A New Perspective on Cyber Compliance
I used to see compliance as a once-a-year scramble — like an annual health check-up. But using Vanta, especially alongside our Microsoft tools, is changing that mindset. It's starting to feel more like a fitness tracker for our security posture — driving consistent habits, surfacing risks early, and giving us real-time confidence instead of last-minute panic.
Dawn Thiart
3/30/20251 min read
For the longest time, I thought of compliance like an annual health check-up.
You do your prep.
Pull together your evidence.
Hope nothing’s out of line.
Maybe scramble to fix a few things before the auditor shows up. Then you breathe a sigh of relief and move on... until the next check-up.
But now that I’ve started using Vanta — and integrating it with our Microsoft stack (𝘌𝘯𝘵𝘳𝘢, 𝘋𝘦𝘧𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳, 𝘚𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘦𝘗𝘰𝘪𝘯𝘵, 𝘎𝘪𝘵𝘏𝘶𝘣, 𝘗𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘯𝘦𝘳, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦) — I’m beginning to see things differently.
Compliance is no more a once-a-year event. It is now a 𝗹𝗶𝘃𝗶𝗻𝗴, 𝗯𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘀𝘆𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗺. One that operates 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗯𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗴𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱, nudging you toward better habits and surfacing risks before they become issues.
It’s kind of like switching from 𝘆𝗲𝗮𝗿𝗹𝘆 𝗱𝗼𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿 𝘃𝗶𝘀𝗶𝘁𝘀 to wearing a 𝗳𝗶𝘁𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗲𝗿.
Instead of waiting to be told you’ve got high blood pressure, you're:
✅ Watching your steps
✅ Tracking your sleep
✅ Staying accountable every day
Small actions, done consistently, that lead to long-term health.
That’s how Vanta is starting to feel — like a Fitbit for our security and compliance posture.
We’re still early in the journey. I’m learning how to connect our systems, automate evidence gathering, and build out policies that reflect what we actually do. But even now, I can tell: this is going to reshape how we think about risk and readiness.
It’s not perfect. I’ve got plenty of questions. But it already feels less like 𝗮𝘂𝗱𝗶𝘁 𝘀𝘁𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘀 and more like 𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝗳𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲.