Compliance positions organizations for long-term success. With a range of shifting requirements, laws, codes, and standards to follow, compliance management is essential for any organization. ISO 37301:2021 – Compliance Management Systems – Requirements With Guidance For Use helps organizations maintain a culture of compliance.
The Benefits of Compliance Management Systems
Compliance is the basis for a successful and sustainable organization, but it is also an opportunity. Any organization needs to comply with an assortment of laws, regulatory requirements, industry codes, standards, generally accepted best practices, ethics, and community expectations. Through a culture of compliance, a resilient organization can meet these various needs and respond to expectations of relevant parties when they arise.
Compliance is on ongoing process. Organizations can safeguard their integrity and minimize noncompliance by embedding compliance in the values, behavior, and attitude of the organization and by keeping leadership involved, since they apply core values to follow throughout the enterprise.
Organizations can develop and spread a positive culture of compliance by following ISO 37301:2021. This results in multifold benefits, including improved sustainability, enhanced business reputation, improved means of considering the expectations of interested parties, increased commitment to managing compliance risks, increased confidence from third parties in the organization’s capacity to achieve success, and minimized risk of contravention.
About ISO 37301:2021
ISO 37301:2021 specifies requirements and guidelines for establishing, developing, implementing, evaluating, maintaining and improving an effective compliance management system within an organization. It is applicable to all organizations, regardless of type, size, and nature.
Essential to the compliance management system outlined in ISO 37301:2021 is the Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) model utilized in other management system standards. Such a model enables an organization to sufficiently establish, develop, implement, evaluate, and, if beneficial to the organization, maintain and continually improve processes. The common elements of a compliance management system fit comfortably into the four steps of the PDCA model.
Leadership, governance, and culture are essential to the PDCA processes, so ISO 37301:2021 outlines understanding the organization and its context, planning, support, operation, performance evaluation, the role of leadership, and continual improvement.
Changes to ISO 37301:2021 from ISO 19600
While ISO 37301:2021 is a new international standard, it replaces and supersedes ISO 19600:2014, which previously outlined guidelines for compliance management systems. In revising this past international standard, ISO 37301:2021 contains new requirements with additional guidance. Keeping in line with changes made to recent ISO management system standards like ISO 9001:2015 and ISO 14001:2015, it also follows ISO’s harmonized structure.
Get ISO 37301:2021
ISO 37301:2021 – Compliance Management Systems – Requirements With Guidance For Use is available on the ANSI Webstore. A culture of compliance helps meet many interests. To assist users who might need related international standards, ANSI offers this document in the following standards packages, which come with a discount to list prices:
ISO 31000 / ISO 37301 – Risk Management Compliance Set
ISO 37001 / ISO 37301 – Anti-bribery Compliance Management Set
ISO 37301 / ISO/IEC 27002 – Information Technology Compliance Management Package
