SOC 2 Compliance
SOC 2 has become the de facto trust signal for SaaS and service companies, which means a lot of organizations pursue it because a customer's procurement team demanded it, not because they set out to build a genuinely well-controlled environment. That's fine as a starting motivation — but the audit only goes well if the controls are real by the time an auditor starts testing, not assembled in a scramble the week before the audit window opens.
Type I versus Type II, and why it matters
A Type I report tests whether controls are designed appropriately at a single point in time. A Type II report tests whether those controls actually operated effectively over a period, usually several months to a year, which means there's no faking it with a last-minute policy update — the auditor wants evidence spanning the whole window: access review logs from month two, not just month eleven; change management tickets throughout the period, not a clean set from the last few weeks. Most customers asking for SOC 2 actually want Type II, so I plan for that from the start rather than treating Type I as a shortcut.
How I prepare an organization
I start by scoping which Trust Services Criteria actually apply — security is mandatory, but availability, confidentiality, processing integrity, and privacy depend on what you actually do and what your customers are asking for. From there, I run a readiness assessment against the relevant criteria, looking honestly at where controls are genuinely operating versus where they exist on paper but aren't consistently followed — access reviews that happen sporadically, change management that gets skipped under deadline pressure, vendor risk management that's more aspiration than practice. We fix those gaps and, critically, make sure the evidence is actually being generated and retained as you go, since Type II is won or lost on evidence collected throughout the period, not reconstructed afterward.
Once the control environment is solid, I help you work with your auditor efficiently — organized evidence, consistent answers across interviews, and no surprises because the gaps were already closed before testing started.
Who this is for
SaaS and service companies that need SOC 2 to close enterprise deals, organizations that got a Type I and now need to sustain controls for a Type II period, and teams that want their next audit to be a confirmation of what's already true, not a fire drill.
If a SOC 2 audit is on your roadmap, reach out and let's get the controls real before the auditor shows up.