Compliance Release Management: Tips for Herding the Cats

Managing semi-annual releases can be a lot like herding cats.

Have you ever experienced:

• Service providers who don’t give updates on their compliance progress,

• Payment networks who can’t or don’t answer questions about the context or strategy surrounding a compliance requirement,

• Internal partners who have a coffee with you every day – then ghost your release compliance meetings?

These are just some of the “cats” a compliance team can encounter.

Here are some important tips that will help you herd the cats during release management:

1. Every company has its own market, its own goals, and its own profitability drivers. They are not in business to make your company rich and famous. Learn and document the goals and business drivers for each mandating entity as well as for your service providers. You will be able to interact with them more effectively if you show that you know what is important to them.

2. Know your company’s size and market share compared to the mandating authority – and compared to your service providers.  That size ratio should inform the tools you will use to interact with and influence these entities. A major global bank can sneeze and Mastercard and Visa will run to get them a Kleenex. If you are a small regional bank, a fintech, or a credit union, your approach will need to be more nuanced and cooperative to be effective.

3. Processors are complying with multiple networks, as well as with their own internal strategies, systems, and processes. Their compliance documents will look different from the network’s compliance documents – they are trying to merge differing and possibly conflicting mandates received from competitors into one cohesive processor system. The more you can understand the scope of what your processor is dealing with, the more effectively you understand their documentation and appeal to them for changes that benefit them and you.

4. Accountability is imperative. Always keep your upstream and downstream partners accountable. People (and companies) perform to what they are measured by – have good contracts and a solid accountability program in place.

5. As much as possible, work constructively, cooperatively, and strategically with your partners. If you care about their business drivers, they are more apt to care about yours.

I would love to train and mentor your Compliance Team. Let’s work together to make them strategic, effective, and successful!