Secrets of Success: Lee Bryan, CEO of Arcus Compliance

Taking the pain out of compliance

With so many moving parts and different perspectives on enforcement across Europe, Arcus Compliance’s ‘hive mind’ approach ensures that each client benefits from the experiences of others.

Lee Bryan shares his Secrets of Success with Business Matters.

What made you start Arcus Compliance – did you want to rock the status quo or was it a gap in the marketplace that you could fill?

I had seen other compliance providers fail in their offering and felt that by combining the regulatory knowledge with an old-school approach to customer service we would have the winning formula.

What is your USP

Personally, I’d say tenacity. I’ve failed more times than I’ve succeeded, but I pushed forward with new ventures regardless. As a business, I’ve always maintained that we must offer the best customer service and deliver on our promises.

What are your brand values?

Efficiency, Consistency, Reliability and Transparency

Do your values define your decision-making process?

Yes, very much so. Anything we do needs to be efficient and scalable. We ensure that the client is aware of any limitations and risk.

Is team culture integral to Arcus Compliance?

Most definitely. We recruit team members with a similar outlook and personality to ensure the culture of the business is maintained

What do you do to go the extra mile to show your team you appreciate them?

Ongoing training opportunities to develop, two bonuses a year, international team building trips, flexible hours to suit their family commitments and our commitment to keeping the work environment fun and fresh.

In terms of your messaging do you think you talk directly to your consumers in a clear fashion?

Yes. One of our values is transparency, so we always look to understand their commercial aspirations first. Then we build a compliance strategy that maps that and allows them to market their products without the fear of enforcement for non-compliant products.

What’s your take on inflation and interest rates – are you going to pass that on to your customers or let your margins take a hit and reward customer loyalty in these tougher times?

No. We offer a retained service that acts as an extension of their company. We have no plans to increase our pricing due to inflation.

How often do you assess the data you pull in and address your KPIs and why?

Our data is assessed constantly, owing to the various moving parts within compliance. It’s essential that we keep our finger on the pulse of any regulatory changes and communicate them to our clients asap.

Is tech playing a much larger part in your day-to-day running of your company?

Yes, we have invested heavily in proprietary software. Having our own software is not only a USP but allows us to handle tasks in a fraction of the time it would take a human to handle them. It means we keep our head count low as well as our costs. Our aim is to provide an outsourced compliance department at a fraction of the cost that it would be ‘in-house’.

What is your attitude to your competitors?

We don’t concern ourselves with our competitors. We focus on our swim-lane only and aim to get better than we were previously. Competition then becomes irrelevant.

Do you have any advice for anyone starting out in business?

Expect the road to be bumpy, then when a problem comes along you’re not as fazed by it as if you were expecting plain sailing. Make sure you have enough cash to cover costs while you are building your reputation, and that reputation is going to take you 3-5 years to build.

It can be a lonely and pressured place to be as the lead decision maker of the business. What do you do to relax, recharge and hone your focus?

I learned transcendental meditation shortly after starting the business. It was a game- changer for me. It made me realise I wasn’t great at everything and that I should farm out anything that I wasn’t great at and focus on what I was good at. TM still plays a part in my life today and keeps me relaxed and focused.

Do you believe in the 12-week work method or do you make much longer planning strategies?

No, it’s not something I follow. I’m pretty much a workaholic and just go hard at it all the time. I don’t employ any schedules or best practices to growing the business, although I am at the point where I am bringing in the staff that focus on that, to allow me to be the aggressive sales person that I am.

What is your company’s eco strategy?

We don’t have an eco-strategy per se. We are of course mindful of our corporate responsibilities but as a consultancy our impact on the environment is low, so we don’t have to worry too much. We help our clients understand their waste obligations and ensure that appropriate programmes are in place for that.

What three things do you hope to have in place within the next 12 months?

1 We are bringing in an MD to improve efficiencies within the business and are looking forward to that.

2) We will be launching some new software that will improve our clients’ ability to manage their compliance files more easily

3) We will be taking our services into the US cannabis sector to help improve compliance in that market.