The growing list of regulations affecting business together with intense media and public scrutiny mean that the pressure of legal and regulatory compliance is also growing.

According to a Research Report on UK and European companies from Atos Consulting TACKLING COMPLIANCE TO REAP LONG-TERM BENEFIT, four in ten CFO’s believe the increased compliance burden is reducing their strategic business involvement and ability to perform ‘value-add’ tasks. However many also concede that the new regulations do have a positive impact upon finance and IT controls.

The report evaluates the impact of recent and forthcoming international accounting regulations (such as IFRS and Sarbanes-Oxley) on Europe’s leading companies.

It concludes that "companies will start seeing new opportunities as a result of having improved their operational processes and business support infrastructures – for example through improvements in capital allocations and a reduction in operational risks and losses. The result is an organisation empowered in the face of ever-changing markets and an increasingly competitive landscape."

How do you do it? Altos (as an IT provider) argues that automation and technology is the answer. In my opinion, no technology will work without the involvement of people.

As LegalLiteracy.com points out "Until there is a paradigm shift about how business views the law and
compliance, recommendations to be more proactive and legally literate
will be seen as merely one more unnecessary burden — one that is as
easily ignored as the admonition to eat more fruits and vegetables and
get more exercise.  We’d rather sit and eat cake.  It’s a lot easier
and a lot more fun." (via Blawg Review 41)