Integrated Governance and Compliance Framework

An extending amount of poorly executable rules and codes increases the responsibilities board members of medium and large organizations. In addition, the board has to deal with withdrawing and highly demanding supervisors. This results in more responsibilities and higher liability risks. Therefore the board needs more insight in the rules, in their responsibilities and liabilities, and instruments to get and stay in control. In order to respond to this need, Duthler Associates has developed the so called Integrated Governance and Compliance Framework (IGCF). The IGCF consists of three integrated layers:

1. Policy Framework,
2. Legal Entity Framework, and
3. Operational Framework for specific domains.

The Policy Framework supports the board with compliance to the abundance of policies that are applicable to the corporate family. It enables them to criticize and enhance business processes. The Legal Entity Framework offers the essential insight in and coherency between the different entities of the corporate family. Within the Operational Framework policies are synchronized with the compliance practice. By means of taxonomies, internal and external reporting are constructed in a more effective and efficient manner. Depending on the client’s priorities, the IGCF can be applied to the entire corporate family, or to specific entities or domains within the corporate family.

By using the IGCF, the appropriate application of (different) policies is secured, the (internal) standardization of data and process definitions is enforced, and business processes can be constructed more effectively and efficiently. One of the benefits of the IGCF is the improvement of quality and speed of internal reporting. As a result of more unambiguous norms the compliance can be organized better and more efficiently. This is important with regard to the demands of (foreign) Tax Authorities, supervisors and accountants. Also the IGCF enables tax advisors and other professionals to counsel more effectively and specifically. In short the IGCF ensures that the board is in control.

The three layers of the IGCF are closely connected with each other and supplement one another. However, this does not make it is necessary to implement all three layers. Depending on the need of the organization, one can also choose to implement the separate elements of the IGCF.

More information on the Integrated Governance and Compliance Framework.