A Day in the Life of a Compliance Manager
Sep 16, 2019
My day starts at 6 AM, I make coffee for myself and get breakfast ready for my family. I walk my son to the bus stop at 6:45, my husband leaves at 7, and the other two (teenagers) leave around 8. Once everyone is gone, I log into my laptop to check emails and see what projects are in store for the day. My workday ends around 5:30 where I try to close out any task I did for the day.
My position as a Compliance Manager is to ensure that everyone on the team is up to date on applicable training and that policies and procedures are being followed according to whichever laws are in effect and we are following our company SOPs. I also research and keep the team abreast of any data privacy laws in other countries that we service. I am to ensure we are always ready for an audit.
The most challenging part of my day is researching to ensure that I am current on what new publications and laws are available or have changed and may apply to our team. In research, things change constantly. The most rewarding part of my job/day is having the opportunity to do my job from home. Seeing my kids walk through the door puts a smile on my face knowing that I am readily available for them while doing a job that I love.
I have been working in Regulatory/Compliance for about 6 years. I started working for a small CRO, then went the site level and worked closely with the IRB’s. Now I am getting a little mix of both. For anyone wanting to work in this profession I would strongly suggest they start at a research site particularly in a “Study Start-Up role” so that he/she can see what the position and study is like from conception i.e. reviewing the protocol, seeing how many visits subject has and schedule, stipend amount and how often, opening study with IRB, setting up monitoring visits, creating study binders, etc. Regulatory is a specialized task, and it is something you can’t learn in school, therefore it is overlooked but it is a very critical part of research. Once you get it down you can create your own style of work and it becomes easier.
