All organisations are governed by policies and procedures which set out how they conduct specific actions. This may include both internal requirements and oversight by government and legislative bodies. These policies and procedures are in place to protect organisations and their customers.

Policies and procedures are most often talked about in the financial, healthcare and IT sectors. This is due to the large volume of data processed by these industries and the need to protect such data. Most often through data protection policies and procedures.

To ensure that your organisation is protected regarding its policies and procedures, it’s important to conduct regular reviews of these processes.

This involves top-down reviews of your organisation policies and procedures. Such reviews can be conducted in-house or by a third party. Third parties such as Platinum Brand Communications provide additional impartiality and an outside perspective of your policies and procedures.

The importance of policies and procedures:

Policies and procedures provide a framework for your organisation to conduct operations.

• They help to prevent unwanted issues such as data breaches and provide a roadmap for employees to follow.
• Having a uniform way to conduct actions across all departments ensure better collaboration and productivity.  Most importantly they provide safety, both for your organisation and your customers.
• Having policies and procedures in place also allows you to follow a pathway to any issues that may arise.
• From bad hiring practices to data breaches, if you have a framework in place, it is much easier to follow a path to their area of origin. If policies do fail, then you know where and why.

But the most strategic way to conduct business is to ensure that your policies and procedures are up to date.

Why policy procedures and reviews are necessary for every organisation:

Many organisations fall into the trap of setting and forgetting their policies and procedures. This is not a major issue to repetitive tasks that do not change often, but for other areas, it can be a serious concern.

• For example, data protection policies and procedures are constantly changing. GDPR requires organisations to do their utmost to ensure privacy. This may mean updating your polices and procedure, conducting audits, along with an array of other actions.
• An organisation’s operations also tend to change over time, through expansion or diversification your organisation may take on new roles that did not previously exist.  For this reason, it’s important to create and draft policies that are in line with existing policies and procedures and which also fit into this new role.
• Moving into new locations may require an update to policies so they are in line with the legislation present in your new place of operations. This can include data sharing and storing procedures. A hot topic among EU-US organisations of late.

Pitfalls for organisations that don’t undertake policy and procedure reviews:

Failure to follow procedures and policies regarding data protection can be costly to an organisation. Not only in terms of the data lost but reputational damage and possible fines and penalties from regulatory bodies.

Not following policy (such as reporting issues promptly) or procedures (using unregulated devices to conduct business) can cause serious damage to an organisation.

Companies in Ireland must follow GDPR guidelines otherwise they face serious penalties within the EU. Data sharing is one of the most talked-about areas of policy and procedures in Ireland and should be a key focus for all organisations.

Having policies and procedures in place is only one step. Organisations need to put into practice these procedures to ensure that they are working and understood by employees.

A prime example of this is the data breach upon HSE patient records. Although no sound blame has been attributed, it has been likely attributed to weak communication channels.

We understand that not all organisations have the resources or wherewithal to conduct internal reviews of their policies and procedures.  It can be a time-consuming task, but one which must be undertaken by many organisations to meet legislative and governing body policies.

Platinum Brand Communication provides a third-party, impartial review service of our client’s policies and procedures. Reviews can be undertaken on a schedule that suits your organisation and our services ensure you meet all requirements set by the government and other regulatory bodies.

We provide our clients with detailed reports on areas of improvement, policy and procedure failures. Most importantly we provide insights into areas of data protection and security which meet current standards. Contact us today to learn more.