Program Controls Effectiveness Measurement Framework & Metrics

Abstract: Any program that is designed to accomplish certain objectives, needs to establish program level controls pertaining to the overall goal. A critical aspect that determines the success of a program is the quality of the controls and their effectiveness in accomplishing the goal. Traditional Control Maturity Models primarily focus on the efficiency, management, and optimization of controls, while only indirectly measuring control effectiveness which neglects an essential aspect of control efficacy. In this paper, we highlight the ineffectiveness of these models, outline an adaptable program controls framework, and provide an approach to define measurable attributes (metrics) that enable a zero-defect program. To the best of our knowledge, we believe this is the first paper that provides a structured approach to defining a controls measurement framework and creation of effectiveness metrics that can be adopted by a variety of program use cases.