Key Takeaways
- Demand for CCOs is rising as organizations face expanding regulatory complexity.
- Setting new CCOs up for success requires clear access to senior leadership and early cross‑functional involvement.
- Right‑sized teams, defined budgets, and supportive technology enable strategic focus.
- Strong early relationship‑building across the business is essential.
- Interdisciplinary teams and selective AI use enhance impact.
- Clear success metrics reinforce the CCO as a strategic partner and help retain top talent.
Demand for chief compliance officers is on the rise.
Bureau of Labor Statistics data shows that about 12,000 new CCO jobs will be added in the next decade,[1] on par with the average job growth across industries — for context, two decades ago, the CCO role was just emerging at many companies.[2]
For organizations looking to bring on a top-notch CCO to address a range of complex issues, hiring the right person is only the first step: They are next tasked with integrating that individual well into the team and setting them up for success.
As organizations face new and multifaceted challenges, from volatile trade policy to artificial intelligence, the need for the CCO to hit the ground running has become all the more clear.
In order to do that, first, it's important to establish a workplace environment that's optimized for the CCO's success. Top compliance leaders are often intellectually curious and ambitious.
Companies should empower CCOs to swim outside their lanes by expanding their remits beyond compliance. For example, CCOs often seek opportunities to contribute to adjacent or strategic areas, including legal, government and public affairs, or environmental, social and governance factors.
Furthermore, the organizations that benefit from retaining strong compliance leadership are those that invest in the infrastructure and cultural buy-in that a CCO needs to thrive. That includes the following strategies.
1. Where appropriate, consider direct reporting lines to the CEO or board.
Establishing a direct line to senior leadership — whether through a solid-line reporting relationship to the CEO or audit/risk committee, or a dotted-line structure that includes regular executive-level touchpoints — gives the CCO clearer visibility into emerging risks and strategic priorities.
In this context, a solid-line reporting relationship reflects the CCO's primary, day-to-day accountability, while a dotted line creates a secondary connection to senior leadership that provides regular access and visibility without shifting operational oversight.
Equally important, this structure creates practical avenues for access to senior leadership, such as one-on-one meetings with the CEO or committee chair, standing invitations to planning sessions, or real-time escalation when issues arise. For many organizations, this reporting structure sends an unmistakable signal to external and internal stakeholders that compliance is not merely a control function — it is central to how the company operates.
While these reporting lines are not always feasible for every organization, companies can still reinforce visibility and independence by structuring a solid-line reporting relationship to the general counsel, supplemented by a dotted line to the CEO or relevant board Cara Bain committee.
2. Be thoughtful about meaningful opportunities for cross-functional collaboration.
Doing so will allow for compliance to be embedded in business processes and decisionmaking from the early stages. In practice, this means bringing compliance into conversations before products are launched, deals are structured, or new markets are entered. Early involvement reduces downstream friction and helps the organization move faster with more confidence. This involvement also strengthens the CCO's credibility by demonstrating how a proactive compliance lens can support and not slow commercial goals. Most importantly, embedding a culture of compliance requires demonstrable support from the CEO and other senior leaders. Offering engaging, companywide training, providing the CCO with proper independence and support, and marketing compliance internally and externally as an integral function to business achievements are all critical in setting this role up for success.
3. Ensure resources and staffing are in place that are appropriately tailored to the scale and complexity of the organization's regulatory exposure.
The right-sized team ensures that routine monitoring and reporting don't crowd out higher value advisory work. For more complex organizations, this may include dedicated specialists for areas like privacy, financial crimes and trade controls.
Even in lean environments, clarity around roles, budgets and technology support allows the CCO to prioritize effectively and deploy resources where they are needed most. Practically speaking, this means delineating what the CCO is accountable for — versus what sits with legal or audit — providing transparency around the budget for staffing and tools, and ensuring that the CCO has reliable access to the type of technology that elevates that function.
4. Relationship-building is key.
The first 90 days of a new CCO's tenure should include intentional engagement with key stakeholders across the enterprise. Beyond legal and audit, early meetings with HR, marketing, product, and investor relations teams are critical to understanding how compliance touches the business.
In global and matrixed organizations, in-person introductions to regional leaders and key external regulators help the CCO establish credibility and set consistent expectations.
These meetings can be structured or conversational depending on the organization's culture, but a consistent framework is invaluable. Many CCOs benefit from a light agenda that covers business priorities, anticipated regulatory touchpoints and pain points in existing processes.
At the same time, leaving space for open dialogue allows leaders to raise issues that they may not have raised in a more formal setting, giving the CCO a more candid and honest view of organizational dynamics.
5. Allow the CCO to build an interdisciplinary team and lean on technology.
In practice, the most successful CCOs surround themselves with teams that combine traditional compliance acumen with emerging skill sets, including data science, cybersecurity and behavioral risk analytics among them.
For midsize organizations without the scale for deep benches, technology can be an equalizer: AI-driven monitoring tools and workflow automation can free the CCO's team to focus on judgment calls rather than manual reviews. The key is not replacing human insight, but augmenting it to give compliance leaders the visibility and time to engage strategically.
Organizations should facilitate CCOs' use of technology to streamline manual tasks that unnecessarily slow the team down. Piloting tools in the most high-need areas can help CCOs see quick wins and decide what's worth adopting or expanding.
6. Define success metrics.
Finally, sustaining engagement for a CCO requires clarity on both impact and trajectory. Boards and CEOs should define success through measurable outcomes such as reduced regulatory findings, increased employee participation in compliance initiatives and improved cross-departmental collaboration.
Continued investment in leadership, communication and business training can also pay dividends: CCOs who can translate regulatory nuance into commercial insight are far more likely to be viewed as business partners rather than cost centers.
Over time, the strongest compliance leaders may even evolve into enterprise risk, corporate affairs or broader governance roles.
Conclusion
Ultimately, organizations that treat CCOs as strategic partners will be the ones that retain top CCO talent and build durable, resilient cultures of compliance.
The next generation of compliance leadership will not just interpret regulations but shape how organizations compete on integrity.
[1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/business-and-financial/compliance-officers.htm.
