CMMC compliance provides many benefits for defense contractors and suppliers. By achieving CMMC certification, your organization can gain a competitive advantage, build relationships with prime contractors, improve its cybersecurity posture, increase trust with customers and partners, reduce liability, and simplify compliance efforts. As the DoD ramps up NIST 800-171 audits and certification requirements for DoD contract eligibility become increasingly imminent, there's no better time to start your organization's CMMC journey. 

Competitive Advantage

The DoD will soon require all contractors, and their sub-contractors, to be CMMC certified for new contracts. Those who obtain CMMC certification early may be at a significant advantage because CMMC requirements will shrink the candidate pool for contracts. There may be significantly decreased competition, which could lead to significant windfalls for CMMC’s earliest adopters. The best way to ensure you can obtain CMMC certification quickly is to become compliant now. The assessment process will be much easier, and shorter, for those who are already compliant.

Prime Opportunities

CMMC requirements flow down from prime contractors to sub-contractors. With sub-contractor non-compliance threatening prime contractors' reputation, profits, and ability to win contracts, CMMC strongly incentivizes large contractors to self-police and cull potentially problematic sub-contractors and vendors from their network. Major players in the defense industry will be eager to avoid even the appearance of impropriety. Achieving compliance now is a way to prove that you take CMMC seriously and won’t cause any compliance problems for your affiliates. Convince prime contractors that you’re a safe bet by jumping on the CMMC train enthusiastically and early. 

Improved Cybersecurity Posture

CMMC provides a comprehensive roadmap for securing information systems and data. By implementing the controls required by CMMC, your organization can improve its cybersecurity posture and mitigate risks. Compliance with the rigorous framework indicates excellent cyber hygiene, which protects you from costly and embarrassing hacks and breaches. 

Increased Trust

CMMC can also increase client and partner trust in your organization. With the high-profile data breaches that have occurred in recent years, many organizations are closely examining the cybersecurity practices of their vendors and suppliers. By achieving CMMC compliance, your company can demonstrate its commitment to protecting sensitive information through a well-established and clear metric even the savviest clients and partners will trust.

Reduced Liability

In the event of a data breach or other cybersecurity incident, CMMC can help reduce your organization's liability. As mentioned above, the CMMC framework provides a standardized method to assess and manage cybersecurity risk. As a result, compliance with the framework can help your organization prove you did everything right, even if something goes wrong. Do your due diligence and follow best practices to help your company remain guilt-free in the face of a cyber event or incident. 

Bonus

Simplified Compliance

Prior to the CMMC, contractors, and suppliers had to comply with a patchwork of different cybersecurity requirements. Standards were not always clear. Depending on the type of contract a team was working on, and the precise nature of the data they were handling, rules could vary widely and unpredictably from one project to the next. CMMC replaces these multiple overlapping and confusing frameworks with a single, unified standard. The CMMC level your organization achieves will map directly onto the kinds of work you do. By achieving CMMC compliance, your organization can simplify its compliance efforts and reduce the costs associated with maintaining multiple compliance frameworks.

Don’t put off CMMC. Doing so means risking the benefits listed here and many more. If you’re curious about what achieving CMMC would look like, book a time to chat or shoot us an email. We’d be happy to share our insights and show you how XQ can help you get closer to CMMC compliance!