Introduction
Data security is a crucial part of any successful business. However, it is often seen as just an IT issue that does not necessarily align with broader business goals and initiatives. This can lead to conflicts and poor security outcomes. By taking a more strategic approach, businesses can align data security tightly with key business objectives, leading to better security and enabling data to safely power business growth.
Understand Your Business Goals and Security Requirements
The first step is gaining a clear understanding of your key business goals and how data security fits in. Some examples of common business goals that rely heavily on data security:
Grow Revenue
- Using data analytics and AI to gain customer insights and target new products and services. This requires robust data security to maintain trust and compliance.
Reduce Costs and Risks
- Consolidating data centers and moving applications to the cloud to cut costs. This requires data to be properly secured and controlled across cloud environments.
Launch New Services
- Leveraging data from partners and third-parties to quickly roll out innovative offerings. Tight security controls on data sharing and access are crucial.
Expand to New Markets
- Processing more customer data subject to regulations like GDPR. Strong data governance and security helps enable global growth.
For each key goal, identify the security requirements to safely achieve it. This helps demonstrate the business value of security.
Align Security Strategies to Business Priorities
With goals and needs established, next focus on structuring your security program to tightly align with and enable these. Some examples:
Cloud Transformation
- Adopt a cloud-first security architecture emphasizing data protection, cloud security tools, and central visibility across cloud environments.
New Product Launch
- Implement data security controls and governance specific to new data types, users, and applications. Accelerate security reviews to meet launch deadlines.
Global Growth
- Invest in scalable data security and compliance tools usable across all locations. Provide localized training on regulations like GDPR.
Cost Optimization
- Automate security processes using technologies like AI to reduce manual work and overhead costs. Move lower risk applications to more cost-efficient cloud services.
The keys are understanding business context and priorities, then structuring security to purposefully support these. This drives better investment decisions.
Develop Metrics Showing Business Impact
To further align security with the business, develop and report on security metrics focused on specific business goals like:
- % uptime of applications essential for sales
- Data breach costs avoided due to security
- Revenue enabled by security investments
- Security program costs relative to company revenue
This reporting shows the concrete value security brings, getting buy-in across the organization.
Foster Partnership Between Security and Business Leaders
Ultimately, alignment requires partnership and collaboration between security and business leaders. Some tips:
- Include security leaders in business goal planning discussions
- Train security staff on business priorities and planning cycles
- Have business leaders own security policies impacting their units
- Create security/business joint committees to guide strategy
Proactive partnership enables security programs optimized for business needs.
Conclusion
Strategically aligning security with business objectives requires understanding the business context, structuring security to support key goals, showing business impact through metrics, and fostering true partnership between security and business leaders. Companies who align security in this manner gain a distinct competitive advantage and safely unlock the power of data for business growth.
