Managing access rights within organizations has always been a critical yet complex task, particularly as evolving security threats and regulatory compliance demands intensify the need for precision and efficiency. With the increasing reliance on digital systems and applications, businesses face several challenges in ensuring that employees are granted the right level of access promptly and efficiently. In this blog post, we will explore the common hurdles in access profile packaging and propose strategies to address them.  

The Business Challenges of Access Profile Packaging

Access profile packaging refers to the process of creating a set of roles across different systems, summarizing which roles a user in each job function requires in which systems. These role packages form the foundation for determining the necessary roles in the IAM system for a given job.

A general problem in managing access rights (in an IAM or ticketing system) is to what systems and applications with what role/profile packages an onboarding employee shall have access. Onboarding an employee into the IAM system should start with HR data entry – this should be used as a „trigger event” to automatically create the default/initial access profile packages in accordance with their job level/category. 

The following key challenges highlight the critical business pain points in access profile packaging and the need for a more streamlined, automated approach. 

1. High IT Workload: IT teams bear a significant burden when managing access rights manually. Handling individual requests, updating profiles, and ensuring compliance with organizational policies consume valuable time and resources. 
2. Resource Intensity: Access management often requires coordination between multiple departments, including HR, IT, and line managers. The manual nature of these processes can lead to ineffectiveness and delays. 
3. Lengthy Onboarding Processes: In large organizations, even with moderate fluctuation, numerous individuals join or are transferred internally each day. Ensuring that new or transferred employees can start work as soon as possible while having the necessary knowledge and permissions is a significant challenge. Frequently, essential permissions are either improperly collected or outdated, creating inefficiencies that require additional IT resources to address and leading to delays in establishing the fundamental access rights. Consequently, it often takes weeks for a new employee to begin work, resulting in a loss of organizational productivity. 
4. Preparation Time: Ensuring that access rights align with job roles and responsibilities requires meticulous preparation. Customizing access profiles for every new hire increases the likelihood of human errors and further delays. Organizations often rely on IAM or ticketing systems, which require manual data entry and multiple approvals before access is granted. 
5. High Costs: The manual and resource-intensive nature of access management contributes to higher operational costs. Moreover, inefficient processes can lead to revenue loss due to delays in employee productivity. 

TheFence DAPP: Leveraging Data Mining and Trigger Events for Efficient Onboarding

To address these challenges, organizations can adopt automated solutions that streamline access management by leveraging stored employee information and advanced data mining methods. Here’s how it works: 

1. Data Entry as a Trigger: When an employee’s details are entered into the IAM system during onboarding, this action serves as a trigger event. The system can then automatically create default access profile packages based on the employee’s job level or category. By utilizing stored data about employees, organizations can determine who needs access to what. 
2. Predefined Access Packages with Data Clustering: Advanced statistical and AI data mining methods can analyze employee attributes into meaningful clusters, facilitating accurate permission assignment while maintaining privacy. This allows the necessary permissions for their jobs to be accurately determined. In favorable cases, such grouping allows 80-95% of the necessary permissions to be accurately assigned. This not only enables employees to start working sooner but also significantly reduces the background work required. 
3. Automation of Workflows: Automated workflows can significantly reduce the time required for approvals and provisioning. Once the trigger event occurs, the system executes predefined processes to assign access rights without requiring manual intervention. In one of our implemented projects, manually assigned permissions were reduced to approximately one-fourth.
4. Regular Recalculation and Integration: Custom code can be developed to enable regular recalculations of permissions, ensuring that access rights adapt dynamically to role changes, organizational restructuring, or evolving responsibilities. Integration into an IAM tool further streamlines this process.
    

Benefits of an AI-based Access Profile Packaging solution

1. Reduced IT Workload: Automation alleviates the burden on IT teams by minimizing manual tasks and streamlining processes. 
2. Faster Onboarding: Employees gain access to the tools they need from day one, improving productivity and satisfaction. 
3. Enhanced Security: Standardized access packages reduce the risk of unauthorized access, over-provisioning and conflicting accesses. 
4. Cost Efficiency: By automating repetitive tasks, organizations can save costs associated with manual labor and improve resource allocation.  

Conclusion

Efficient access profile packaging is essential for modern businesses to maintain security, productivity, and cost-effectiveness. By leveraging trigger events in IAM systems, implementing data mining for employee clustering, and adopting automated workflows, organizations can effectively address the operational and security challenges associated with traditional access management. These strategies not only simplify the onboarding process but also ensure that employees have the right tools and access to succeed in their roles. 

With the ability to group employees and accurately assign permissions, the overall efficiency of access management improves significantly. Implementing such solutions requires a collaborative effort and a commitment to modernization, but the long-term benefits—such as faster onboarding, reduced IT workload, and enhanced security—make it a worthwhile investment. 

Take control of your access security with TheFence™, schedule a personalized demo with a TheFence specialist!