GRC remains top of mind for SAP users
PAC US, Peter Russo - Managing Director
GRC - or Governance, Risk and Compliance - is a major area of concern for key executives, especially CFOs who ultimately sign the checks for major tech and consulting purchases. The issue sprang to prominence with the SOX regulations and changes to IFRS. But while organizations largely have those under control now, there are plenty of regulations on the way - in areas like sustainability and in some specific sectors like banking and insurance with Basel III and Solvency II. And, GRC is a wide field; other issues it helps with are perennial and common to most businesses - fraud reduction, for instance. And senior execs remain in the front line of accountability.
With BusinessObjects GRC 10, announced earlier this year and on show at Sapphire, SAP aims to help companies better address the common GRC issues. Improvements include unifying processes and also the look and feel across different modules, easier set up and management of policies.
So GRC 10 should be a useful step up, especially in established SAP and BusinessObjects shops. But there are other areas perhaps better addressed by specific point solutions - eg compliance to international trade or 'green' regulations. But ultimately, like so many other aspects of business, this is less a technology problem, and much more a process-driven issue. It's important to have the right technology, but getting the right processes to ensure people's behavior is critical. Technology can help to highlight both good and bad practices - or conformance thereto - but the practices have to be designed well and sensibly in the first place.
As regulations continue to increase across all industry sectors, if a company doesn't have the in-house skills to ensure robust and workable procedures are in place, consultancy support is a must. For all but the most GRC-savvy of firms, it is advisable for any exec in a position of responsibility to start by calling in a qualified audit firm to check out today's procedures and practices.
About the author:
Peter has over 10 years of experience in the SITS industry. He joined Pierre Audoin Consultants (PAC) in 2001. He serves as the managing director of PAC's U.S. operations and its partners in Latin America. Peter is also the founder of PAC's global SAP & Oracle Services research teams programs.
On the consulting side, he is involved in U.S. and global projects for software suppliers pertaining to ecosystem assessment, competitive benchmarking, go-to-market strategy in emerging industries, and analysis, planning, and execution of localized partnership strategies.
Peter is often quoted in both IT news and major publications for his views on the application software market. He is also a frequent speaker at IT conferences and PAC Webinars.
