Experts Offer Energy and Utility Compliance Tips and Trends at SCCE

This week in Houston, Texas, leaders within the energy and utilities industry have gathered for the Society of Corporate Compliance and Ethics’ annual Utilities and Energies Compliance and Ethics Conference, where hot topics include standards of conduct and governance. Ahead of the conference, we polled cross-industry experts to weigh in on the top compliance tips and trends facing energy and utility organizations in 2014. The insights were both diverse and action-oriented.

Amidst a highly regulated environment, energy and utility organizations are under increased scrutiny. Experts cite meeting regulatory compliance standards, ethics, governance, and global and environment stewardship as the biggest issues. I’ve broken down the top trends and tips below. For the full list, please click here.

Top Three Trends in Compliance:

• Compliance and Security will become a subset of one another.
  – Jerome Farquharson CISSP, CRISC, director, Compliance & Critical Infrastructure Protection Committee, formed to help the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC)
• For energy and utility companies working on a global level, compliance complications are expected to arise most often in cases involving third parties and foreign partners, and the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
  – Scott Lane, executive chairman, The Red Flag Group
• Look for more collective action on water stewardship and accounting in the months and years to come.
  – Carole S. Switzer, president, Open Compliance & Ethics Group (OCEG)

Top Four Tips for Compliance

• Build a culture of compliance within your organization via documentation, reporting standardization and technological efficiencies.
  – David Childers, CEO of Complí
• Document all of the steps in your organization’s anti-corruption and compliance programs.
  – Tom Fox, founder and principal, Tom Fox Law
• Establish compliance and monitoring standards throughout your supply chain.
  – Jim Larson, principal consultant, Environmental and Occupational Risk Management (EORM)
• Keep business changes in sync with regulatory changes.
  – Michael Rasmussen, chief GRC pundit and principal analyst, GRC 20/20

Check back next week where we’ll provide conference highlights.