Third-Party Risk Management
Most organisations rely on external providers to deliver essential services. Cloud platforms, software suppliers, consultants, payment processors, logistics partners, and managed service providers may all have access to important systems, information, or business processes.
This creates a level of dependence that cannot be ignored. If a supplier experiences a cyberattack, service failure, or compliance issue, your organisation may still have to deal with the consequences.
Third-Party Risk Management helps you understand those dependencies and manage them throughout the supplier relationship. At CA, we focus on practical oversight that protects your organisation without making supplier management unnecessarily complicated.
Why This Matters.
A supplier may have a strong reputation and still introduce serious risk. The difficulty is that organisations often have limited visibility into how third parties protect information, maintain their services, manage incidents, or control their own subcontractors.
Without a consistent process, important supplier decisions may be based on assumptions, incomplete questionnaires, or information that is no longer current.
Third-Party Risk Management helps you:
Identify critical suppliers:
Understand which providers support essential operations, handle sensitive information, or have access to important systems.
Reduce supply-chain exposure:
Recognise security, operational, financial, and compliance weaknesses before they lead to disruption.
Strengthen contracts and accountability:
Set clear expectations for security, incident reporting, service continuity, data protection, and regulatory responsibilities.
Monitor changes over time:
Respond when a supplier changes its technology, services, ownership, location, or use of subcontractors.
Our approach
We build the assessment process around the size and complexity of your supplier environment. Critical providers receive the right level of attention, while lower-risk suppliers are handled through a simpler and more proportionate process.
Map suppliers and business dependencies
We identify your third parties and establish what services they provide, what information they handle, and which systems they can access.
We also consider the operational impact. Could the organisation continue working if a key provider became unavailable for several days? Is there an alternative supplier, or would the interruption stop an essential service?
Classify suppliers by risk
Not every third party presents the same level of exposure. We classify suppliers according to factors such as data access, system connectivity, business criticality, geographic location, and regulatory relevance.
This allows you to apply stronger due diligence where it is needed instead of treating every provider in exactly the same way.
Assess controls and contractual protections
We review the supplier’s security, resilience, privacy, incident management, and compliance arrangements.
Depending on the level of risk, this may involve reviewing policies, certifications, audit reports, supporting evidence, or conducting interviews with the supplier.
We also examine whether contracts clearly define responsibilities, notification times, audit rights, continuity requirements, and obligations when the relationship ends.
Monitor and manage supplier risk
Third-party risk does not end when a contract is signed. We help establish review schedules, monitoring processes, escalation criteria, and procedures for handling incidents or significant changes.
Where weaknesses are identified, we provide realistic recommendations and help you agree appropriate improvement measures with the supplier.
What sets CA apart
Risk-based assessments
We adjust the level of scrutiny to the importance and exposure of each supplier.
Practical supplier engagement
We communicate findings clearly and support constructive conversations about improvement.
Full lifecycle coverage
Our approach covers supplier selection, onboarding, monitoring, contract changes, and offboarding.
Independent advice
Our recommendations are based on your business needs, not on promoting a particular platform or product.
The business value
Third-Party Risk Management with CA gives you greater visibility into the organisations your business depends on.
It helps reduce unexpected disruption, protect sensitive information, improve contractual accountability, and demonstrate responsible oversight. It also gives you a clearer basis for deciding whether to accept a risk, request improvements, introduce additional safeguards, or reconsider the relationship.
Next step
You can outsource a service, but you cannot completely outsource responsibility for the risk. Contact CA for an initial consultation. We will help you identify critical suppliers and develop a practical process for managing third-party exposure.