CCO's Annual Report Needs Both Summary, Details

Chief compliance officers’ annual reports to their board of directors need to strike a balance between an easily understood summary and details, speakers at an SEI Investments’ forum for CCOs said. It’s also important to ask boards what their preference is, they said.

The report should also include an assessment of service providers, and recommendations from annual reports in prior years must be aggressively monitored, they said.

Panelists also recommended that CCOs continue a dialogue with their boards throughout the year outside of board meetings. To determine priorities, CCOs should conduct risk assessments, they added, and they should delegate daily business practices to others.

The forum was held as part of SEI’s ComplianceAdvantage Program.

“Based on the discussions that followed each presentation, it’s clear that CCOs have made great strides in implementing policies and educating senior management and their boards,” said Jim Volk, chief accounting officer and chief compliance officer for SEI’s investment manager services unit. “While there’s still work to be done to make sure the compliance mindset permeates throughout an entire organization, CCOs overall have been diligent in using the resources they have to change the culture of their organization.”