What is Compliance? (Coursera)

What is Compliance? (Coursera)

Compliance isn’t only about preventing problems and ensuring that everyone is abiding by laws, rules, and regulations. It’s also about the positive impact a robust and ethical compliance program can have on a business or organization.

Class Deals by MOOC List - Click here and see Coursera's Active Discounts, Deals, and Promo Codes.

In this course we will discuss why compliance is important – from the needs facing businesses in highly regulated industries to avoiding fines and penalties to preventing reputational and economic nightmares. We’ll examine real-world examples of compliance and governance failures and their impact, and consider strategies for avoiding similar situations in our own organizations. You’ll be able to think about risk management in new ways and apply strategies to manage it.

Course 1 of 4 in the Regulatory Compliance Specialization.

What You Will Learn

  • Define compliance within an industry setting
  • Describe the ways in which compliance affects any industry, company, or organization
  • Identify the reasons industries, companies, and organizations should engage in compliance
  • Examine the importance of compliance in supporting the financial, reputational, and functional aspects of an industry, company, or organization

Syllabus

WEEK 1
What is compliance?
What is compliance and why is it important? In this module, we answer those questions while also looking at some recent high-profile cases of non-compliance in the business world.

WEEK 2
Why is Compliance Important?
Non-compliance can have massive real-world implications for the general public, not just individuals directly related to a non-compliant company. In this module, we examine laws that specifically create compliance obligations, as well as the potential costs of non-compliance.

WEEK 3
Compliance & Risk
Every company and organization must deal with risk, and compliance is ultimately a vehicle to mitigate risk. This module explores the close relationship between compliance and risk management. We will analyze the ways in which compliance programs manage risk, as well as alternative forms of risk management.

WEEK 4
Developments in the Field of Compliance
This module highlights developments in the ever-evolving world of compliance, with special emphasis on recent trends in regulatory focus.

Go to Class
MOOC List is learner-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Related Courses

Empathy, Data, and Risk (Coursera) Coursera
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Empathy, Data, and Risk (Coursera)

Risk Management and Innovation develops your ability to conduct empathy-driven and data-driven analysis in the domain of risk management. This course introduces empathy as a professional competency. It explains the psychological processes that inhibit empathy-building and the processes that determine how organizational stakeholders respond to risk.

Sep 28th 2026
4 Weeks
Risk in Modern Society (Coursera) Coursera
Leiden University,LDE Centre for Safety and Security

Risk in Modern Society (Coursera)

Risk has become one of the defining features of modern society. Almost daily, we are preoccupied with assessing, discussing, or preventing a wide variety of risks. It is a cornerstone notion for businesses and organizations, but also for nation states and their many levels of government. And even for individuals, risk and the avoidance or embracing thereof, is a key theme. The course Risk in Modern Society sheds light on the broad concept of risk.

Sep 14th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Corporate Finance II: Financing Investments and Managing Risk (Coursera) Coursera
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Corporate Finance II: Financing Investments and Managing Risk (Coursera)

In this course you will learn how companies decide on how much debt to take, and whether to raise capital from markets or from banks. You will also learn how to measure and manage credit risk and how to deal with financial distress. You will discuss the mechanics of dividends and share repurchases, and how to choose the best way to return cash to investors. You will also learn how to use derivatives and liquidity management to offset specific sources of financial risk, including currency risks. Finally, You will learn how companies finance merger and acquisition decisions, including leveraged buyouts, and how to incorporate large changes in leverage in standard valuation models.

Sep 14th 2026
4 Weeks
Doing Business in China Capstone (Coursera) Coursera
The Chinese University of Hong Kong

Doing Business in China Capstone (Coursera)

Doing Business in China Capstone enables you to apply your skills to real business challenges. You’ll use your newly earned business skills to identify, explore and evaluate a real opportunity involving products. In this capstone, you are the business consultant working for a well-established “HON / wellness” company. The CEO has given you a task. You have to bring a new overseas product into China.

Sep 14th 2026
4 Weeks
Fundamentals of Financial Planning, with Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women (Coursera) Coursera
Goldman Sachs

Fundamentals of Financial Planning, with Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women (Coursera)

This course is one of 10 courses available in the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women collection, designed for entrepreneurs ready to take their business to the next level. In this course, you will begin to develop and optimize your business for growth by considering your cash flow cycle and examining the impact that this can have on your success.

Sep 14th 2026
1 Week
Brand and Product Management (Coursera) Coursera
IE Business School

Brand and Product Management (Coursera)

Identify the critical information needed to develop a product and brand strategy that generates both quick-wins and long-term value. By completing this course, you will be in position to create an activity plan to bring your brand strategy to life - both externally towards consumers and internally to employees. You will be able to define the right metrics for determining success in the implementation of your product and brand strategy, considering any adjustments that may need to be made under a test and learn methodology.

Sep 14th 2026
4 Weeks
China Strategy (Coursera) Coursera
The Chinese University of Hong Kong

China Strategy (Coursera)

This course is designed to help you, as a strategist of a foreign company, better understand how to develop your China strategy. Specifically, after studying China’s changing strategic landscape, you will focus on mastering three strategic issues: who – the major players in China, how – the entry modes, and where – the location strategy for your China business. This course is aimed to deliver updated knowledge and real experiences of developing China strategy.

Sep 14th 2026
4 Weeks
Fundamentals of Social Media Advertising (Coursera) Coursera
Facebook

Fundamentals of Social Media Advertising (Coursera)

This course takes a deep dive into paid advertising on social media. Learn how to start advertising on platforms like Facebook and Instagram by developing effective ads. Learn how to work with design teams by capturing the essence of your ad campaign in a creative brief, and understand how privacy policies may affect your ads. Complete the course with a project where you will produce a creative brief with assets you would deliver to a design team for your ad campaign. You’ll also create your first social media ad.

Sep 14th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Human Health Risks, Health Equity, and Environmental Justice (Coursera) Coursera
University of Michigan

Human Health Risks, Health Equity, and Environmental Justice (Coursera)

The fourth and final course of the Impacts of the Environment on Global Public Health specialization will cover two topics. The first is environmental justice – that is, avoiding an inequitable distribution of environmental health threats in our population, and ensuring a healthy and safe environment and health equity for all. The second is risk assessment and management, a framework that can be utilized to assess and quantify human health risks, and to identify appropriate approaches to mitigating those risks and promoting better health. We will explore the steps involved in risk assessment, as well as how risk assessment can incorporate and address environmental justice issues.

Sep 14th 2026
4 Weeks