Careers in Compliance

Build a legal career in one of the hottest 21st century employment fields In his 21st Century Legal Career Series, Richard L. Hermann researches, evaluates, and predicts where the employment opportunities are and will be for law graduates. Volume 2, Careers in Compliance: JDs Wanted, focuses on what the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) calls one of the fastest growing occupations. The number of compliance officers nationwide has more than doubled in the last six years to around 300,000. A barrage of new laws, such as the Affordable Care Act and the Dodd-Frank Act, and their implementing regulations (Dodd-Frank alone has spawned almost 400), heightened government enforcement, large fines, and other penalties have acted as a compliance wake-up call to affected companies and industries. New laws and more vigorous government enforcement have also upgraded the nature of the job. As part of compliance, companies now emphasize risk assessments, ethics, employee training, and developing paths for employees to report possible misconduct. A growing number of compliance officers come to the job armed with a law degree. This booklet shows you where these jobs are and how to take advantage of this exciting career opportunity. Highlights include: - What is Compliance ? - The Work - Organizing the Compliance Function - Who Hires? - JD-Advantage Compliance Jobs and Careers - What Does It Pay? - Breaking into Compliance - Follow Up While ever-present, compliance has become considerably more important and central to the activities of most organizations in the 21st century. America's 6,000 publicly-traded companies find that, since the enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in 2002, it has become impossible to function without a compliance staff. There has even been a "trickle-over" effect to closely-held corporations and nonprofits including hospitals, academic institutions, museums, and foundations. Prior compliance experience is not always necessary, due to intense demand. The new compliance reality forces organizations to expand their searches beyond candidates with just compliance backgrounds to other disciplines, law being prominent among them. Hermann focuses on what law students and lawyers need to know to break into this hot field.