SOC 2 compliance is essential for maintaining your cybersecurity and building customer trust, but it often feels like a roadblock to fast-paced development. Many engineering teams resist compliance efforts due to added workload and perceived inefficiencies, but some care and the right assets can boost your compliance without lengthening your SDLC.
In this article on SOC 2 compliance for startups, we’ll show you how you can achieve SOC 2 certification without disrupting your engineering workflows, including practical steps you can take to streamline your compliance efforts while maintaining efficiency.
Why Engineering Teams Resist SOC 2 Compliance
Whether it’s inertia, red tape, or confusion, teams can resist compliance initiatives for all sorts of reasons. Understanding them can help you clear your compliance hurdles, so taking an inventory of your current SOC 2 posture is the first step in improving your compliance. Some factors that often hold up SOC 2 compliance for startups are:
- Bureaucracy. Some teams find compliance tasks bureaucratic. If compliance slows down product development or security and documentation requirements seem excessive, teams will be less likely to follow through.
- Confusion. Lack of clear ownership often results in last-minute compliance scrambles. Without clear leadership, roles, and direction, compliance tasks often slip through the cracks.
- Preference. Engineers prefer focusing on building features, not security checklists. The extra compliance focus turns development teams away from building a better product, unless you have a clear compliance framework in place.
When your team sees SOC 2 compliance as a hindrance to product development, they won’t make compliance a priority. Communication breakdowns also hinder collaboration between departments, causing important compliance information to go overlooked. But with clear leadership and the right SOC 2 tools in place, you can eliminate the oversights that occur due to siloed workflows and streamline your compliance processes — without sacrificing productivity.
How To Streamline Compliance Without Disrupting Workflows
Whichever factor is slowing down your compliance efforts, the key to overcoming it is to implement the leading best practices that help you strike the right compliance and development balance. These SOC 2 security best practices for developers can help you get started.
1. Assign Compliance Ownership Outside Engineering
The first step toward elevating SOC 2 compliance for startups is to appoint a leader to handle the job — and they shouldn’t just come from engineering.
Compliance is a team effort, requiring collaboration from multiple departments. Having all hands on deck can bring greater clarity to any compliance issues that may be overlooked. To streamline your compliance workflows, start by designating a compliance manager or security team to handle documentation and audits. Then, foster a cross-functional environment by involving legal, IT, and DevOps teams to distribute all the responsibilities. Also, clearly define all compliance roles so that your engineers won’t be burdened with administrative duties.
2. Schedule Compliance Work in Low-Impact Phases
Your team is bound to let compliance fall by the wayside if it takes up too much of your product development, so it’s better to integrate it into your sprints. Start by aligning your security and compliance efforts with product roadmaps, ensuring that development stays on schedule. Then, perform security reviews and policy updates during lower-priority sprints, where more time is available for compliance. Also, batch your compliance-related tasks together to minimize interruptions so that your team will face fewer delays.
3. Use Tools and Services That Make SOC 2 Easier
Once you have a framework in place that simplifies SOC 2 for engineering teams, the next step is to give them tools that streamline their compliance tasks. SOC 2 automation platforms can offload the burden of tedious compliance workflows from your team and ensure that no task is overlooked. A few leading compliance automation platforms are:
- Secureframe, for monitoring security, automating risk mitigation, and achieving industry-leading security standards (SOC 2, HIPAA, GDPR, CCPA, ISO 27001, PCI DSS)
- Drata, for evidence collection and risk management automation
By using SOC 2 tools that can simplify burdensome compliance duties, your team will not only be better equipped to maintain their compliance, but they’ll also be able to do it without compromising efficiency.
4. Work With a Trusted Partner
The right tools are essential, but the best tool is often an experienced partner that can help you along your compliance journey. If you find yourself especially burdened by or unsure of your compliance requirements, consider leveraging the expertise of seasoned external SOC 2 consultants to guide you through the process.
A few services that a consultant could offer your DevOps and SOC 2 compliance teams are:
- Virtual CISOs (vCISOs) that provide expert leadership and risk management without the cost of a full-time executive
- Compliance as a Service (CaaS), which gives you access to experts who can help your business achieve complete compliance, from planning to design to management
- Cybersecurity risk assessments, which elevate cybersecurity throughout your organization with customized insights and actionable intelligence
- Penetration testing, which uncovers vulnerabilities before hackers can, bolstering your cybersecurity and compliance
- Internal audits, including a comprehensive audit of your company’s controls
Some companies may be concerned that working with a consultant is too cost-prohibitive for their operations, especially if they’re SMBs. But the gains provided by the added efficiency and improved compliance more than offset the investment — and the cost is often less than a fine. Check out our webinar on finding the right cybersecurity partner for more info.
Balance Security and Innovation With Trava
Some companies compromise on compliance because they find it a hindrance to their development efforts, but it doesn’t have to be. Approach it strategically, and your SOC 2 compliance can strengthen your cybersecurity posture and your broader business growth as a whole. Automation, clear ownership, and smart scheduling can help reduce friction, and working with an experienced compliance partner can help you navigate uncharted waters.
Trava Security is an industry leader in compliance and cybersecurity advisory services. Our team of cybersecurity and compliance experts has a 100% success rate in helping our clients meet or exceed their certifications and industry standards, so when clients work with us, they know they’re in capable hands. We recognize the complexities of SOC 2 compliance for startups, and we work alongside clients of all sizes to give them the guidance and tools they need.
Do you need a trusted partner to help you navigate your regulatory requirements? Talk to Trava today.