The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) requires that executives certify that their companies have controls in place to ensure that financial reports are reliable and compiled according to generally accepted accounting principles. Sections 404, 302, and 409 require controls and processes that can result in certifiable financial reports. Ultimately, much of this responsibility falls on IT organizations which control the environment that supports the information in these reports.

Organizations are working diligently to achieve compliance with SOX. As they do so, they are realizing the significant cost, in dollars and resources, of compliance. Some estimates put compliance work at large corporations in the thousands of hours, but there are ways to ease this burden. One of those is through the adoption of IT Service Management (ITSM).

While ITSM was not conceived with SOX in mind, it can help organizations achieve regulatory compliance while promoting IT governance and improved business operations. ITSM provides a governance framework that allows more control over the validity, integrity, timeliness and availability of data while aligning IT infrastructure with business needs