
will have a process map, a visual snapshot of your company’s current operational structure. Using an easy to read flow chart along with simple diagrams, your business will be structured according to its current level of output and then can be streamlined in a way that more profitably achieves your company’s goals.
3. Make sure that you follow the process from end to end. Cross the organizational boundaries and become process driven. This will get you out of the silos and keep departments from competing with each other.
4. Get Started! No business can go anywhere without its employee’s hard work and loyalty. Involve your employees in the analysis and get them on board. Take action to improve all aspects of your businesses operational goals. Operational excellence is a key result of business analysis! Every organization can benefit from business process analysis but many are not sure where to start. If you are one of these organizations we can help. Our process mapping methodology is used by clients in both the public, private and nonprofit sectors to increase performance and productivity and our knowledgeable analysts are highly skilled in business process analysis, process mapping and process re-engineering. Efficient systems and processes are the key to success. DocuVantage will share with you the methods and tools that have been used by our clients for years. Start with a business process analysis and learn more about our business process mapping offer at: http://www.docuvantage.com/document-management-special-offers
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