No Workout Required

I bumped into a cousin of mine a few days ago. We chatted a few minutes about who in the family was doing anything new or interesting. Only unusual news was an upcoming engagement party.

But what was interesting was that my cousin – Jack – was ready to change jobs.

“So what are you planning?” I asked. I was only being polite – it seemed the right thing to do.

“Glad you asked,” he told me with that big grin of his. “Pushing carts around a grocery store parking lot just isn’t me anymore. It was OK when I was younger, but now I’m looking for a grown-up job.”

I nodded. Made sense.

“So,” he said, staring at me intently, “what is it you do again? I always forget.”

“Compliance,” I told him. “I’m a corporate compliance officer.”

He nodded. “Sounds good,” he told me. “So, do you wear a fancy uniform? Gold buttons? Some kinda hat maybe?”

I almost laughed out loud. Me? In a uniform? With gold buttons?

“Nah,” I told him. “Just regular clothes just like everybody else.”

He looked disappointed.

In an effort to cheer him up, I added, “I do get to wear impressive name badges at major events.”

He wasn’t impressed.

“So,” he pushed on, “Do you go to a training camp? Do push-ups? Run laps?”

“Nah,” I told him. “No training camp. Just classes and conferences; learning from my colleagues, speaking to peers at other companies and mentoring, updates on changes in legal issues and developments in behavioral science – things like that.”

His sigh was long and pretty dramatic.

“Well,” he said, “so, you don’t have to be big or strong or tough, huh?” He looked me up and down as if he’d never seen such a weakling in his life.

Sigh. I didn’t try to defend my clearly visible lack of real muscles or physical strength.

“It’s not a physical job,” I told him.

“Not like a bouncer or a Sumo wrestler, huh?” he said.

“Nope,” I agreed. “It’s not a muscle kind of work.”

He shrugged his shoulders. “I was hoping it would be tough work, physical work, the kind of work that takes real strength, real training – a real tough job.”

I felt a brief moment of regret. I almost wished I did have compliance muscles.

How could I tell him the real stuff involved in compliance work? The training and prep. The studies. The legalities involved. The interviews and investigations conducted. The changes we needed to keep up with. The rules we kept up with to help protect our coworkers at every level – from corporate execs or even boards of directors to the lowest person on the staff.

How could he grasp that our work was the undergirding for so much else? That we were the conscience of our company – in a way we were even the voice for those who would be hurt if our companies broke the rules. We kept people safe from cheating, cutting corners, risking lives.

We were, we are, and we always will be a kind of conscience for the world. We work to keep people everywhere safe.

There’s no exercise bike big enough to train for that task.    

© 2024 K. Leet

What do you think?

How tough is your job?

What differences does compliance make?

How do you “train” for your job?

Health question: But do you do some exercise to stay in shape?

These are stories (usually fictional, but not always), based on insights and experiences from the world of compliance & ethics.