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07/06/2026 9:12 pm
TL;DR: SOC 2 preparation is not an IT-only exercise: StrongDM’s guide says effective certification teams need executive sponsorship, project management, legal, HR, and security input, especially when policies, contracts, and access controls must change across the business. That matters because compliance programmes fail when governance, operations, and identity controls are split across silos.
NHIMG editorial — based on content published by StrongDM: SOC 2 Team Roles & Responsibilities
By the numbers:
- Only 20% have formal processes for offboarding and revoking API keys, and even fewer have procedures for rotating them.
- 79% of organisations have experienced secrets leaks, with 77% of these incidents resulting in tangible damage.
- 97% of NHIs carry excessive privileges, increasing unauthorised access and broadening the attack surface.
Questions worth separating out
Q: How should organisations build a SOC 2 team that actually delivers evidence?
A: Start with clear ownership, not broad participation.
Q: Why do SOC 2 programmes affect IAM and password governance?
A: SOC 2 requires controls to be provable, repeatable, and consistently applied.
Q: What breaks when SOC 2 responsibilities sit only with security teams?
A: The programme slows down because security rarely owns contracts, HR processes, or business justification on its own.
Practitioner guidance
- Assign control owners before the audit starts Map each SOC 2 requirement to a named executive sponsor, project manager, legal reviewer, technical owner, and evidence producer.
- Review password and authentication workflows early Treat stricter password requirements as an identity programme change, not a documentation task.
- Include legal and vendor management in the control workflow Build a process for updating contracts, third-party obligations, and access-related clauses as part of the SOC 2 workstream.
What's in the full article
StrongDM's full blog covers the operational detail this post intentionally leaves for the source:
- How StrongDM frames each SOC 2 role, including executive sponsor, project manager, primary author, legal, and IT/security
- The article's guidance on workload distribution when acquisitions or global office structures make the audit more complex
- The section on how stricter password requirements can change day-to-day user behaviour and support overhead
- The resource and course links StrongDM points readers to for building a SOC 2 programme
👉 Read StrongDM's SOC 2 team roles and responsibilities guide →
SOC 2 team roles and responsibilities: what IAM teams miss?
Explore further
08/06/2026 9:04 am
SOC 2 is a governance model, not an IT checklist. The article is right that certification depends on business, legal, HR, and technical participation, because audit evidence only exists when those functions are coordinated. That framing matters for identity teams because access controls, password standards, and vendor processes all live across organisational boundaries. Practitioners should treat SOC 2 as cross-functional control design, not a compliance task handed to security alone.
A few things that frame the scale:
- Only 20% have formal processes for offboarding and revoking API keys, and even fewer have procedures for rotating them, according to Ultimate Guide to NHIs.
- 79% of organisations have experienced secrets leaks, with 77% of these incidents resulting in tangible damage, according to Ultimate Guide to NHIs.
A question worth separating out:
Q: Who should own vendor and contract changes during SOC 2 work?
A: Legal should lead contract updates, with input from security, procurement, and the business owner of the relationship. Third-party access and data-handling obligations are part of the control environment, so they cannot be treated as side work. If vendor obligations are unclear, the audit will surface gaps late and create avoidable rework.
👉 Read our full editorial: SOC 2 team roles show why compliance needs more than IT
