When reading the third edition of the Nordic Ethics & Compliance Survey  there is an immediate change in the language you usually get from many global reports, where the narrative comes from a place of pressure, competitive risk, and regulatory escalation, the Nordic tone is quieter, and more rooted in identity.

The 2025 Nordic Ethics & Compliance Survey captures this clearly. Most respondents describe compliance not as enforcement or oversight, but as a natural extension of their organisation’s values. Sustainability is not an obligatory reporting track, it’s integrated into how decisions are made. There’s a sense of collective responsibility that many regions spend years trying to cultivate.

But as you read a little deeper, something else emerges too, there’s a tension that is not rooted in the values but in capacity.

The survey respondents are largely from smaller compliance teams, with less than 20 reporting more than 25,000 employees. In many organisations, very small. According to the numbers, often just one to five people. Who seem to carry multiple responsibilities, supporting businesses that span borders, suppliers, and regulatory expectations that grow heavier every year.

And yet, they are expected to do the things that most large enterprise teams do, like deliver training to an entire workforce, monitor risks in real time, oversee third-party integrity. All while keeping leadership informed and helping strengthen ethical decision-making, all with a new and growing task to govern the responsible use of AI.

All without the operational scale or staffing depth that larger multinationals can rely on. What the survey does, perhaps unintentionally, is remind us that ethical strength and operational strength are not the same thing. From the report, the Nordics have the first in abundance. The second not so much.

The report implies that compliance is beginning to move from: “We trust employees to act responsibly.” to “We need documentation, systems, and controls that hold up to scrutiny.”

Having delivered a number of programme effectiveness talks in the region, I don’t think that trust has eroded, I just think that because the world around these organisations has changed, the values these organisations have lived by are now getting squeezed.

Supply chains are longer, and more exposed. Regulations are shifting faster than ever. Expectations for proof, not just principle are rising. Geopolitics is affecting everything from sanctions to investments to data flows.

The Nordic ethical core is still intact. But the environment that surrounds it is harder, sharper, and less forgiving.

Culture is no longer enough on its own.

Where measurement matters

It’s important to add that this survey asked compliance professionals their opinions, vs asking employees what they think. One of the most striking lessons from employee-based global research is how differently a programme can look from the top and how it is felt on the ground. So what remains uncertain is the lived experience of the employee:

• Leaders often believe values are clear.
• Employees often face situations where those values compete with pressure, deadlines, incentives, or customer demands.

This is not a Nordic problem. It’s something LRN has been writing about for years. The juxtaposition of how ethical decisions feel in moments of pressure, whether managers reinforce or dilute values, if speak-up is safe in practice, not just in policy compared to what the leadership perceive to be true is important

The Nordic survey paints a picture of a region with strong cultural foundations who continue to approach compliance as an extension of their values, with sustainability and responsible conduct woven into everyday decision-making, not treated as external obligations. This cultural clarity is a competitive strength in a world where many organisations still struggle to articulate what they stand for.

AI adoption is widespread, but primarily at a general-use level rather than in risk analytics or automated monitoring. Speak-up systems are stabilising, with higher substantiation rates , which a sign of increasing maturity and trust. The real challenge ahead is ensuring that ethical values scale consistently across the organisation, especially at the middle management level, where daily decisions are made.

What did I get from this survey, well I think Nordic companies have the values right. The next phase for organisations in the region is building the operational backbone, the systems, workflows, and reinforcement mechanisms that will allow those values to hold under pressure, across borders, and at speed.