The Traditional Role of the Regulatory Affairs Manager

Businesses have had to focus on regulatory affairs ever since governments started regulating the most important sectors of the economy. However, the way regulatory changes were managed is evolving, largely due to the influx of technology in the financial sector. Let’s look at the traditional role of the regulatory change management and how has changed. The financial sector is a business that operates by making decisions for the future based on present evidence – the sector doesn’t just produce goods that clients can buy. Instead it offers investment opportunities which may yield a lot of profits in the future. Therefore, it is so important for businesses to have knowledge about what the regulatory framework will look like in the future. The complex nature of the planning that goes into making these businesses successful needs to have the right information.

A major change in regulations can end up making business plans unsustainable. A plan to sell more mortgages may be jeopardized by tighter regulations about who is eligible for a mortgage. Even small changes can have far-reaching consequences. These miniscule changes can accumulate and result in multiple compliance violations, which can result in heavy fines from regulatory bodies. Businesses in the financial sector do a lot of research to come up with predictions and trends. They analyze the way the market moves. The reports they create are then used to decide how the business will operate over the next few years.

A crucial part of the business

The regulatory affairs manager thus becomes a vital part of the business process. The regulatory bodies usually announce all changes in advance. They often even give notifications for any deliberations they may be having about possible changes in the regulations. They know how damaging it can be for businesses to suddenly have to adapt to new regulations, which is why they ensure that the industry is well-informed.

However, banking regulatory affairs need a bit more knowledge to be truly successful. Remember that banks are often operating on longer timelines than most other businesses. They are trying to create income streams that will pay out over the next few decades. Thus, a truly successful regulatory affairs manager will be able to tell the business which way the wind is blowing. They foster relationships with people who work in different regulatory institutions. They know what the addition of a new governor to the federal regulators should mean for the way the regulator will behave in the future.


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Technology is changing the regulatory affairs game

There is another important part of managing regulatory change – ensuring that the business is complying with the changes. This is where technology makes the most impact. Managing regulatory changes manually is a complicated process with a lot of potential for mistakes. Overlooking a small detail can result in major compliance conflicts. Change management technology thus becomes one of the most productive tools that regulatory affair managers have at their disposal.

Regulatory change management solutions vary in functionality and scope. There are barebones solutions which are only capable of notifying you about regulatory changes once the changes are officially published. Then there are solutions which don’t just notify you about forthcoming changes – they also help your business adapt to the variations in the regulatory framework. These operate by helping your business manage all change related processes and tasks from a central location. They also provide data visualizations and calendars which enable executive level employees to ensure that organization-wide change management activities are on track.

Want to see how your business will function with a change management solution in place? The Predict360 Regulatory Change Management solution is designed to help businesses quickly adapt to regulatory changes. It has built-in libraries of federal and state level regulations which are updated as needed. Get in touch with our team for a demonstration of the solution and to see how it will help your business achieve more in lesser time.