.VP, Legal - Ethics & Compliance

Equinix is the world’s digital infrastructure company®, operating over 260 data centers across the globe. Digital leaders harness Equinix's trusted platform to bring together and interconnect foundational infrastructure at software speed. Equinix enables organizations to access all the right places, partners and possibilities to scale with agility, speed the launch of digital services, deliver world-class experiences and multiply their value, while supporting their sustainability goals.

A leadership role at Equinix means you will drive and collaborate on work that impacts the world. We embrace diversity in thought and contribution and are committed to providing an equitable work environment that is foundational to our core values as a company and is vital to our success.

.VP, Legal - Ethics & Compliance

Job Summary

You will serve as the global leader specializing in Ethics & Compliance. This is a key leadership role responsible for developing, implementing, and maintaining an effective ethics and compliance program that aligns with the company’s core values, legal obligations and strategic goals. The VP, Legal - Ethics & Compliance will work to foster a culture of integrity and ethical decision-making across the organization, ensuring compliance with laws, regulations, and internal policies in the increasingly regulated environment of the data center industry.

Responsibilities

Ethics and Compliance Strategy

• Compliance Strategy: Design, develop and implement a comprehensive compliance strategy that is risk based, proportionate, and aligned with the organization’s goals and objectives. This includes establishing policies, procedures and controls to ensure compliance with applicable laws, regulations and industry standard

• Staying current: Stay up to date with relevant laws, regulations, and industry best practices to ensure the organization’s compliance, particularly as the organization extends its presence in high-risk jurisdictions. Monitor changes in the ethics and compliance regulatory landscape and assess their impact on the organization’s operations

• Risk Assessment: Conduct regular risk assessments to identify potential compliance risks and develop strategies to mitigate them. This may involve evaluating internal processes, conducting audits, and implementing risk management frameworks.  Evaluate risk-tailored resource allocation and provide updates and input on revisions based on assessment

• Lessons learned: process for tracking and incorporating lessons learned from risk assessment and prior issues, including from other companies operating in the same industry/region into compliance strategy

Responsibility for Operational Integration

• Develop and enforce policies addressing ethical conduct, conflicts of interest, whistleblowing, anti-bribery, and corruption

• Responsible for integrating policies and procedures and ensuring employees’ understanding of the policies

• Evaluate how compliance policies and procedures are reinforced through internal controls, working with other relevant functions

• Training key gatekeepers in the control processes to identify and escalate concerns

Build Culture and Trust

• Champion an ethical culture across the organization by developing and leading training programs on ethics, compliance, and integrity

• Serve as a trusted advisor to the executive team and board of directors on ethical practices, compliance matters, and emerging regulatory trends

• Provide guidance and support to employees on ethical decision-making and encourage a strong compliance mindset throughout the organization. Encourage open dialogue and accountability at all levels of the organization through clear communication and accessible reporting mechanisms

• Foster “open door” atmosphere across organization to ensure that concerns and issues come to the attention of the ethics and compliance organization

Ethical Risk Management

• Identify and assess ethics-related risks in business activities, including supply chain operations, third-party relationships, and customer engagements. Promote and uphold the company’s core values and ethical standards in all business operations

Reporting & Investigations

• Evaluate effectiveness of reporting mechanisms, including employee awareness of reporting methods

• Responsible for developing processes for evaluating complaints and reports and scoping investigations.  Process to ensure that investigations are properly evaluated, scoped, and are independent, objective, appropriately conducted and properly documented

• Work with other groups on tracking investiga