Organizations must achieve a diverse set of strategic objectives. This is accomplished by translating strategic objectives into often interdependent and disparate operational objectives. Operational objectives include revenue growth, operational efficiency, compliance with laws and regulations, public perception, corporate responsibility and market leadership, as well as customer and employee satisfaction. Attainment of each operational objective requires the assumption of inherent risks.

Operational assessments focus on mitigating inherent process design and execution risks through the use of controls. Controls are employed to reduce the organization’s residual risk, or risk after control implementation, to a tolerable level. Operational assessments examine whether the organization’s processes enable the achievement of strategic objectives.