Our Process

All companies have a process. Here is why ours is unique.

Our Process

Risk assessment without judgement

We know what works and what doesn’t because we have been on the ‘doesn’t side of this fence. There are dozens of IT consulting, value added resellers, and managed service providers that have a presence in central Iowa. With over 5 years of experience working in that industry, we know some of the tricks of the trade and have built our process to take advantage of the best parts, avoid the weaknesses, and add significant value for credit unions.

We start with an assessment. Same as everyone else, right? Wrong. Their process is generally automated, impersonal, and designed to take as little time as possible. A generic report is created with an overwhelming, unsorted list of problems on your network. Quotes to remediate these issues are provided with the report, hoping to capitalize on your fear.

Our assessment is an interview. Technical questions and controls are included, like supported operating systems and hardware. We also ask questions that we know are important because we go through the same exams you do: policies, procedures, disaster recovery (backups are great but don’t mean much if you can’t restore that data), and risk management are just a few of the high level categories we dive into.

Instead of just listing off everything you have to work on, we assign 3 values to each item:

  • Likelihood: When would this item cause a risk to your organization?
  • Impact: If this event occurred, how much risk would it cause to your organization and members?
  • Time: How long will it take to reduce the risk level of this item?

We create a written report that focuses on the critical and high risks and review with you. Once we have agreed on the final results, we create a strategic plan that focuses on the most critical risks to your credit union that also includes business objectives.

Once our plan is created, we can start working together to improve your credit union and make IT, compliance, and risk management competitive advantages that provide peace of mind to you, the employees, and most importantly, the members.