Ethics & Compliance Legal Specialist - Hybrid, Cary, North Carolina
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About the job
As an Ethics & Compliance Legal Specialist, you’ll be a key member of our Legal / Ethics & Compliance team, supporting company‑wide ethics and compliance programs. In this role, you’ll help ensure we meet regulatory and policy obligations, support due diligence, investigations and reviews, and promote a strong culture of ethical decision‑making across the organization.
This role is well‑suited for an experienced compliance professional (typically 5–7 years of experience) who brings sound judgment, strong communication skills, and a practical approach to ethics and compliance in a complex, global business environment.
As an Ethics & Compliance Legal Specialist you will:
- Support ethics and compliance programs, policies, and processes that promote ethical conduct and regulatory compliance
- Act as a team administrator for the Speak-Up line, including intake, documentation, coordination with stakeholders, and tracking outcomes
- Conduct various due diligence and other review processes, including but not limited to anti-corruption due diligence, gifting reviews, restricted party reviews, and conflicts of interest.
- Serve as a team lead for data and reporting and, in particular, prepare clear, well‑structured reports and presentations analyzing data and summarizing findings, risk and recommended outcomes for the Chief Compliance Officer, Chief Legal Officer, leadership and key stakeholders
- Conduct and support compliance‑related risk assessments, including data collection and analysis to evaluate ethical, regulatory, and business risks
- Partner with Legal and cross‑functional teams to document findings and inform recommendations
- Help monitor adherence to policies and applicable regulatory requirements
- Support internal and external audits by gathering documentation, responding to inquiries, and tracking remediation efforts
- Contribute to ethics and compliance training, communications, and awareness initiatives for employees and leaders
- Stay current on evolving ethics and compliance best practices and help assess their impact on business operations
- You’re curious, passionate, authentic and accountable. These are our values and influence everything we do.
Required qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in legal studies, business, compliance, risk management, or a related field (or equivalent experience)
- 5–7 years of progressive experience in ethics, compliance, legal operations, investigations, audit, or a related corporate function
- Strong technical and organizational skills
- Strong critical thinking, writing and documentation skills, with the ability to clearly communicate complex or sensitive topics
- High integrity, sound judgment, and the ability to handle confidential information with discretion
- Proven ability to collaborate across functions and build trusted relationships
- An equivalent combination of related education, training and experience may be considered in place of the above qualifications.
Additional competencies, knowledge and skills:
- Collaborating: Working cooperatively with others to help a team or work group achieve its goals.
- Technical and Professional Knowledge and Skills: Having achieved a satisfactory level of technical, functional, and/or professional skill or knowledge in position-related areas; keeping up with current developments and trends in areas of expertise; leveraging expert knowledge to accomplish results.
- Planning and Organizing: Establishing an action plan for self and others to complete work efficiently and on time by setting priorities, establishing timelines, and leveraging resources.
- Exposure to in-house investigation work, due diligence, risk assessment, and/or auditing
- Experience with Excel and/or PowerPoint
- Experience working closely with highly sensitive information
- Independent thinker who can manage projects with little supervision and wants to grow in, and expand, the role
- Professional certifications (e.g., compliance, ethics, or legal‑related), a plus
World-class benefits
Highlights include...
- Comprehensive medical, prescription, dental and vision plans.
- Medical plan options include:
- PPO with low annual deductible and copays.
- HDHP combined with a health savings account with a contribution from SAS (no access to on-site health care center).
- Onsite Health Care Center (HQ) that’s free to employees and family members enrolled in the PPO plan. There's a pharmacy too! Not local to HQ? The pharmacy will ship prescriptions for no additional charge!
- An industry-leading 401k plan.
- Tuition Assistance Program and programs and resources to support your development
- Generous time away including vacation time, a variety of paid holidays, and our much-loved U.S. Winter Wellness Break between December 25 and January 1.
- Volunteer Time Off, parental leave and unlimited paid sick days.
- Generous childcare benefits for all full-time employees.
You are welcome here.
At SAS, it’s not about fitting into our culture – it’s about adding to it. We believe our people make the difference. Our inclusive workforce brings together unique talents and inspires teams to create amazing software that reflects the diversity of our users and customers.
Additional Information:
To qualify, applicants must be legally authorized to work in the United States, and should not require, now or in the future, sponsorship for employment visa status. SAS is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants are considered for employment without regard to any characteristic protected by law. Read more: Know Your Rights.
Resumes may be considered in the order they are received. SAS employees performing certain job functions may require access to technology or software subject to export or import regulations. To comply with these regulations, SAS may obtain nationality or citizenship information from applicants for employment. SAS collects this information solely for trade law compliance purposes and does not use it to discriminate unfairly in the hiring process.
SAS only sends emails from verified “sas.com” email addresses and never asks for sensitive, personal information or money. If you have any doubts about the authenticity of any type of communication from, or on behalf of SAS, please contact Recruitingsupport@sas.com.
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