The Importance of Policy Management Tools for MSPs

Policies keep successful organizations aligned with their goals and objectives. However, without effective management, they lose their impact.

For MSPs offering compliance as a service (CaaS), policy management tools create a strategic advantage. They enable efficient oversight of policies across multiple clients while staying current with regulatory requirements.

These tools empower MSPs to proactively manage compliance, mitigate risk, and demonstrate clear value to their clients. Here’s how:

Why Policy Management is Critical for Business Success

Policies define the boundaries of acceptable behavior within an organization. When done right, they become the guiding principles that help everyone make smart choices.

Policies ensure that all actions contribute to the bigger picture. Whether it’s dodging potential disasters or complying with a regulatory framework, well-designed policies serve as the rulebook for achieving business goals and objectives.

From Documentation to Implementation: Making Policies Work

Policies sitting on a shelf (or in a forgotten folder in SharePoint) don't achieve anything. It's the management of those policies that transforms them from words on a page into actual, consistent practices that drive a business forward.

Policy management is how you make sure everyone actually reads the rules, understands them, and behaves accordingly. From drafting and authorization to publishing, communicating, assessing, and updating, policy management is the process that keeps it all organized.

How Regulatory Compliance Impacts Client Organizations

For regulated businesses, policies aren’t just about hitting targets, they’re a legal obligation. Being able to prove that the right policies and procedures are in place and that a team is actually using them, might be the only thing standing between a business and incapacitating financial penalties.

Even businesses that aren’t regulated can benefit from policy management. While they may not face the same legal mandates, unregulated businesses still face numerous challenges that effective policies can help mitigate.

What happens if a key employee suddenly leaves? Without documented procedures, their critical knowledge walks out the door with them. Or consider a workplace accident. Clearly defined safety policies and documented training procedures provide evidence in the event of a legal challenge.

CaaS Policy Management Challenges

For MSPs offering Compliance-as-a-Service (CaaS), policy management takes on a whole new level of importance. It requires balance to provide guidance around policies, but not take ownership. If you own it, you own the risk, and that can lead to some serious liability issues for your MSP.

Forget about those generic policy templates you downloaded off the internet and stuffed into SharePoint or Google Docs. CaaS demands more. It requires dedicated GRC software built specifically for MSPs, and that software must be packed with robust policy management tools.

With the right toolkit, you can efficiently manage compliance programs for multiple clients, tailoring policies to their specific needs, industry regulations, and risk profiles. The result? A win-win, with reduced risk for both your MSP and your clients.

Important Policy Management Tools in GRC Software for MSPs

Juggling the sheer volume and complexity of policies for multiple clients, each with their own unique needs and regulatory headaches, demands specialized tools. If you're serious about compliance readiness and streamlining your operations, here are some important policy management features to look for in any governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) software for MSPs.

Centralized Policy Library

Nothing leads to non-compliance faster than policies scattered across multiple folders and drives. A centralized policy library acts as your single source of truth, ensuring everyone is on the same page with the latest approved versions. No more version control headaches, no more outdated documents, just an organized policy paradise.

Version Control and Tracking

Speaking of versions, robust version control is a must. Imagine being able to track every change, see who made it, and rewind to previous versions if needed. This not only simplifies policy updates but also provides a clear audit trail.

Streamlined Workflows

You can do without endless email chains for policy reviews and approvals. Customizable workflows streamline the process, minimizing manual effort, speeding things up, and reducing the risk of errors or bottlenecks.

Access Control and Permissions

Access control is key, especially in regulated industries. Controlling who can access, edit, and approve policies protects sensitive information and ensures that changes are authorized by the right people. This feature also enables you to transfer policy ownership to your clients and avoid any sticky liability situations.

Communication and Distribution

Policies don't do any good if nobody knows about them. Tools for communicating updates and distributing policies ensure that everyone stays informed about the latest rules and clearly understands their responsibilities. Plus, consistent communication demonstrates that you’ve done your due diligence.

Training and Acknowledgement

You've got the policies, you've communicated them, but how do you prove it? Readership tracking tools and notifications for unacknowledged policies are another way to demonstrate due diligence and reduce the risks of human error.

Reporting and Analytics

Comprehensive reporting and analytics go beyond tracking policy usage. They help you identify areas of non-compliance, measure the effectiveness of your initiatives, and provide evidence to auditors. This data is also valuable for demonstrating the value of your services to your clients.

Integration Capabilities

Policies don't exist in a vacuum. They're connected to other systems and processes. Integration with other business applications ensures consistency and alignment between policies and actual practice. The more integrations your GRC software for MSPs offers, the more efficient your operations will be.

Master Policy Management with Compliance Scorecard

Compliance Scorecard manages the entire policy lifecycle, supporting your compliance program from creation to assessment. Here are just some of the features you’ll find in our GRC software for MSPs:

Policy Packs: Jumpstart your compliance program with pre-built Policy Packs containing policies and procedures tailored to specific industries and compliance frameworks.
Repeatable Process: Maximize your efficiency by creating a policy once and deploying it many times.
Authorization: Compliance Scorecard offers tracking, revision control, and e-signatures to ensure policies are authorized and owned by the end user.
Scorecards: Our scorecards measure policy alignment against industry or custom standards, enabling the assessment of their effectiveness and allowing for necessary adjustments to address vulnerabilities.
Ease of Use: Compliance Scorecard's client-facing, multi-tenant platform with centralized documentation, shared library, and easy-to-use assessment tools simplifies compliance conversations and employee adoption.
Reporting and Audit-Readiness: Compliance Scorecard's unified platform tracks and stores everything needed for compliance audits, and our reporting capabilities simplify the evidence-collection process.
Multiple Integrations: Compliance Scorecard integrates with commonly used MSP tools, eliminating the need to toggle between platforms and saving valuable time.
Scalability: As your client base grows, Compliance Scorecard’s scalable architecture grows with you.

Take Control of Compliance

Compliance and, by extension, CaaS, involves a lot of policies. But, like any other business objective, achieving compliance isn't just about having the right policies but also making sure those policies actually work. That means ensuring they’re communicated, understood and followed.

Compliance Scorecard provides complete policy lifecycle management, with features that take you from policy creation to assessment. Ready to ditch the policy headaches and elevate your compliance game? Contact us today or schedule a live demo to see first-hand how we can help you drive revenue with CaaS.