Chief Compliance Officer (CCO)

Title	Chief Compliance Officer (CCO)
Department	Compliance / Legal / Executive Leadership
Reports to	[Chief Executive Officer / General Counsel / Board Audit or Compliance Committee]
Location	[Remote / Hybrid / On-site]
Employment type	Full-time
Salary	[Salary range. Postings with a range perform significantly better, and several states require one.]

Position overview

The Chief Compliance Officer (CCO) provides executive leadership for [Company]'s enterprise compliance and ethics program. This role owns the framework of policies, controls, training, monitoring, and reporting that keeps the organization aligned with applicable laws, regulations, and internal standards of conduct.

The CCO partners closely with executive leadership, legal, risk, internal audit, privacy, security, human resources, and business units to identify regulatory obligations, prevent and detect misconduct, and respond effectively to issues. The role maintains independence and direct access to the Board.

As regulators increasingly scrutinize how organizations govern automated decisions and AI, the Chief Compliance Officer also helps ensure AI use is fair, transparent, and consistent with legal and ethical obligations, working alongside risk, privacy, and AI governance leaders.

Key responsibilities

Compliance program leadership

• Design, implement, and maintain the enterprise compliance and ethics program.
• Set the compliance strategy, risk taxonomy, and annual plan.
• Define the code of conduct and enterprise compliance policies.
• Ensure the program aligns with recognized effectiveness expectations.
• Report program status, risks, and issues to executive leadership and the Board.

Regulatory oversight

Identify and track applicable legal and regulatory obligations across the enterprise, including:

• Sector regulation, anti-bribery and anti-corruption, and sanctions
• Anti-money-laundering, consumer protection, and fair-dealing rules
• Data protection and privacy obligations, in partnership with the privacy office
• Emerging AI and automated-decision regulation, in partnership with risk and AI governance

Risk assessment and monitoring

• Conduct enterprise compliance risk assessments.
• Establish monitoring, testing, and surveillance activities.
• Track key compliance indicators and issue remediation.
• Maintain a regulatory-change management process.

Ethics, investigations, and reporting

Own the ethics program, confidential reporting hotline, and investigations process. Ensure allegations of misconduct are triaged, investigated, and resolved fairly, with appropriate discipline, root-cause analysis, and corrective action.

Training and culture

• Deliver enterprise compliance and ethics training.
• Build a speak-up culture and reinforce tone from the top.
• Communicate policy changes and regulatory developments.
• Advise leaders and employees on compliance questions.

Third-party and transactional compliance

Establish due diligence and monitoring for third parties, vendors, distributors, and business partners, and support compliance review of transactions, new products, and market entry.

Regulatory engagement and reporting

Serve as a primary contact for regulators and examiners, manage regulatory inquiries and examinations, oversee required filings, and maintain records demonstrating program effectiveness.

Required qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Law, Business, Finance, Accounting, or a related discipline. Juris Doctor (JD) or Master's degree often preferred.
• 12 to 18+ years of progressive experience in compliance, legal, regulatory, risk, or audit functions.
• 5+ years leading an enterprise or business-unit compliance program.
• Experience briefing executive leadership and Boards of Directors.
• Deep knowledge of the regulatory environment relevant to the organization's industry.
• Experience managing investigations, remediation, and regulatory engagement.

Preferred certifications

One or more of: CCEP or CCEP-I, CRCM, CAMS, CIPP, CRISC, CIA, and a Juris Doctor (JD) where the role requires legal depth.

Technical knowledge

Enterprise compliance program design, regulatory analysis and change management, compliance risk assessment, monitoring and testing, ethics and investigations, anti-bribery and anti-corruption, sanctions and anti-money-laundering, data protection and privacy coordination, third-party due diligence, policy governance, GRC platforms, and AI and automated-decision compliance.

Essential competencies

Executive leadership, sound judgment and integrity, executive and Board communication, regulatory interpretation, influence without authority, investigative rigor, program management, and the independence to escalate difficult issues.

Success measures: first 12 months

• Assess and refresh the enterprise compliance program.
• Publish or update the code of conduct and core policies.
• Complete an enterprise compliance risk assessment.
• Strengthen monitoring, testing, and issue remediation.
• Stand up or improve the ethics hotline and investigations process.
• Establish regulatory-change management.
• Deliver enterprise training and reporting.
• Improve program effectiveness and Board reporting.

About [Company]

[Two or three sentences about your organization, the maturity of your program, and what the first year looks like. Candidates in this field respond to honesty about whether they are joining a build or an established function.]