Isaca CGEIT Practice Test - Questions Answers, Page 52

A due diligence process is the best way to enable a clear understanding of the vendor's capabilities that will be critical to the enterprise's strategy. A due diligence process is a systematic and comprehensive investigation and evaluation of the vendor's background, reputation, performance, quality, reliability, security, compliance, and suitability for the enterprise's needs and expectations. A due diligence process can help the enterprise:

Verify the vendor's claims and credentials, and validate the vendor's references and testimonials

Assess the vendor's financial stability, legal status, and ethical standards

Identify the vendor's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats

Compare the vendor's offerings, capabilities, and prices with other vendors and market benchmarks

Determine the risks and benefits of engaging with the vendor, and the mitigation and contingency plans

Negotiate the terms and conditions of the contract, service level agreement (SLA), and key performance indicators (KPIs)

According to the CGEIT Review Manual 2022, 'Due diligence is a comprehensive appraisal of a business undertaken by a prospective buyer or partner to establish its assets and liabilities and evaluate its commercial potential.'1

According to the ISACA article on Third-Party Vendor Selection: If Done Right, It's a Win-Win2, ''Once you have identified which processes can be outsourced as well as their inherent risks, you can begin performing due diligence on potential vendors. The level of due diligence should be tailored to the significance of the relationship as well as the potential risks it poses.''

According to the Gartner article on How to Evaluate Technology Vendors in 4 Rigorous Steps1, ''Evaluating vendors requires detailed objectives, criteria, prioritization and monitoring. Here's help. When it comes to choosing a vendor, enterprise tech buyer teams can easily become bogged down in the details and documentation provided by sales teams.''

Engaging stakeholders to identify and validate business requirements is the best way to improve the success rate of future IT initiatives. Stakeholders are the individuals or groups who have an interest or influence in the IT initiatives, such as business users, customers, managers, sponsors, etc. Engaging stakeholders can help:

Understand the needs, expectations, and priorities of the stakeholders, and ensure that they are aligned with the business objectives and strategy

Define and document the business requirements that specify what the IT initiatives should deliver in terms of functionality, quality, performance, and value

Validate and verify that the business requirements are clear, complete, consistent, feasible, and testable

Communicate and manage any changes or issues that may affect the business requirements or the IT initiatives

Engaging stakeholders to identify and validate business requirements can help avoid missing key functionality in the corporate applications, and ensure that they meet the stakeholder's needs and expectations. This can also reduce the reliance on spreadsheets and databases as alternative software solutions, and increase the user satisfaction and adoption of the enterprise applications.

The other options are not the best way to improve the success rate of future IT initiatives. Engaging the business user community in acceptance testing of acquired applications is a good practice, but it is not sufficient to ensure that the applications have the key functionality that meets the business requirements. Acceptance testing is done at the end of the IT initiative lifecycle, after the applications have been developed or acquired. If the business requirements were not properly identified and validated at the beginning of the IT initiative lifecycle, acceptance testing may reveal significant gaps or defects that may be costly or difficult to fix. Establishing a process for risk and value management is a useful technique, but it does not directly address the issue of missing key functionality in the corporate applications. Risk and value management involves identifying, assessing, prioritizing, and treating the risks and benefits associated with IT initiatives. However, without clear and valid business requirements, risk and value management may not be effective or accurate. Prohibiting the use of non-approved alternate software solutions is a restrictive measure, but it does not solve the problem of missing key functionality in the corporate applications. Prohibiting the use of spreadsheets and databases may force the users to use the enterprise applications, but it may also create dissatisfaction, frustration, or resistance among them. Moreover, it may prevent them from performing their tasks efficiently or effectively if the enterprise applications do not meet their needs.

For more information on engaging stakeholders to identify and validate business requirements, you can refer to these web sources:

Stakeholder Engagement - ISACA

Business Requirements - ISACA

Requirements Validation - ISACA

Effective risk management in IT governance requires that risk evaluation is embedded in the management processes of the organization. This means that risk evaluation is not a separate or isolated activity, but rather an integral part of the planning, execution, monitoring, and reporting of IT activities and initiatives. Embedding risk evaluation in the management processes can help:

Identify and assess the potential threats and opportunities that may affect the achievement of IT and business objectives

Align the IT risk appetite and tolerance with the enterprise risk appetite and tolerance

Prioritize and allocate the resources and actions to address the risks based on their impact and likelihood

Monitor and report the risk performance and outcomes in relation to the IT value drivers and benefits

Embed the risk culture and awareness across the organization

According to the CGEIT Review Manual 2022, 'Risk evaluation should be embedded in management processes.Risk evaluation should be performed as part of planning, executing, monitoring and reporting activities.'1

According to the ISACA article on Risk Management: A Driver for Value Creation2, ''Risk management should be embedded into all business processes. It should be part of strategic planning, project management, change management, performance management, etc.''

According to the NIST article on Staging Cybersecurity Risks for Enterprise Risk Management and Governance3, ''Embedding cybersecurity risk management into enterprise risk management (ERM) processes can help organizations better understand their cybersecurity risks, prioritize them based on their potential impact on business objectives, and allocate resources accordingly.''

Standardization is the process of establishing and applying common rules, formats, definitions, and methods for data collection, storage, processing, and exchange. Standardization is critical for enabling data interoperability, which is the ability of data to be shared and used across different systems, platforms, applications, and organizations. Standardization can help improve data interoperability by:

Enhancing the quality, consistency, and accuracy of data

Reducing the complexity and ambiguity of data

Increasing the compatibility and comparability of data

Facilitating the integration and analysis of data

Promoting the reuse and sharing of data

According to the CGEIT Review Manual 2022, 'Standardization is the process of developing and implementing technical standards.The goals of standardization can be to help with independence of single suppliers (commoditization), compatibility, interoperability, safety, repeatability or quality.'1

According to the UN Statistics Wiki on Data Interoperability Guide2, ''Standardization is a key enabler for interoperability. It allows for a common understanding of data elements across different systems and domains.''

According to the ISO/IEC 38500:2015 standard on Information technology --- Governance of IT for the organization3, ''Standardization can improve interoperability between systems within an organization or between organizations.''

Effective culture change is the process of transforming the values, beliefs, behaviors, and norms of the organization and its stakeholders to support the strategic alignment of business and IT goals. Effective culture change can enable the implementation of IT governance by:

Creating a shared vision and understanding of the purpose, benefits, and expectations of IT governance

Engaging and empowering the stakeholders to participate and collaborate in IT governance activities and decisions

Fostering a culture of trust, transparency, accountability, and responsibility for IT governance outcomes

Encouraging a culture of innovation, learning, and improvement for IT governance processes and practices

Aligning the incentives and rewards with the IT governance objectives and performance

According to the CGEIT Review Manual 2022, 'Culture is a key enabler for effective IT governance. Culture influences how people behave, communicate, collaborate, and make decisions. Culture also affects how people perceive, value, and use IT.Therefore, culture change is often necessary to implement IT governance successfully.'1

According to the ISACA article on Culture Change: A Critical Success Factor for Effective IT Governance2, ''Culture change is not an easy task; it requires strong leadership, clear communication, stakeholder involvement, and continuous monitoring and feedback. However, culture change can also bring significant benefits for IT governance, such as improved alignment, engagement, performance, and value creation.''

According to the CIO article on How to create a culture of innovation in IT3, ''Creating a culture of innovation in IT requires more than hiring talented people and acquiring the latest technologies. It also requires a shift in mindset, behavior, and structure that fosters creativity, collaboration, experimentation, and learning.''

The first thing that should be done to reduce the complexity of the IT landscape is to conduct strategic planning with business units. Strategic planning is the process of defining the vision, mission, goals, and objectives of the enterprise and how they will be achieved. It also involves aligning the IT strategy with the business strategy and ensuring that they support each other. By conducting strategic planning with business units, the enterprise can identify and prioritize the IT needs and expectations of each business unit, as well as the commonalities and synergies among them. This can help to reduce the complexity of the IT landscape by eliminating duplicate technologies, resolving conflicting priorities, and creating a coherent and consistent IT architecture that meets the business requirements and delivers value. The other options are not as effective as conducting strategic planning with business units for reducing the complexity of the IT landscape. Promoting automation tools used by the business units may improve efficiency and productivity, but it does not address the underlying issues of duplication and conflict. Migrating all in-house systems to an external cloud environment may reduce costs and increase scalability, but it does not ensure alignment and integration of IT systems across business units. Standardizing technology architecture on common products may simplify IT operations and maintenance, but it does not consider the specific needs and preferences of each business unit.

The chief information officer (CIO) is the senior executive who is responsible for the achievement of IT strategic objectives. The IT strategic objectives are the high-level goals and priorities that guide the IT vision, mission, and value creation for the organization. The CIO is responsible for:

Developing and communicating the IT strategy and aligning it with the business strategy and objectives

Managing and delivering the IT solutions, services, and projects that support and enable the business needs, requirements, and value drivers

Leading and overseeing the IT functions, resources, and capabilities, and ensuring their quality, efficiency, and effectiveness

Monitoring and reporting the IT performance and outcomes, and ensuring their alignment with the IT strategic objectives and value drivers

Implementing and maintaining the IT governance framework, policies, standards, and practices

The other options are not correct. The IT steering committee is a group of senior executives and stakeholders who provide guidance, direction, and oversight for the IT strategy and initiatives, but not responsible for their achievement. The business process owners are the individuals or groups who have an interest or influence in the business processes that are supported or enabled by IT, but not responsible for the achievement of IT strategic objectives. The board of directors is the highest governing body of the organization that sets the vision, mission, strategy, and objectives of the organization, as well as oversees its performance and value creation, but not responsible for the achievement of IT strategic objectives.

According to the CGEIT Review Manual 20221, ''The CIO is responsible for ensuring that IT strategic objectives are achieved. The CIO should develop an IT strategy that is aligned with enterprise strategy; manage IT resources to deliver value; monitor IT performance; implement IT governance; etc.''

According to the CIO article on What is a CIO?Everything you need to know about the Chief Information Officer role2, ''The chief information officer (CIO) oversees an organization's technology strategy, as well as the hardware, software and data that helps other departments do their jobs.''

According to the ISACA article on The Role of CIO in Enterprise Governance of Information Technology3, ''The CIO plays a key role in EGIT by translating business strategy into IT strategy; managing IT resources; delivering IT solutions; measuring IT performance; ensuring compliance; etc.''

A periodic service provider audit is a process of conducting an independent and objective assessment of the service provider's performance, quality, compliance, and security in relation to the agreed service level agreement (SLA) and the enterprise's expectations and requirements. A periodic service provider audit can help provide quality of service oversight by:

Verifying and validating the service provider's claims and credentials, and ensuring that they meet the contractual obligations and standards

Identifying and evaluating the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of the service provider's services, processes, and controls

Detecting and reporting any issues, gaps, or risks that may affect the quality of service delivery or the enterprise's objectives and value

Recommending and implementing corrective and preventive actions to address and resolve the issues, gaps, or risks

Monitoring and measuring the outcomes and effectiveness of the corrective and preventive actions, and ensuring their alignment with the SLA

According to the CGEIT Review Manual 20221, ''Service provider audits are a key mechanism for ensuring that service providers are meeting their contractual obligations and delivering value to the enterprise. Service provider audits should be conducted periodically or as needed to assess the performance, quality, compliance, and security of the service provider's services, processes, and controls.''

According to the ISACA article on IT Outsourcing: Audit Considerations2, ''IT outsourcing audit is a process of examining and evaluating the IT outsourcing arrangements between an enterprise and its service providers. IT outsourcing audit aims to provide assurance that the IT outsourcing arrangements are aligned with the enterprise's strategy, objectives, and risk appetite; that the service providers are delivering the expected services in accordance with the SLAs; that the service providers are complying with the applicable laws, regulations, and standards; and that the service providers are managing and mitigating the IT outsourcing risks effectively.''

According to the PwC article on Service Provider Audits3, ''Service provider audits are an essential tool for organizations to gain insight into their service providers' operations, controls, risks, and compliance status. Service provider audits can help organizations ensure that their service providers are meeting their expectations and obligations; identify any areas of improvement or concern; enhance their relationship and communication with their service providers; and optimize their IT outsourcing strategy.''

The best approach to ensure global regulatory compliance when implementing a new business process is to ensure the appropriate involvement of the legal department. The legal department is the function that provides legal advice and guidance to the organization on various matters, such as contracts, transactions, disputes, regulations, and compliance. By involving the legal department in the implementation of a new business process, the organization can ensure that the business process complies with the relevant laws, policies, and standards that apply in different countries and jurisdictions. The legal department can also help to identify and mitigate any legal risks or issues that may arise from the new business process, such as liability, litigation, or sanctions.

The other options are not as effective as ensuring the appropriate involvement of the legal department for ensuring global regulatory compliance when implementing a new business process. Using a balanced scorecard to track the business process is a good practice for measuring and evaluating the performance and value of the business process, but it does not guarantee compliance with global regulations. Reviewing and revising the business architecture is a necessary step for designing and aligning the business process with the business strategy and objectives, but it does not address the legal aspects of the business process. Seeking approval from the change management board is a relevant procedure for implementing a new business process, but it does not ensure that the change management board has the expertise or authority to assess and approve the global regulatory compliance of the business process.