Organizations are more frequently embedding trust metrics into their request for proposals (RFPs) to ensure that potential vendors can also be trusted ecosystem partners.
Trusted ecosystems help improve an organization's brand, reputation, and trust perceptions, which, in turn, drive stronger business performance.
IDC’s new Future of Trust survey ranked security and compliance as the top considerations for organizations seeking to be perceived as a trusted ecosystem partner.
Other important areas identified include environment and sustainability, privacy, and diversity and inclusion.
A strong security posture helps organizations to maintain compliance with legal regulations, mitigate increasingly sophisticated cybersecurity risks, protect against financial risk, and respond to external threats, such as natural disasters.
Compliance refers to an organization’s legal obligations to specific industry and regional regulations. Robust compliance policies protect organizations from legal liabilities, improve operations and public relations, and help ensure the well-being of employees, customers, and consumers.
Compliance ranked second globally, but in Asia/Pacific – unlike the U.S. and EMEA – it was the highest-ranked trust consideration.
"As we talk to organizations about trust metrics, we are finding that most metrics or scorecards target three areas – security, compliance, and customer," said Amita Potnis, research director, Future of Trust.
She opined that organizations will increasingly embed these trust metrics into their RFPs as they look to build trusted ecosystems that can strengthen trust perceptions and improve brand reputation.