Third-Party Risk Management (TPRM) today prioritizes concerns of regulatory fines over strategy and operational directives for stronger security. By investing in a complete, targeted approach, organizations can elevate TPRM as an essential part of their security program strategies.
Robust cybersecurity structures are critically important, and third-party risk management was once a vital component of these defense strategies. Presently, based on how the program is operated today, this enterprise approached is antiquated.
Originally regarded as an initiative-taking measure to safeguard sensitive data and content with strengthening digital infrastructures against external risks, unfortunately TPRM has become an organizational checkbox exercise that values procedure over substance.
This standard process from well-intentioned evaluation to superficial compliance is not just a failure of program outcomes; but can become an invitation to cyber risks and threats.
Over time, the cybersecurity security ecosystems, in trying to align with business objectives, deferred too often to regulatory audit-driven frameworks. Auditors, in turn, prioritized documentation and process over real-world security outcomes. In the process overtime, TPRM’s original purpose became predictable and stagnant and constructed an entire industry on the impression of security.
Symptoms of a larger Cybersecurity Issue
TPRM has become a “checkbox approach” that over time created a larger problem in cybersecurity risk management.
TPRM and compliance assessments and security questionnaires were originally developed to ensure thorough vetting of third-party relationships and genuine risk mitigation. But these tools have expanded into complex, redundant, and sometimes nonsensical documents that are more about optics than security protection. Rather than adding true security value, they often serve as organizational bureaucratic indications toward compliance, adding minimal insight into potential cyber risks.
As a result, this auditing process has led to a false sense of cyber security. Companies believe that by completing these required checklists and having covered their bases when they are still exposed to outside cyber risks these processes were designed to mitigate.
The consequences of this checkbox culture extend beyond ineffective organizational TPRM and have led to “questionnaire fatigue” among vendors and contractors.
All too often, assessment questionnaires are sent as one-size-fits-all templates, an approach that overwhelms vendor companies with formulaic, repetitive questions, many of which are not even relevant to their specific role or organizational risk profile.
Without tailoring or context, these reviews become procedural exercises rather than meaningful evaluations. The result is surface-level engagement, where companies appear to conduct due diligence but in fact miss critical insights. Risk profiles end up looking complete on paper while failing to capture the real-world complexity of the threats they are meant to address.
Need to Identify the Fundamental Problem
The growth of TPRM tools has automated much of what was once a manual, resource-intensive process. These platforms were developed to simplify the development, distribution, and completion of Assessment security questionnaires, addressing the operational burden organizations need to provide when performing third-party risk audits. While they have provided much-needed efficiency, the questionnaires also unintentionally reinforced a checkbox approach to third-party risk, with many assessments falling short in delivering meaningful insight.
And here is the Surprise: Numerous core regulatory frameworks — ISO 27001, PCI, NIST CSF, NIST 800-53, or SOC 2 — do not require a security questionnaire process at all.
Across the board companies in many market segments received recommendations and guidance that emphasized compliance over security. Over time, organizations collectively adopted Assessments without much scrutiny. Today, TPRM has become a business model that thrives on process over outcomes and organizational optics over effectiveness.
The checkbox mentality reveals another inherent problem: whether the individuals managing TPRM are equipped to assess the risks they are tasked with evaluating.
Governance Risk and Compliance (GRC) professionals are typically responsible for TPRM, balancing regulatory demands with cybersecurity objectives. But only relying on checkbox compliance raises fundamental questions about whether these compliance gatekeepers have the necessary training and expertise to understand evolving threats and vulnerabilities.
How to Elevate Third-party Risk Management
To break away from this TPRM process, organizations should reassess their approach to TPRM by adopting a truly risk-based approach that moves beyond simple compliance.
This requires developing targeted, substantive security questionnaires that prioritize targeted assessments over broad questionnaires to get to the heart of a vendor’s security practices. Rather than sending out general questionnaires, organizations should create assessments that are relevant and probing, asking questions that genuinely reveal the strengths and weaknesses of a vendor’s cybersecurity posture. This focus on quality over quantity in security assessments allows organizations to move away from treating TPRM as a paperwork exercise and back toward its original strategy goal of effective risk management.
Beyond improving questionnaires, organizations must cultivate a culture of transparency and collaboration with their key vendors. TPRM is more effective when vendors are seen as partners in achieving mutual security goals. A collaborative approach encourages honest, accurate responses instead of rushed, superficial checklist completion.
When vendors are treated as active participants in an organization’s cybersecurity posture, they are more likely to engage in meaningful ways. This culture shift, from seeing vendors as mere service providers to strategic partners, has the potential to transform TPRM from a rote check-the-box procedure into a proactive and effective part of cybersecurity.
Rethinking TPRM means redefining the role of GRC professionals; not as compliance enforcers, but as cybersecurity-informed risk managers. This shift is not about being upskilled internally, it is about creating shared clarity between parties and most importantly about internal collaboration with the Cybersecurity management team!
That last part is key. Effective TPRM is not just assessing a vendor’s security; but ensuring the company internal buyer knows their responsibilities as well. When both parties understand what they are responsible for, the relationship moves to a more effective security posture.
By adopting a more thoughtful, strategic approach to TPRM with the GRC professionals and Security Teams to work in collaboration, then organizations can move past the compliance-driven ‘check box’ procedures that dominate today’s practices.
Management needs to recognize that the current approach can be improved, by challenging the status quo and investing in comprehensive, risk-based strategies, organizations can reclaim TPRM as an essential part of their security programs.
Modevity Vendor Risk Management as a Service supports organizations by mitigating varied company and regulatory risks and utilizes powerful database technology, AI, and vendor assessment automation with continuous monitoring – to provide real-time reports for the identification of risks when conducting business with vendors across varied departments or operations.
Contact Information:
Thomas J. Canova, Co-Founder, Chief Marketing Officer
Modevity, LLC
610-251-0700
