Compliance: The Evaluation Phase

This section provides orientation on the evaluation phase of a compliance project. As interviews from the project are completed, the analyses of each object included in the scope are also completed. It is in this phase that decisions are made regarding which non-compliances should or should not be treated or accepted.

The decision to accept or treat non-compliances should take into account not only the resulting metrics identified, but also the organization's tolerance with respect to these non-compliances. Once evaluated, a decision is made to treat the non-compliances considered unacceptable to the organization, at which point the system allows treatment events to be generated. These events are used to manage activities to meet non-compliant requirements or manage strategies to reduce them. Treatment events created in the project during the evaluation phase can be viewed in the Treatment tab, but can only be managed through the Workflow module. For details, see Chapter 10: Workflow -> Events.

Keep in mind that the analysis, evaluation, and treatment phases are not completely sequential, but rather overlapping processes. Compliance evaluation may begin before the analysis is over and, similarly, the treatment phase can begin before evaluation of all the non-compliances has been completed. Also note that there must be at least one non-compliant requirement in a completed interview for the Evaluation tab to be enabled, allowing non-compliances to be treated or accepted.

After an interview is completed in the analysis phase, you can check which requirements are non-compliant. In the evaluation phase, the non-compliances are progressively evaluated by compliance managers. Thus, at any time during the project, it may be that some identified non-compliances have already been evaluated, but not others. For evaluated non-compliances, the decision has already been made to accept them or treat them by creating a treatment event. The total number of non-compliances evaluated is then divided between non-compliances being treated and those accepted in this phase.

When a non-compliance is sent to treatment, its status becomes "Sent to Treatment". This status is temporary and changes as soon as the corresponding treatment events are created in the Workflow module. The event author receives a notification in the Home module when the events are created and the status of each becomes "Being Treated". Note that these events can only be managed through the Workflow module, and only by authorized users. Note that the graphs in the Evaluation tab consider non-compliant requirements that have been sent to treatment as "Being Treated".

Once non-compliance treatment has begun in a project, it may be that some of the non-compliances sent to treatment have been treated (that is, the corresponding events were closed), while others may still be undergoing treatment (open events).