5 Roadblocks to Scaling an Ethics & Compliance Program — and How to Fix Them

During a routine case review call at a large global manufacturer, five teams dialed in: Legal, HR, Compliance, and two regional offices. Everyone was ready to help.

Then came the question that stopped the call cold: “So… who actually owns this investigation?”

Silence.

The company’s whistleblower program had grown fast, but the structure around it hadn’t. Cases moved faster than the workflows built to manage them. And what started as a handful of manageable reports had become a maze of ownership questions, duplicate tracking, and delayed follow-up.

If you’ve managed an ethics and compliance program, you’ve probably seen a version of that moment. Programs don’t stall because people don’t care. They stall when outdated processes and tools can’t keep up with the speed of organizational change, cultural shifts, and regulatory complexity.

Scaling your ethics and compliance program means connecting the dots between people, process, data, and culture. On high-performing teams, investigations follow defined ownership paths, workflows are standardized across regions, and employees trust the system enough to speak up — and recommend it to others.

Over the past year, we’ve worked with global teams at every stage of this journey — some adding structure to keep up with growth, others rebuilding after close calls. Across industries, the same five roadblocks stall even the most well-intentioned programs.

In this article, we’ll show you how leading teams are addressing the blockers that keep them stuck — and what you can do next.

Roadblock #1. Unclear ownership and processes slow investigations

When no one knows who owns a case, investigations stall. A report lands in HR’s inbox, gets copied to Legal, and then forwarded to Compliance. Each group assumes someone else will take the lead. The case sits for a week with no next step.

One global company told us about a retaliation report that hit two regional offices at the same time. One team opened an investigation. The other flagged it but never escalated. One region fixed the issue. The other buried it in their inbox. By the time leadership connected the dots, the same employee had filed a second complaint.

A compliance director summed it up: “It’s like trying to run a relay with no hand-off zone.” Deadlines get missed, documentation lives in different folders, and no one can say with certainty who’s responsible when regulators or the board ask for answers.

How to fix it: Clearly defined ownership by task

The teams that avoid this mess don’t depend on hallway conversations or reply-all chains to move cases forward. They set clear lines of accountability from the start.

Define exactly who owns each type of allegation (e.g., retaliation = HR, bribery = Legal, conflicts of interest = Compliance).

	Document escalation rules so no one’s guessing when a case moves up the chain.
	Route reports through one intake path so ownership is assigned the moment a case comes in.
	Use a single investigation framework with the same hand-off steps across regions.
	Keep ownership visible to leadership and investigators so there’s no debate over who’s driving a case.

Scalable programs start with clarity: who owns what, when to escalate, and how information moves. Whether you manage ten cases or a thousand, clear lines of responsibility build confidence across every region and investigation.

Roadblock #2. Outdated workflows stall whistleblower case management

Many ethics and compliance teams still track cases in Outlook threads and Excel spreadsheets. An HR lead gets the initial report by email. Legal spins up its own thread to discuss next steps. Compliance logs the case in a spreadsheet. Three versions of the same incident move on separate timelines.

The same witness statement sits in three inboxes with three different timestamps. No one can tell which version is the source of record. When leadership asks for an update, one person forwards an old thread, another points to a tracker, and someone else says, “Give me a minute to check.”

That’s how a harassment case that should close in ten days ends up dragging past 45 — with three conflicting timelines and no clean audit trail. Nothing is technically broken, but every hand-off is manual, every update is a scavenger hunt, and no one can see the full timeline without piecing it together from scratch.

How to fix it: Structured, repeatable workflows

The teams that move fast don’t just tidy up their inboxes. They remove the friction that slows every step of the investigation.

	Use a centralized reporting portal that brings intake options into one place, so nothing gets missed or buried in disconnected inboxes.
	Create a single shared case file where the incident report, investigation notes, and attachments live together. No more juggling PDFs and versioned Word docs across departments.
	Lay out the exact investigative steps (intake, triage, fact-gathering, escalation, closure), so everyone knows what happens next instead of waiting for someone else to act.
	Keep a single timeline of key actions, e.g. who did what and when, so no one has to dig through four different inboxes to reconstruct events.
	Use a clear status view (Open, In Review, Escalated, Closed) so investigators and stakeholders can see progress without sending another “just checking in” email.

When every case follows the same path and lives in one place, teams stop chasing updates and start closing investigations faster.

Roadblock #3. Program data lives everywhere so leadership can’t see the risk

Most ethics and compliance teams collect plenty of data but can’t unify it for confident reporting case notes live in one system. Hotline reports sit in a shared inbox. HR keeps its own spreadsheet. Legal logs updates in a separate database. When someone finally needs a clear picture, it takes days to stitch everything together.

Without a single source of truth, leadership can’t see which risks are escalating or where repeat incidents are happening. Investigators waste hours chasing updates instead of resolving issues. When regulators ask for evidence, teams scramble to piece together what should have been visible from the start.

How to fix it: One source of truth for case data

To scale, you need a single source of truth. Leading ethics and compliance teams make the data they have usable.

	Centralize case information so hotline reports, investigation notes, and outcomes live in one place instead of scattered across inboxes and trackers.
	Keep a real-time view of key metrics like “time to close,” substantiation rates, and repeat issues.
	Use consistent fields and categories so you can compare trends across business units, not just list raw case counts.
	Automate status updates so leadership can see what’s happening without waiting for a quarterly rollup.
	Keep an export-ready audit trail so regulatory responses don’t turn into last-minute hunts through old emails.

When leadership can see patterns as they emerge — not months later — they can make better calls on resources, risk, and strategy. Data stops being a chore and starts becoming leverage.

Roadblock #4: Employees don’t trust the system enough to speak up

Many teams misread a quiet hotline as good news. In reality, silence often means employees don’t believe speaking up will help. A misconduct report gets filed, no confirmation goes out, weeks pass, and word spreads that reporting is pointless — or risky. Then the reports stop altogether.

This isn’t just a cultural issue. A stalled speak-up channel blinds leadership to brewing problems. Patterns like harassment, conflicts of interest, and retaliation stay hidden until they become legal or reputational crises.

How to fix it: Build visible, trustworthy reporting practices

Teams that maintain healthy reporting channels make the process visible and predictable — not performative.

	Confirm reports quickly so employees know their concern was received and taken seriously.
	Use neutral, plain language in acknowledgment messages to build trust. Avoid legalese that feels cold or scripted.
	Offer multiple intake paths (web portal, hotline, in-person) so employees can choose the method that feels safest to them.
	Provide periodic status updates without revealing sensitive details, so reporters know the case hasn’t been forgotten.
	Track and analyze engagement data over time (volume, channel, issue type) to spot early drops in trust.

One company we worked with started sending automated confirmation messages within 24 hours and visible status updates at key milestones. Their reporting volume jumped 40% over the next six months. Not because incidents increased, but because employees believed their reports mattered.

When employees see the process in action — not just in policy — they’re more likely to trust it and use it. And when they do, you’ll hear about issues earlier, intervene faster, and build a more resilient culture.

5. Roadblock #5. Manual reporting slows leadership visibility and decision-making

Many compliance teams still build board reports the hard way. Someone exports hotline cases from a vendor tool into Excel. Another downloads attachments from a shared drive. Legal forwards a list of escalations from Outlook. Someone else pastes everything into PowerPoint.

It’s a time sink. By the time the slides hit the boardroom, the data is already out of date. Leadership sees last quarter’s story, not this week’s reality.

When the team gets follow-up questions like:

• “Why did substantiation rates spike in Q2?”
• “Which regions are driving the increase?”
• “Are retaliation cases going up or are we just catching more?”

the compliance team has to pause the meeting, check multiple files, and circle back later.

How to fix it: Real-time reporting that answers real questions

Teams that do this well don’t work harder at spreadsheets. They set up reporting flows that give leadership answers the moment they ask.

	Pull case data from a single source, not five. One export should reflect the full caseload.
	Track incidents with structured fields (e.g., region, allegation type, substantiation, escalation date) so leaders can drill down without waiting.
	Establish a consistent reporting cadence (monthly or quarterly) so there’s no scramble to assemble numbers.
	Use BI dashboards or shared reports that refresh automatically, not static decks that age out within a week.
	Build views around common leadership questions, like “Which regions had repeat incidents this quarter?”

When the board or leadership team gets real-time answers, conversations shift from “What’s happening?” to “What should we do about it?” That’s the difference between reporting as an obligation and reporting as an advantage.

The path to a scalable, defensible ethics & compliance program

Ethics and compliance programs don’t stand still. As your organization grows, investigations span more regions, involve more stakeholders, and face more scrutiny. The five roadblocks outlined here are common signals that existing processes aren’t keeping up with the real scale of risk.

Scaling isn’t about starting over. It’s about removing friction, creating clarity at every step, and giving leadership confidence that the program works as intended.

Strong programs track patterns, document decisions, and make it easier for people to raise concerns. That kind of structure doesn’t need to be complex, but it needs to be deliberate.

If your program is hitting these friction points, it may be time to assess whether your reporting paths, workflows, and data practices still match your organization’s scale.

Ready to fix the gaps in your ethics & compliance program?

If you’ve been thinking about scaling your whistleblowing program, you know it isn’t about adding more layers or buying more tools. To move from a check-the-box hotline to a strategic, board-trusted function, you need more than basic software. You need features built for scale, defensibility and a culture employees trust.

Resolver’s Whistleblowing & Case Management Software is built to help fast-moving teams scale without sacrificing defensibility or trust. From structured workflows to real-time dashboards, we help global organizations close cases faster, spot trends sooner, and meet the moment with confidence.

Download our free RFP checklist to help evaluate platforms built for global ethics and compliance.