This text presents a study on the legal notion of compliance and how it affects the way in which large companies are conceived. The study is structured around the main developments of the figure at the international level, reason for showing that this legal institution implies, on the one hand, changes in the very identity of the companies, a transformation that is expressed in new interpretations of the nature of the companies, their obligations, and their liability. On the other hand, linked to the above, compliance imposes mutations to the corporate governance models where the company is organized in a way that allows to meet the new challenges established by the respect for the law, for which it is necessary to adopt different instruments that favor the control of the legal risks arising from its own behavior. Based on an analytical and comparative methodology of the doctrine and international standards, the study concludes that it is appropriate to adopt the institution in the Colombian case, given that there have been cases of emblematic companies involved in major scandals. The international experience teaches that the submission of large companies to the law is a necessary condition to consider these organizations as something positive for society.
