GRC Tools and Its Importance
Wondering how you can mitigate risks, improve organizational efficiency, and implement a common governance policy across your organization? The answer is simple; GRC.
Governance, Risk management, and Compliance (GRC) is a core framework that any organization must follow to manage its business operations including IT operations that are subject to compliance regulations. Every business or organization needs a GRC strategy. Consider GRC as the glue that binds your business objectives and helps you comply with company policies or regulations while mitigating associated risks. Best of all, since GRC provides a structured and integrated framework, it is the go-to solution for all your Information security management needs.
GRC Has 3 Core Components
Governance: As the name suggests, this refers to overall company governance or management that is aligned with its business objectives. According to Oracle’s definition of GRC, “good governance is defined as effective, ethical management of a company at the executive level and is treated as an objectively measurable commodity.” All organizational activities including IT operations must be aligned with the organizational goals and enable timely decision making.
Risk Management: Think Business. Think Risks. So, how do you control or manage risks effectively while operating within your company policies and regulations? Risks can be categorized as technical or technological risks, commercial or financial risks, information security risks and so on. Companies need to identify and address these risks and provide comprehensive enterprise risk management policies.
Compliance: Company activities must comply and conform with their policies, rules, and regulations. Management processes that identify these rules, laws, contracts, policies, and so forth must be defined and secured. Compliance involves control and audit to effectively streamline their processes.
How does GRC Work and Why Should You Care?
Now that we know what GRC is, let’s find out how GRC works and why a company should be implementing it.
A GRC strategy can be implemented for a single activity of an enterprise or for the whole organization. Completely integrated GRC solutions are available for enterprises across many verticals such as Legal, Finance, or IT. Instead of each vertical acting independently and struggling with compliance, implementing an integrated GRC will bring together different departments under one common code of governance and compliance. Using a GRC strategy helps a company effectively achieve its objectives amidst uncertainty, manage risks efficiently, and reduce expenditure.
The GRC framework clearly defines and measures the effectiveness of the organization’s GRC implementation, thereby ensuring an organized approach to managing businesses while adhering to regulatory compliance.
What Types of GRC Solutions are Available?
Many such GRC frameworks or solutions are available in the market and can be tailored to meet your company needs. Vendors for GRC solutions fall into 3 broad segments:
- Integrated GRC solutions that crosses an enterprise
- Domain-specific GRC solutions that caters to a single vertical or department. For example, Legal or Finance
- Point solutions that cross an enterprise and can be tailored to focus on either governance, risk management, or compliance but not all
What is a GRC Tool and How Does it Help?
A GRC tool is typically a cloud-based integrated software framework that helps you create policies and controls across your organization and helps you align them with your internal compliance requirements. Administrators in an organization can use the GRC software to monitor and enforce rules, policies, and procedures.
Integrated GRC software frameworks enable coordination among different departments such as IT, legal, security, finance, or auditing, among others, in an enterprise. You can also identify risks, measure progress on company’s goals, or provide information audits on any department in the organization.
Implementing GRC can benefit:
- Business executives who need to monitor and manage risks
- Finance managers who need to manage and monitor regulatory compliance
- Legal counsels who need to maintain law and company policies
- IT directors who need to manage software installations and IT activities
However, a caveat. Before you implement GRC, do your homework and prepare your environment first. What does this mean? This means assessing your organization’s risks, policies, people, and controls. And then, create a GRC framework that involves company processes and people for a successful implementation.