Keep GC Out Of Compliance

General counsel should be kept separate from corporate compliance, as both functions are increasingly complex and competing interests frequently arise, says columnist Reynolds Holding in The New York Times. Splitting legal and compliance departments – as Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan have done recently – allows GCs to defend companies against regulators while others make sure compliance standards are met, and it gives the separate departments the opportunity to act as check on one another. However, despite 2010 federal sentencing guidelines that give breaks to companies with independent compliance officers reporting directly to the board, fewer than 10 percent of companies have implemented that structure.