Challenge

What challenges were you and your team experiencing prior to working with us – what prompted you to seek a solution? Not knowing where to start really! Data privacy wasn’t managed by anyone with any expertise, when I came in it got handed to me and it got to the point where I asked our CEO if I could go out to tender and find a company that would be confident to support us in outsourced data protection and hold us accountable.

If you’re experiencing similar challenges within your organisation and you’re unsure whether to hire a DPO internally or to outsource, we have a really useful article that will help you make that decision: Should you outsource your DPO? 

How did you go about searching for the solution and services? I did an initial Google search for Data privacy and DPO in the UK and chose 5 different companies. We looked into the background of the companies, and the people who worked there, and we were confident that Evalian® knew what they were doing.

Please describe the reasons you decided to work with us.  It was through our initial call with Evalian® commercial director, Chris – who was really down to earth, knowledgeable and didn’t use complex terms or language that I didn’t understand. Not only that but the price point was brilliant – Evalian® matched what we were paying our previous company, but offered so much more within the service.

Did you have any expectations going into the process? We knew what we didn’t want, previous companies we’d worked with before had poor communication and were not responsive to urgent queries. We wanted someone to help us sort out our processes, work with what we had already or, if necessary, build our framework from scratch. Evalian® said, “no problem, it’ll take time and effort on both parts” and we appreciated that transparency and pragmatic approach along with realistic timeframes.

Solution

Can you describe the process we took your business through and anything you learnt about your own business through working this way? Gap analysis was lengthy – Evalian® wanted to know all about and talk to all the stakeholders in the business, gathering information from everyone within the company that touched data. They wanted to know what systems we use and how things work which took time but was needed and we appreciated that. Lots of people had to be involved, and what impressed us was the level of attention to detail. Saying that Evalian® were easy to work with and the flow was smooth throughout the initial processes of getting to know our business.

Were there any challenges you found along the way and how did you feel we or your consultant, helped to support you through that? There haven’t been any real challenges, I thought it was going to be very daunting but our Evalian® consultant, Isabela, is incredibly responsive, and really helpful, and if she doesn’t know something, she knows someone who can and this really puts us at ease. If anything has gone wrong, she has been able to advise effectively and within a tight timeframe.

What changes did you make as a result of working with us? Everything to do with data privacy has changed internally. The good thing is, everyone within the company takes it more seriously, they’re really more on board with it now, and the training has put data protection at the forefront of their minds. We now regularly ask “can we do that?” or “should we do that?”. I can then drop Isabela a line and she is there to support me. Honestly, it makes me more confident in what I’m saying to people, our procedures, filling out forms, due diligence questionnaires and so on.

Impact

What has been the most significant achievement for your business facilitated by using our services? As a whole it’s meant we’ve tidied up the business, if suppliers’ questionnaires aren’t up to scratch, we can terminate a contract with reasoning to back it up to ensure our security and due diligence are paramount to our workflows. We are definitely more self-aware as a result of working with Evalian®.

What impact has the results from working with us had on your clients/stakeholders? I think we’re more mindful in signing contracts. I have to review everything now but it makes us look more safety and detail-oriented. We have robust procedures, which adds to our professional reputation.