WilmerHale has seen compliance monitorships from both sides, serving as a monitor and guiding numerous companies under monitorship, including securing early terminations. We know firsthand what monitors look for, how they test whether a program works, and what it takes for a company to successfully satisfy its monitorship obligations. We put that insight to work for companies under monitorship.

We help clients prepare for a monitor’s arrival, manage the relationship with the monitor and the government, and navigate the monitor’s reviews. We evaluate and implement the monitor’s recommendations without disrupting the business, building and testing the controls, third-party management systems, policies, and training a monitor will scrutinize. We also help clients meet their reporting obligations to the DOJ and SEC.

Because we begin remediation while investigations are still underway, clients can show the government real results at resolution, which can affect whether a monitor is imposed at all. For companies already under monitorship, we build the record needed to make a credible case for early termination, and, after a monitorship ends, we conduct reviews to help ensure that improvements endure.

Our team has conducted hundreds of enterprise and business unit risk assessments and built, evaluated, and strengthened compliance programs for organizations of every size, from startups to Fortune 100 multinationals. 

Our experience spans more than 20 industries, including the technology, electronics, telecommunications, manufacturing, engineering, infrastructure, defense, construction, automotive, pharmaceutical, aircraft services, media, finance, gaming, and food and beverage sectors. In the last five years alone, we have advised more than 50 public company clients on designing, building and benchmarking compliance programs.

We know how programs compare across sectors and what regulators expect of companies with similar risk profiles. That breadth lets us benchmark a client’s risks and compliance structure against its peers and draw on proven tools and precedents to work quickly and cost-effectively. 

Drawing on experience across industries and jurisdictions, we help clients develop tailored policies, procedures, internal controls, training programs, investigation programs, and third-party management systems that address their unique risk profiles. We also help them identify emerging compliance challenges, including privacy and data governance risks. The result is a practical, risk-based compliance framework that is effective in daily operations and resilient under regulatory scrutiny.

We don’t wait until after an investigation to help clients strengthen their compliance programs. As we guide clients through active investigations, we get to work assessing root causes, identifying control gaps, and implementing targeted remediation.

Working closely with management, boards, compliance teams and outside auditors, we enhance policies and procedures, strengthen internal controls, improve third-party risk management, refine reporting protocols and develop practical training and communications programs. We also help clients address complex cross-border issues involving data privacy laws, privilege, state-secrets laws and blocking statutes, enabling efficient investigations across multiple jurisdictions. 

As remediation progresses, we present those efforts to enforcement authorities, demonstrating not only that misconduct has been addressed, but also that meaningful, sustainable improvements are already underway. This approach strengthens clients’ compliance profiles going into resolution discussions, informs the government’s assessment of their programs, and positions them to meet reporting obligations and navigate monitorships successfully, or avoid them altogether.

We have led compliance remediation in dozens of DOJ and SEC investigations. Most were resolved without a monitor, and the government credited our clients' compliance improvements in resolution papers and through reduced penalties.

Issues and questions arise even in strong compliance programs and environments. General counsel, chief compliance officers and other business leaders turn to us for practical, real-time advice on the discrete issues they encounter every day and higher-risk situations where the right course is less clear. 

We help clients assess the compliance implications of engaging high-risk third parties, entering new markets or pursuing transactions such as minority investments, joint ventures, acquisitions and divestitures; responding to payment solicitations or potential extortion; making donations and contributions; and navigating other circumstances that may present heightened corruption or regulatory risk.

Our advice is tailored to the client’s business, risk profile and regulatory environment. We help clients evaluate the legal and compliance risks of a proposed course of action, conduct appropriate due diligence, identify practical safeguards and pursue legitimate business objectives while mitigating risk. Drawing on experience across industries and jurisdictions, as well as firsthand knowledge of regulatory expectations and enforcement priorities, we help clients respond as their businesses, regulatory obligations and risk profiles evolve, providing ongoing counsel on anti-corruption, sanctions and trade compliance, privacy, cybersecurity, governance and other compliance matters.

We have advised clients on the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act since the statute was enacted, and our FCPA and Anti-Corruption Practice is ranked Band 1 by Chambers USA. Our team includes a former Chief of the DOJ’s FCPA Unit, and our practice leaders author Complying with the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, the field’s leading treatise, now in its 11th edition.

We help companies prevent, detect and respond to corruption risk. Our compliance services include anti-corruption risk assessments; policies, procedures, internal controls and training; third-party due diligence and management systems; and day-to-day counseling on donations, minority investments, joint ventures and other high-risk activities.

We have secured public and nonpublic declinations, closed investigations without charges, and negotiated major global resolutions, including Glencore’s coordinated resolution with authorities across the United States, Europe, Africa and South America. After resolution, we guide companies through FCPA monitorships and reporting obligations and have secured early terminations.

WilmerHale advises boards of directors, senior management, audit committees and special committees on compliance, governance and oversight issues that can have significant legal, regulatory and reputational consequences. We provide guidance on governance structures and policies, committee charters, conflicts of interest, internal controls, procurement, disclosure controls, whistleblower and reporting frameworks, succession, attorney reporting procedures, and compliance matters arising in transactions.

Our lawyers regularly work with leadership teams during investigations, government-imposed monitorships and other periods of heightened risk, helping them make informed decisions, strengthen compliance programs, meet reporting obligations, and demonstrate sustainable improvements to regulators.

We have evaluated whistleblower hotlines, reporting channels and ethics programs as a monitor, so we know how regulators judge whether a speak-up culture actually works. Our lawyers help clients assess conduct from the top, not just tone. They also know that it is not just the “top” that matters: tone and conduct from the middle, and how an organization’s culture flows down, are key determinants of conduct and willingness to speak up. 

Our team has designed and enhanced whistleblower hotlines and reporting channels for clients across multiple industries and jurisdictions, including programs developed to satisfy the laws of several countries at once. 

We develop manuals and protocols covering the full whistleblower reporting process, from intake, triage and routing through investigation, remediation and lessons learned. We also assist clients with internal coordination among compliance, legal, internal audit and other stakeholders involved in receiving and addressing concerns.

We have substantial experience conducting culture reviews that assess policies, procedures and training, and advising boards and special committees on whistleblower policies, conflict-of-interest policies and attorney reporting procedures.

Third parties can present significant compliance risks, particularly for companies operating across jurisdictions or relying on agents, distributors, consultants, vendors, and other business partners. 

We help clients build risk-based systems to identify, assess, approve, and monitor those relationships throughout the third-party life cycle. Our work includes designing and testing due diligence and third-party management programs; developing policies, internal controls, contractual safeguards, and guidance for gatekeepers; and using audits, data analytics, control testing, and site visits to assess whether programs are working in practice.

When concerns arise, we investigate third-party relationships, contracting practices, and payment flows, assess root causes, and help clients strengthen controls and verify remediation. Our experience includes developing and testing a global third-party management system covering more than 1,000 business partners and assessing controls governing partner incentive programs, as well as investigating risks involving vendors, agents, consultants, distributors, and channel partners around the world.

We help companies identify and manage compliance risk throughout the transaction life cycle, including acquisitions, joint ventures, minority investments, divestitures and other strategic transactions. 

Before a transaction, we conduct risk-based due diligence focused on compliance programs, internal controls, third-party relationships, geographic exposure and government touchpoints. During the transaction, we help clients translate diligence findings into appropriate safeguards, including anti-corruption and compliance representations and covenants, governance arrangements and contractual protections.

Our work continues after closing. We assess and integrate acquired businesses, strengthen policies and internal controls, remediate identified gaps and develop monitoring and auditing frameworks to help ensure improvements work in practice. Our experience includes advising on compliance integration following major cross-border acquisitions and helping clients address anti-corruption, sanctions, privacy, cybersecurity and data-sharing risks in transactions around the world.