Search

Spreadsheets provide many of the key links between information systems, closing the gap between business needs and the capability of central systems. Recent regulations have brought these vulnerable parts of information supply chains into focus. The risk they present to the organisation depends on the role that they fulfil, with generic differences between their use as modeling tools and as operational applications. Four sections of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) are particularly relevant to the use of spreadsheets. Compliance with each of these sections is dependent on maintaining the integrity of those spreadsheets acting as operational applications. This can be achieved manually but at high cost. There are a range of commercially available off-the-shelf solutions that can reduce this cost. These may be divided into those that assist in the debugging of logic and more recently the arrival of solutions that monitor the change and user activity taking place in business-critical spreadsheets. ClusterSeven provides one of these monitoring solutions, highlighting areas of operational risk whilst also establishing a database of information to deliver new business intelligence., Comment: 7 Pages including references and diagrams in colour

This paper presents the arguments and supporting business metrics for Enterprise Spreadsheet Management to be seen as a necessary good. These arguments are divided into a summary of external business drivers that make it necessary and the good that may be delivered to business spreadsheet users involved in repetitive manual processes., Comment: 8 pages, includes references