Third-Party Risk Management: From A to Zen

2 minute read

March 2020

Just as the mind, body and spirit are intertwined, there are several interconnected pillars to a wholistic third-party risk program. A truly effective third-party risk management (TPRM) program looks at several differing factors and brings them together to develop a comprehensive and balanced program.

Risk professionals can no longer rely on paper forms and spreadsheets to manage the health of the hundreds (or thousands) of vendors within a company ecosystem. Financial health, reputational health and cybersecurity health must all be evaluated, along with the inherent and residual risk that comes with partnering with a vendor. Only a wholistic view into vendor relationships gives risk managers complete visibility into the risk profile of third parties to make sound business decisions.

How to Develop A Comprehensive Third-Party Risk Management Program

Objective insights into the viability of third parties can help organizations make better business decisions and meet regulatory requirements, including cybersecurity ratings, reputational insights and financial ratings.

Cybersecurity Ratings

Analyzing vendor’s security behaviors is crucial to help organizations manage third-party risk, benchmark performance and assess and negotiate cyber insurance premiums. The BitSight Security Ratings Platform supplements IT security risk assessments with objective cybersecurity ratings and rankings for an even more complete view of vendor populations, eliminating the need to manually enter, recalculate risk scores, and/or continually update information on each organization being assessed.

Reputational Insights

Managing reputational risk, including Politically Exposed Persons (PEPs) and heightened risk individuals, can help to manage not only an organization’s reputation, but financial and regulatory risk, as well. Refinitiv (formerly Thomson Reuters WorldCheck) can be used for transaction monitoring, enhanced due diligence, and onboarding. The service continuously monitors vendor organizations and their employees, delivering real-time notifications for potential issues that may signal heightened risk.

Financial Ratings

Empirical ratings — uninfluenced by company bias — can serve as accurate and predictive indicators of a company’s financial viability, operational efficiency, and resilience. RapidRatings uses a unique quantitative analytics model to measure the financial health of public and private companies, providing empirical ratings — uninfluenced by company bias —which serve as accurate and predictive indicators of a company’s financial viability, operational efficiency, and resilience.

ProcessUnity Vendor Risk Management Can Jumpstart A Comprehensive Program

History shows that organizations have been in the dark when it comes to understanding the health and performance of critical third parties – but that will come to a stop when organizations begin to develop a comprehensive third-party risk management program.

ProcessUnity Vendor Risk Management offers a suite of vendor risk rating connectors that quickly and easily integrate data into individual programs to create wholistic vendor views. Contact us to schedule a demo and learn why external vendor risk ratings, with richer content and specialized intelligence, can inform a comprehensive Third-Party Risk Management program.

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About Us

ProcessUnity is a leading provider of cloud-based applications for risk and compliance management. The company’s software as a service (SaaS) platform gives organizations the control to assess, measure, and mitigate risk and to ensure the optimal performance of key business processes. ProcessUnity’s flagship solution, ProcessUnity Vendor Risk Management, protects companies and their brands by reducing risks from third-party vendors and suppliers. ProcessUnity helps customers effectively and efficiently assess and monitor both new and existing vendors – from initial due diligence and onboarding through termination. Headquartered outside of Boston, Massachusetts, ProcessUnity is used by the world’s leading financial service firms and commercial enterprises. For more information, visit www.processunity.com.