Eight Takeaways: “Meeting Today’s Evolving Compliance Regulations”

Compliance is a top priority for many industries, maybe yours. Insurers, financial services, pharmaceutical companies, manufacturers, and so many others must comply with a host of regulations governing how they use and protect data. In particular, keeping personally identifiable information (PII) private and safe comes under constant scrutiny, but maintaining compliance isn’t easy, and the landscape constantly evolves.

Good compliance and information governance (IG) practices contribute to information security and help organizations avoid liability and fines. Customers also want to know that the companies they deal with takes the utmost care with their personal information.

Compliance and information governance aren’t one-and-done initiatives. They require constant attention, and that’s a challenge. Andy Jones, Xerox vice president of workflow automation for large enterprise operations, covered the compliance issue recently with an article in Document Solutions magazine. Here are some takeaways from that piece, “Meeting Today’s Evolving Compliance Regulations.”

1. According to a 2015 AIIM report on IG, 45% of respondents said lack of IG leaves their organization open to litigation and data protection risks.
2. Regulations concerning keeping and protecting documents and records continue to evolve and change, sometimes reversing or contradicting previous regulations.
3. As more data enters organizations through more sources, companies must look at all angles to make sure they are protected and compliant.
4. Technology investments can be essential to meeting constantly evolving compliance guidelines.
5. Learn the must-have Enterprise Content Management (ECM) features cited in the article that help you meet compliance protocols.
6. Create a diverse compliance committee representing multiple business units, since every department has different regulations and processes.
7. The day-to-day steps taken by employees form the basis of IG policy adherence.
8. The best line of defense is ongoing auditing of employee workflows to ensure compliance with procedures.

The article notes that while compliance policies and regulations may be daunting, they don’t have to be. “By auditing and tracking how information enters the organization and investing in tools to help automate and manage business-critical data, compliance practices in any organization can be a lot easier.”

Read the full article here at Document Solutions magazine. Use the ideas he shares to take the pulse of your compliance practices.