A secure ecosystem fuels business growth

English poet John Donne wrote nearly 400 years ago his famous line “No man is an island.” Today we know that no business is an island either. In our collaborative economy, organizations that continually grow and engage their ecosystems–intricate webs of connections with customers, partners, suppliers and even competitors–can create greater influence, enhance performance and generate more revenue.

But this growth and engagement must be done securely. We’ve seen what can happen when organizations don’t adequately extend IT security to encompass external relationships. According to the Identity Theft Resource Center, of the 783 data breaches that occurred in the U.S. in 2014, 15.1 percent involved a subcontractor or third party. Because an ecosystem is made up of interconnections and interdependencies, all of its members must be secure, or risk being as vulnerable as the weakest.

Extending security throughout the ecosystem doesn’t just protect an organization, it can also accelerate growth. Only 13 percent of the 2,000 global organizations we recently surveyed said they are using security to enable new things. And that 13 percent are likely better positioned for expansion because they already have the security infrastructure and processes in place to evolve their ecosystems quickly and confidently.
For example, federation services create trust between an organization and its partners by securely exchanging credentials to allow access only to authorized data, mitigating the risk of a breach. Single sign-on and access management let users have one credential to access information and assets needed to do their jobs - leading to greater productivity, security and compliance. It also automates the task of changing or revoking that access if an employee moves to a new department or leaves the company, and can lock out access from a stolen or lost device. The same is true for extending privileged account management to control administrative access. And once an onboarding template that includes these types of services is in place, the organization can securely add new members to its ecosystem and begin reaping the benefits in a fraction of the time.

The key is to integrate IT security as part of your expansion plan from the beginning, not as an afterthought that requires additional budget or could slow down progress. The more suppliers and partners an organization can securely and confidently onboard, change access rights for, and remove when a relationship ends, the quicker it can scale. The sooner partners can securely access the data they need, the more productive and valuable they become. This is how strong ecosystem security connects to and enables business growth.

In a recent post, I discussed how simple, transparent IT security can drive, rather than deter, business growth. In another, I talked about taking a human-centric approach to security can enhance an organization’s productivity and innovation. With such security, businesses can also grow their ecosystems and move forward with more speed and confidence, whether that means strengthening their partner network, expanding overseas or onboarding new suppliers.
How has a secure ecosystem enabled your business to grow? Please share your thoughts here.