A Look Back at LogicGate’s 2024 Annual Agility User Conference

In March we hosted our annual Agility User Conference in Chicago gathering hundreds of Compliance, Cybersecurity and Risk professionals together to learn from educational sessions, exchange industry expertise and best practices, and broaden their professional networks including valuable insights from longtime customers.  This year we rolled up our sleeves to dig into critical industry topics that our attendees consistently contend with, such as mitigating and managing risk to enhance operational resiliency, effectively embracing the power of automation and how to strategically build a culture of risk, and successfully communicate security and compliance impact against business outcomes.  Many attendees also took advantage of the hands-on workshops to refine their Risk Cloud skills and expand their imagination.

7,500 Foot View of Risk

Seven-time US National Champion in sport lead climbing, Emily Harrington, gave an inspiring keynote demonstrating that effective risk management has a place in the boardroom and on the boulder.  Sharing her emotional journey of climbing El Capitan, one of the toughest vertical rock formations, her analysis of real-life threats - including concussions, broken bones and exhaustion - helped attendees have a new outlook on managing risk strategies.

Experiential Learning 

By popular demand, we brought back the hackathon-style Build Bash event where participants teamed up and put their creativity and Risk Cloud platform skills to the test to solve a fictitious - and fun - use case. This year’s theme was space exploration, requiring teams to use Risk Cloud solutions to navigate a spaceship through the uncharted galaxy with the goal of landing on Planet Agility. The imaginary concept helped teams explore and better understand Risk Cloud’s flexible and customizable capabilities for future, more pragmatic use.

Industry analyst and GRC pundit, Michael Rasmussen, led the Third Party Risk Management interactive workshop exploring new TPRM strategies and methods to boost business resiliency.  Ticket holders received hands-on experience developing a structured third-party information architecture that aligns with business operations, enhancing efficiency.  Participants gained the knowledge to manage due diligence and third-party risk effectively, understanding the challenges and learning to capitalize on these relationships while ensuring compliance.  Rasmussen also led a keynote mirroring the critical challenges today’s GRC professionals face against real-life events to show how connected the world of risk is. He emphasized the importance of accurate data reporting, control of customization, effective governance and holistic operations to inspire successful and secure GRC programming versus allowing vulnerabilities that turn into breaking news stories.

Educational Sessions

We curated Agility sessions for presenters to share learnings and best practices around three critical topics: Risk, Automation and Strategy.  While each presentation provided unique views and perspectives from their specific different industries, regulatory environments and ethical guidelines, consistent elements threaded throughout the sessions are featured below.  We also strongly encourage you to check out the Dynamic GRC, Agile Risk Management session from our CISO, Nick Kathmann. 

Embrace AI, but don’t abandon human intelligence

AI will make your organization more effective, efficient and powerful.  If adopted without the right GRC policies, guardrails and human oversight, AI can also take advantage of and expose your vulnerabilities. AI governance isn’t an option - it’s a must - which means enterprises need to strike the right balance between AI implementation and trust in human intelligence.  By leveraging Risk Cloud’s AI features, risk and compliance leaders are bolstering output activity, accelerating cybersecurity measures, quickly solving complex problems and safeguarding sensitive information.

Collaboration is key, but unlocking resistance is easier said than done

Having a holistic approach to risk management requires interdepartmental participation and buy-in.  Several business functions have elevated risk exposure which makes it difficult - but not impossible - to consolidate disparate functions and bring alignment for centralized visibility.  External regulations, department-specific goals, application favorability, egos and other elements are challenges risk leaders must overcome to create risk allies and build company culture that embraces - and respects - security protocols.  Overnight success doesn’t exist, but implementing a holistic risk management strategy with timelines, teams and the use of one centralized solution will help secure participation across the enterprise. 

Connecting impact to business outcomes and board member buy-in 

Know your audience. While risk and compliance have a direct impact on business direction and financial outcomes, communicating those impacts through a GRC lens - risk posture, SOC, NIST, Advanced Persistent Threat and so on - needs to be translated into business speak.  With Risk Cloud, you can leverage data-driven decision making, easily understandable dashboards and flexible solutions that can serve different department needs while implementing shared access and standardization for cohesive reporting.  Strategize how enterprise risk management can articulate the financial, reputational and security impact so board members have a holistic view to make the best decisions for the business. 

Yes, but…

When acquiring a new company, expanding product pipeline, entering a new market or deciding to move forward with another business growth lane, the inevitable “go or no go” decision is not the responsibility of security, risk and compliance leaders.  Most of the time our seat at the table presents the opportunity to say “yes, but here are the risks and the implications associated with X decision and the associated costs."  In the instance of M&A, Risk Cloud saves teams time and money with standardized and automated features for pre-and-post evaluations of subsidiaries, so leaders can reinvest their time in analyzing the acquisition from the business lens and offer solutions for high-risk purchases versus only presenting potential risks. 

Thank you to our attendees, sponsors and the incredible LogicGate team for coordinating another successful Agility conference.  We look forward to an even bigger and better event in 2025, expanding sessions and experiential learning opportunities, and reconnecting with familiar faces as well as welcoming new customers.

Check out some commentary from attendees: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2HyTdTfhPKs