Compliance automation software is the answer to rising compliance costs

After last year’s U.S. presidential election, many businesses eagerly awaited a new “era of deregulation” that would allegedly result in relaxed compliance requirements – and lower costs. Although some regulations have been relaxed or even repealed, IT compliance is as time-consuming and expensive as ever. A recent survey by Wealth Management found that broker/dealers and registered investment advisors have increased their compliance budgets by an average of 9%. Further, investment advisors charged with compliance oversight report that compliance tasks take up 1/3 of their time. So much for the “era of deregulation.” Fortunately, the era of compliance automation is upon us.

In the Beginning, There Was Excel

For many years, organizations and third-party IT auditors have been using Microsoft Excel to “automate” their IT compliance processes. This worked well – in the 1990s, when the only other option was paper files. If your organization, or your IT auditor, is still using Excel for “compliance automation” in 2017, you aren’t actually “automating” anything. Excel is a great spreadsheet program, but it is not an IT audit and compliance solution, nor will it do anything to help you with IT governance and risk management, which are integral parts of compliance.

Modern RegTech software solutions, such as Continuum GRC’s IT Audit Machine (ITAM), are designed specifically to create, measure, monitor, and manage IT governance programs for compliance frameworks such as COBIT, FedRAMP, COSO, SSAE 18 SOC 1, AT 101 SOC 2, CJIS, DFARS, ISO 27001, ISO 27002, ISO 27005, NIST, and ITIL. With compliance automation software, your organization gets a truly automated, workflow-driven approach to managing, communicating, and implementing IT policies and procedures.

Let’s look at some of the ways in which compliance automation software saves time, money, and headaches.

How IT Compliance Automation Software Helps You Work Smarter, Not Harder

It helps you bridge the cyber security skills gap. The cyber security skills gap is quite real, and it’s getting worse by the day. Qualified cyber security personnel are difficult to find, and even if your company manages to snag one, it will pay top dollar for them. Compliance automation software fills this void by getting you the expert compliance help you need right now, at a price that’s far lower than what you’d pay to hire internal staff or even outsource the work to an IT audit firm. On average, ITAM users see a 46% reduction in labor costs.

It frees up your internal IT resources. Information technology personnel don’t grow on trees, either. By automating your IT compliance processes, your internal IT staff have time to work on initiatives that will grow your business instead of being bogged down with compliance audits.

It enables rapid report generation. Compliance automation software lets you say good-bye and good riddance to fumbling around and trying to reconcile a dozen different spreadsheets. Easy-to-use self-help modules and a centralized repository of all IT compliance requirements, with their associated controls and automated information flows, let you generate complex reports with just a few clicks of your mouse. On average, ITAM users speed up report generation by 180%!

It ensures that your controls are up-to-date. Compliance standards are continually evolving. Excel can’t tell you if your controls are compliant with the latest changes to IT security frameworks, but compliance automation software like ITAM can. If the regulations change, you find out right away, and you can respond right away.

It eliminates silos and improves cyber security. Respondents to the Wealth Management survey named cyber security as the top priority of their compliance efforts. Compliance automation software like ITAM doesn’t just make compliance easier; it integrates IT governance, policy management, risk management, compliance management, audit management, and incident management. With one user portal, you get the big picture of your organization’s cyber security controls, risks, and vulnerabilities.

The cyber security experts at Lazarus Alliance have deep knowledge of the cyber security field, are continually monitoring the latest information security threats, and are committed to protecting organizations of all sizes from security breaches. Our full-service risk assessment services and Continuum GRC RegTech software will help protect your organization from data breaches, ransomware attacks, and other cyber threats.

Lazarus Alliance is proactive cyber security®. Call 1-888-896-7580 to discuss your organization’s cyber security needs and find out how we can help your organization adhere to cyber security regulations, maintain compliance, and secure your systems.

The cyber security skills gap is real and growing; there simply aren’t enough cyber security employees to go around.

Cyber crime is rapidly escalating, and board rooms are taking notice. KPMG’s 2017 U.S. CEO Outlook survey shows cyber security risk to be among CEOs’ top concerns, yet only 40% of them feel that their organizations are fully prepared to handle a cyber attack. This isn’t surprising in light of the very serious – and worsening – cyber security skills gap. The cyber security unemployment rate was zero in 2016, and it’s expected to remain there until 2021. Coincidentally, that’s the same year by which Cybersecurity Ventures predicts there will be 3.5 million unfilled cyber security jobs.

Small and medium-sized firms are being hit the hardest by the cyber security skills gap, as the short supply of qualified talent is quickly snapped up by multinational firms that can afford to pay the high salaries and provide the “Cadillac” benefits and perks that this talent has the power to demand. The situation is expected to worsen in light of New York’s new cyber security law, which requires finance and insurance firms operating within the state to hire CISOs and “qualified cyber security personnel.”

Governments and private-sector organizations are wringing their hands over how to deal with the problem. The mayor of New York City has announced a plan to invest $30 million in in cybersecurity training, academic research, and development labs, with the goal of creating 10,000 new cyber security jobs over the next decade. IBM has launched what it’s calling a “new collar” jobs initiative to train both students and older workers in cyber security.

Outsourcing the Best Way to Immediately Bridge the Cyber Security Skills Gap

In light of the cyber security skills gap, the best option for most organizations is to outsource their cyber security functions to a reputable cyber security provider such as Lazarus Alliance. Our Cybervisors® service allows organizations of all sizes to immediately retain the services of the best and brightest subject matter experts in cyberspace law, cyber security, risk assessments and management, audit and compliance, governance and policies, and more.

In addition to getting the help you need right away, there are many other benefits to outsourcing your enterprise’s cyber security functions, including:

• Significant cost savings. It is almost always less expensive to outsource cyber security than to hire and maintain a security team full-time in-house. Even outsourcing just part of your cyber security functions, such as compliance, could result in significant savings.
• Allows you to focus on your business’ core competency. Most likely, you don’t hire in-house staff to handle your own legal matters or do your own taxes. You realize that law and accounting are not part of your core competency, so you outsource those functions to attorneys and accountants. (Along the same lines, you probably outsource your building security to a security firm!) Using this logic, why would your firm handle its own cyber security? Outsourcing this function to a professional frees up monetary and human resources that can be used to create, innovate, and drive your business.
• Allows you to access a level of expertise most companies don’t have internally. Cyber security is a highly specialized field, and the skill set it requires is quite different than those in other IT areas. It’s also highly dynamic, with new technologies and threat vectors emerging daily. Our Cybervisors® focus on only one thing: cyber security. They are highly experienced in this field, they are immersed in it, and they engage in continuous education to stay abreast of the cyber threat landscape.

Initiatives like the ones New York City and IBM have launched are positive steps in the direction of bridging the cyber security skills gap, but training new cyber security professionals takes time, and organizations need help right now. Your organization can’t wait 10 years, or even six months, to get the security help it needs, at a price it can actually afford. The cyber security skills gap is here for the long-haul, and outsourcing is the best way to handle the problem right now.

The cyber security experts at Lazarus Alliance have deep knowledge of the cyber security field, are continually monitoring the latest information security threats, and are committed to protecting organizations of all sizes from security breaches. Our full-service risk assessment services and Continuum GRC RegTech software will help protect your organization from data breaches, ransomware attacks, and other cyber threats.

Lazarus Alliance is proactive cyber security®. Call 1-888-896-7580 to discuss your organization’s cyber security needs and find out how we can help your organization adhere to cyber security regulations, maintain compliance, and secure your systems.