The Compliance Certifications Decoder!
Today as a public service to the compliance, audit, and internal control community, we address one of the eternal questions managers face as they build their risk and compliance teams or plot their own next career move.
What do all those certifications on someone’s LinkedIn profile actually mean?
Seriously — I’ve connected to some compliance professionals with more than two dozen capital letters after their name. The record that I’ve seen is eight credentials, totalling 30 letters, proudly listed by Murali Chandrasekhar, a cloud security and compliance whiz currently working at Google. And I’m sure his profile isn’t the craziest one out there.
To decode the madness, then, we’ve created a list of compliance, audit, and risk certifications: what each acronym means, and who issues it. You can see the list at the end of this post, and we’ve added them as a spreadsheet on the Resources part of this blog, too.
Sifting through my contacts, I found more than 50 certifications with some relevance to compliance, audit, and risk management. The list below is somewhat logically grouped, with the most important or most common certifications listed first, the more exotic ones further down.
How credible are these distinctions? You tell me. For example, I sometimes see job postings for compliance officers that require or encourage the CCEP (certified ethics and compliance professional), issued by the Society of Corporate Compliance & Ethics. Other times, recruiters have told me that the only certifications that matter are the JD law degree and the CPA accounting license. (Those two are so common we did not include them here.)
There can be some confusion about duplicative acronyms, too. For example, we found CSOE twice — “certified Sarbanes-Oxley expert” and “cyber security operations engineer.” The second seemed too IT-focused to include here, but you’ll see the same acronym for both certifications if you search LinkedIn long enough.
And why do we list these incomprehensible jumbles of letters at all? Once upon a time, it was just to indicate how pretentious and self-important you were. Now automated recruiting software uses certification acronyms as search terms, so you have to include them to make your resume findable among the many millions out there online.
We will try to update this list from time to time, since many more relevant certifications exist. If you see that we’ve missed an acronym proudly displayed on your LinkedIn profile, drop me a line at [email protected] and let me know — or, of course, send me a note on LinkedIn.
Certifications Decoder
| Certification | What does it stand for? | Who issues it? |
| CCEP | Certified Compliance & Ethics Professional | Society of Corporate Compliance & Ethics (SCCE) |
| CCEP-I | Certified Compliance & Ethics Professional-International | Society of Corporate Compliance & Ethics (SCCE) |
| CCSA | Certified in Control Self-Assessment | Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) |
| LPEC | Leadership Professional in Ethics & Compliance | Ethics & Compliance Initiative (ECI) |
| GRCP | GRC Professional | Open Compliance and Ethics Group (OCEG) |
| CFSA | Certified Financial Services Auditor | Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) |
| CGAP | Certified Government Auditing Professional | Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) |
| CIA | Certified Internal Auditor | Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) |
| CRMA | Certified in Risk Management Assurance | Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) |
| QIAL | Qualification in Internal Audit Leadership | Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) |
| CBCP | Certifiied Business Continuity Professional | Disaster Recovery Institute International |
| CrFA | Certified Forensic Accountant | Institute of Certified Forensic Accountants |
| FCPA | Forensic Certified Public Accountant | Forensic CPA Society |
| CCP | Certified Compliance Professional | Frankfurt School of Finance and Management |
| CICP | Certified Internal Control Professional | Internal Control Institute |
| CICS | Certified Internal Control Specialist | Internal Control Institute |
| CIPP | Certified Information Privacy professional | International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) |
| CIPP-E | Certified Information Privacy Professional-Europe | International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) |
| CIPP-US | Certified Information Privacy Professional-US | International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) |
| AICA | Associate Member of the International Compliance Association | International Compliance Association (ICA) |
| CHC | Certified in Healthcare Compliance | Health Care Compliance Association (HCCA) |
| CHPC | Certified in Healthcare Privacy Compliance | Health Care Compliance Association (HCCA) |
| CHRC | Certified in Healthcare Research Compliance | Health Care Compliance Association (HCCA) |
| CCSFP | Certified Common Security Framework Practitioner | HITRUST Alliance |
| CGEIT | Certified in Governance of Enterprise IT | Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA) |
| CISM | Certified Information Security Manager | Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA) |
| CISA | Certified Information Systems Auditor | Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA) |
| CRISC | Certified in Risk and Information Systems Control | Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA) |
| CSOE | Certified Sarbanes-Oxley Expert | Sarbanes-Oxley Association |
| CAMS | Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist | Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists (ACAMS) |
| CFE | Certified Fraud Examiner | Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE) |
| CPC | Certified Professional Coder | American Academy of Professional Coders (AAPC) |
| CPC-A | Certified Professional Coder-Apprentice | American Academy of Professional Coders (AAPC) |
| CPCO | Certified Professional Compliance Officer | American Academy of Professional Coders (AAPC) |
| CPMA | Certified Professional Medical Auditor | American Academy of Professional Coders (AAPC) |
| CCT | Certified Compliance Technician | American Association of Healthcare Administrative Management |
| CRIP | Certified Revenue Integrity Professional | American Association of Healthcare Administrative Management |
| CPHRM | Certified Professional in Healthcare | American Hospital Association |
| CPHQ | Certified Professional in Healthcare Quality | National Association for Healthcare Quality |
| CHA | Certified Healthcare Auditor | American Institute of Healthcare Compliance |
| RHIT | Registered Health Information Technician | American Health Information Management Association |
| CCIE | Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert | Cisco Systems |
| CRCM | Certified Regulatory Compliance Manager | American Bankers Association |
| CERP | Certified Enterprise Risk Professional | American Bankers Association |
| IACCP | Investment Adviser Certified Compliance Professional | Investment Adviser Association |
| CISSP | Certified Information Systems Security Professional | International Information System Security Certificate Consortium |
| FITSP-A | Federal IT Security Professional-Auditor | Federal IT Security Institute (FITSI) |
| GISF | GIAC Information Security Fundamentals | Global Information Assurance Certification (GIAC) |
| CIMP | Certified Identity Management Professional | Identity Management Institute |
| CISCGC | Certified Islamic Specialist in Corporate Governance and Compliance | General Council for Islamic Banks and Institution (CIBAFI) |
| CSSGB | Certified Six Sigma Green Belt | American Society for Quality |
| FCCA | Fellowship of Chartered Certified accountants | Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) |
| CAIA | Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst | Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst Association (CAIA) |
| CRCP | Certified Regulatory and Compliance Professional | FINRA Institute at Georgetown |
| ITIL | Information Technology Infrastructure Library | Axelos |
| CFS | Certified Fund Specialist | Institute of Business & Finance |
| PMP | Project Management Professional | Project Management Institute |
| CSM | Certified ScrumMaster | Scrum Alliance |