Solution Perspective by Michael Rasmussen of GRC 20/20
Reviewed by GRC 20/20: Symbiant Delivering Agility to Risk, Compliance & Assurance Processes
Reviewed by Michael Rasmussen of GRC 20/20, Symbiant is a robust, low-cost GRC platform built for agility, automation, and real-world performance.
Content on this page reflects the independent analysis conducted by GRC 20/20 Research in their Solution Perspective on Symbiant.
GRC 20/20
Symbiant Delivers a GRC Single Source of Truth
“The Symbiant solution provides an integrated information and application architecture that facilitates risk management and, in that context, compliance, internal control, and assurance across the organization. It does this by providing an engaging, visual, and intuitive interface […] with a single source of GRC truth […]. This includes enterprise/operational risk management, finance and accounting, ESG, corporate compliance, IT security, and business operations. Symbiant effectively and efficiently enables an organization’s end-to-end GRC management strategy […] to manage the risk lifecycle across the organization. […] Specific differentiators that enable Symbiant are:”
Ease of use
Symbiant customers find the solution intuitive, engaging, and
easy to use. This enables the back-office functions of risk management, such as
the 2nd and 3rd lines, but also enables and engages the front-office functions
(the 1st line) that are making risk and compliance decisions that impact the
organization every day.
Cost of ownership
Symbiant delivers one of the lowest software licensing costs
in the GRC market with a robust and agile solution that is highly configurable
without coding and customization. This ensures that the configuration is fully
preserved and functioning with updates and new releases. Many Symbiant
customers report that their cost of implementation and ongoing ownership is
significantly less than the legacy competitors in the space that they have used in
the past. They offer a flexible, no commitment, pay-as-you-go, monthly contract.
Unified architecture
Symbiant has a single integrated application and
information architecture. Unlike some solutions, where there are different code
bases and applications that are haphazardly put together and marketed as
a platform, the Symbiant solution was designed from the ground up to be a
consistent and unified architecture that delivers the greatest insight and analytics
within the organization and across organizations/entities.
What Symbiant Does
Where Symbiant has excelled
Organizations state that Symbiant has improved the quality of their GRC- related management, monitoring, and reporting processes across their organization. This improves the organization’s overall visibility into GRC with greater accountability and ownership to manage risks through a single source of truth for all risk, compliance, control, and assurance activities. All of this while eliminating the overhead of managing manual assessment processes encumbered by hundreds to thousands of spreadsheets, documents, and emails. Clients find that the solution is flexible to adapt to their requirements, has the capabilities needed, allows them to grow and mature their program over time, and is simple and easy to use. Overall, users find the solution was particularly easy to implement and roll out in their organization and across organizations. One client stated,
“The customization options are limitless, so we have been able to chop and change our solution as our frameworks have evolved, with very little additional cost compared to other similar vendors. Their support is also second to none – I have direct access to their support team, who always respond extremely quickly.”
Foundational Capabilities in Symbiant
The Symbiant solution can be implemented to address the complex requirements of a fully functional and broad GRC/enterprise risk management program, or it can be implemented to address very specific risk and compliance needs. Some organizations find that they often start with addressing a specific, narrow risk and compliance need, such as IT security, and find that they expand the Symbiant implementation over time to address a wide range of risk and compliance needs.
Specific capabilities Symbiant delivers that enable organizations in managing risk and
compliance, no matter the scope, are:
- Risk management. Symbiant provides an integrated capability in a unified architecture to manage the array of risks in the context of the objectives of the organization. Their core risk management function delivers risk registers, assessments, workshops, controls, policies, incidents/events, along with key risk indicators managed through active dashboards and reports.
- Internal control management. Symbiant enables the management and assessment of controls throughout the organization. The control module in
Symbiant enables the definition, assessment, and monitoring of management, process, IT, and other internal controls. - Compliance management. Symbiant delivers a compliance management platform to enable the organization to assess and monitor obligations and requirements across the organization’s processes and functions. Their open architecture allows them to be standard and framework agnostic, allowing the organization to use and adapt what best fits their needs. This allows for different compliance regulations to be tracked, reviewed, and actioned.
- Audit & assurance management. With Symbiant, clients enable assurance activities with audit management, action tracking, workpaper management, and assessments. This ties into the risk management module to deliver a risk-based approach to audit planning and execution.
Benefits Organizations Can Expect with Symbiant
Organizations are most likely to move to the Symbiant platform because they found that their manual, document-centric approaches took too many resources to administer, only addressed specific areas of risk, and found things slipping through the cracks because of the continuous barrage of risk and change. Some organizations may choose Symbiant because their existing GRC management platforms were too complex or were too costly in the licensing and administration of the system or did not perform as well as they were on legacy architectures.
Specific benefits organizations can expect from implementing the Symbiant solution are:
- Significant efficiencies in time through automation of workflow and tasks, as well as reporting. Specifically, the time it takes to build reports from documents and spreadsheets now is just a matter of seconds.
- Reduction in errors by automating the validation of risk, compliance, and controls by removing errors from manual processes and reconciliation that was incomplete or incorrectly entered.
- Data integrity with Symbiant being a single source of truth and the system of record for all risk and compliance management information.
- Collaboration and synergies by providing a single platform with a consistent interface to manage risk and interactions – instead of different departments doing similar things in different formats and processes.
- Consistency and accuracy of GRC information, as all functions must conform to consistent processes and information collection. A single solution with a uniform and integrated assessment process and information architecture.
- Accountability with full audit trails of who did what and when; this delivers value in fewer things slipping through the cracks — particularly business managers who have become more accountable for risk in their functions.
- Increased maturity where the risk accountability, appetite, and tolerance are clearly defined, and risk owners are engaged.
- Agility to keep up with the business where the solution is highly agile and adaptable to deal with business and risk change.
- Accessibility and engagement as Symbiant is a centralized platform which means all users have access.
About GRC 20/20 Research, LLC
GRC 20/20 Research, LLC (GRC 20/20) provides clarity of insight into governance, risk management, and
compliance (GRC) solutions and strategies through objective market research, benchmarking, training, and
analysis. We provide objective insight into GRC market dynamics; technology trends; competitive landscape;
market sizing; expenditure priorities; and mergers and acquisitions. GRC 20/20 advises the entire ecosystem
of GRC solution buyers, professional service firms, and solution providers. Our research clarity is delivered
through analysts with real-world expertise, independence, creativity, and objectivity that understand GRC
challenges and how to solve them practically and not just theoretically. Our clients include Fortune 1000
companies, major professional service firms, and the breadth of GRC solution providers.
Research Methodology
GRC 20/20 research reports are written by experienced analysts with experience selecting and implementing
GRC solutions. GRC 20/20 evaluates all GRC solution providers using consistent and objective criteria,
regardless of whether or not they are a GRC 20/20 client. The findings and analysis in GRC 20/20 research
reports reflect analyst experience, opinions, research into market trends, participants, expenditure patterns, and
best practices. Research facts and representations are verified with client references to validate accuracy. GRC
solution providers are given the opportunity to correct factual errors, but cannot influence GRC 20/20 opinion
Hover to Explore our Solutions.
Symbiant
All-in-One GRC & Audit
Management Powerhouse
Symbiant’s flexible, modular platform streamlines governance, risk, compliance, and audit—so you can reduce complexity, adapt fast, and stay focused on achieving your objectives.
Our Solution at a Glance:
Risk Management Software
The Symbiant Risk Management Software module enables organisations to identify, understand, and manage risks with ease and efficiency. It provides a streamlined approach to monitoring, assessing, and mitigating risks, ensuring informed decisions and compliance.
AI-Powered Assistant
Symbiant AI connects data across your organisation, delivering actionable insights and seamless workflows. From logical, data-driven risk scoring to uncovering root causes and predicting the domino effect of control failures, Symbiant AI empowers smarter, faster decisions. Eliminate duplicate risks in seconds, refine controls, identify emerging risks, and so much more—all tailored to your business.
Audit Management Software
The Symbiant Audit Management Software module streamlines audit planning, action tracking, and time management. It automatically pulls relevant data, allows easy report customisation, and generates professional audit reports.
Risk Management Software
The Symbiant Risk Management Software module enables organisations to identify, understand, and manage risks with ease and efficiency. It provides a streamlined approach to monitoring, assessing, and mitigating risks, ensuring informed decisions and compliance.
AI-Powered Assistant
Symbiant AI connects data across your organisation, delivering actionable insights and seamless workflows. From logical, data-driven risk scoring to uncovering root causes and predicting the domino effect of control failures, Symbiant AI empowers smarter, faster decisions. Eliminate duplicate risks in seconds, refine controls, identify emerging risks, and so much more—all tailored to your business.
Audit Management Software
The Symbiant Audit Management Software module streamlines audit planning, action tracking, and time management. It automatically pulls relevant data, allows easy report customisation, and generates professional audit reports.
