Risk management and compliance software tools are usually online platforms that enable firms to implement best-practice governance, risk & compliance (GRC) processes. The tools automate risk and streamline risk and compliance processes, cutting out admin and capturing adequate, accurate risk and compliance data – thanks to a variety of data governance rules. The solutions enable firms to build online risk registers and control libraries, conduct risk assessments, and implement workflows and controls to address and reduce risk. This software can also be used to manage regulatory change, provide compliance assurance, plan & schedule audits, and to manage incidents. Leading risk & compliance management software allows firms to map risk to strategic objectives & enterprise performance to understand how risk & compliance obligations impact business operations and strategic plans. Most GRC software platforms offer a variety of dashboards and reports – enabling firms to get a complete view of risk and investigate problem areas as they delve into the detail.

When selecting a compliance risk management software, leaders must consider which staff and departments will need access to the tool and what data and metrics they need to summarize and report on. When scoping out requirements for risk management and compliance software organizations must consider:

• Are there any regulatory requirements that the organization must comply with that will affect how the GRC program is structured?
• Does the operational risk management software offer best-practice Operational Risk Management (ORM) and Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) functionality?
• How will you categorize and rate risk and what framework, risk ratings and categorization will be used to make risk comparable across different areas?
• Can leaders obtain a simple view of compliance status against regulatory obligations and industry standards?
• Can the risk & compliance management software be implemented according to your individual needs and bespoke requirements?
• Can staff easily implement risk and compliance tasks online?
• Can the risk and compliance management solution scale and grow with your organization as your requirements expand and your risk & compliance program matures? 
• What IT security features and data privacy options does the GRC solution offer, and does it align with the requirements of your IT team?
• Does the compliance and risk assessment software integrate with your other internal applications and systems via APIs to pull risk & compliance related data into and out of the platform to ensure a single source of truth for risk – reducing data input errors? 
• Which staff and teams will need to use the risk and compliance software – what information will they input and what reports & insights do they need to view and in what format?
• Look for a risk management software vendor that provides risk and compliance solutions that enable you to build an online obligations library of obligatory requirements, manage regulatory change, scan the regulatory horizon for updates, and monitor compliance – using simple workflows and online forms to carry out compliance checks and attestations.
• Choose compliance management software that offers specific solutions around anti-money laundering, conflicts of interest, sanctions checks, gifts & entertainment, whistleblowing, and feedback & complaints.
• Choose a compliance platform that offers templates and frameworks that align with ISO standards.

The benefits of utilizing SaaS cloud-based risk and compliance management software include:

• Reduced time spent on risk reporting, data aggregation, and administrative tasks.
• Risk and compliance management software provides a centralized view of risk exposure and compliance status across the entire organization.
• Compliance and risk management software enables everyone in the organization to feed into risk and compliance activities – easily completing risk & compliance related tasks online as part of their daily role. This creates consistent risk & compliance data to support risk-based decision-making – providing compliance assurance. 
• Risk & compliance management software generates improved visibility of an organizations operational risk profile. Many risk and compliance tools offer Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) capabilities, cyber risk management, project risk management, and supply chain & third-party risk management in the same platform.
• Risk & compliance management software reduces the overheads associated with risk monitoring and risk reporting efforts.
• Compliance and risk software improves an organization’s approach to risk management by enabling critical linkages between risk management, strategy, compliance, and operational performance. 
• Compliance risk software supports organizations to conduct adequate due diligence to provide compliance assurance to regulators.

• Choose risk and compliance management software that is simple for your users to configure and customize in house, as it will result in reduced implementation charges and cut back on professional services fees.
• Choose compliance risk assessment software that enables your organization to set up multiple risk registers, types, and categories – this will enable risk teams to report on specific risk areas individually and also roll everything up into a holistic view.
• Select risk and compliance management software with a variety of reporting requirements out-of-the-box – that can be further customized to meet any bespoke needs.
• Select a risk and compliance management software that integrates with your other systems & data sources to ensure risk related data is consistent.
• Look for risk and compliance management software companies that offer a multitude of governance, risk & compliance use cases including, incident reporting, regulatory change management, audit management, policy management, project management, strategic planning, and ESG – managing these functions in one central platform is beneficial as it enables firms to integrate the data for improved reporting outputs. 
• Look for risk and compliance management software that offers solutions for the cyber risk team and data protection buyer – for example cyber risk management, cyber incident management, asset management, and templates to manage compliance with data privacy laws and regulations.
• Look for compliance management tools that offer out-of-the-box templates to align with the regulatory standards you follow.
• Look for supply chain risk management tools that offer vendor risk management and third-party risk management. 

• Poor quality GRC data due to a lack of data governance and data entry errors.
• Capturing risk and compliance information across various forms and spreadsheets leads to data entry problems like copy & paste mistakes, overwritten data, and missed fields.
• Siloed risk and compliance data held in unintegrated spreadsheets creates bad quality risk data and an inconsistent risk framework that results in misleading reporting – resulting in poor decision-making. 
• Relying on manual processes that lack automation negatively impacts the resolution of risk, causing risk to escalate to unbearable levels.
• Manual disjointed processes also affect compliance with regulations, policies, and procedures – making it tough for firms to prove compliance to regulators.
• Siloed data and a reliance on multiple spreadsheets makes it nearly impossible to link risks to the relevant controls and regulatory compliance obligations – making it hard to understand risk exposure and compliance status.
• Without using risk and compliance management software, companies are unable to compare GRC data across different sites due to inconsistent risk frameworks and siloed data. This makes it tricky to make risk-based decisions and provide an accurate view of compliance status across departments and sites.

Use the Camms online calculator to find out how much you could save in terms of cost and hours spent on managing risk if you were to use risk management software. Enter the necessary details about how you currently manage risk in your company and our useful calculator tool will produce potential figures on the likely time and money you could save by implementing risk and compliance software.

Access our risk management ROI Calculator