Simplifying User Access Reviews for Regulated, Hybrid Environments

Access reviews are one of the most time-consuming and least trusted controls in regulated organizations.

In hybrid environments, they often turn into manual exercises that satisfy audit requirements without meaningfully reducing access risk — and often at the cost of missed deadlines, rework, and recurring audit findings.

Reviewers rush approvals, identity teams coordinate spreadsheets, and audits become recurring fire drills.

The root problem isn’t effort.

It’s that most access review programs are built on systems that were never designed for governance at scale.

Why Access Reviews Break Down

Why Active Directory Fails as a Governance System

For most organizations, Active Directory is the starting point for access control.

Over time, AD is stretched far beyond its original purpose:

• Groups are used to control application access
• Business roles are approximated with nested groups
• Exceptions accumulate and persist
• Access intent is hidden behind technical constructs

What works for authentication breaks down quickly when used for governance.

Access Reviews Quickly Expand Beyond Active Directory

As environments mature, access reviews must also cover:

• ERP platforms such as SAP S/4HANA, Oracle EBS, and Oracle Fusion
• Hundreds to thousands of Windows and Linux servers
• Database platforms supporting financial and operational systems
• Cloud environments across AWS and Azure

Each system introduces different entitlement models, owners, and audit expectations.

What starts as “review AD groups” becomes govern access across dozens of disconnected systems.

Manual approaches do not scale to this reality.

Entra helps — but governance doesn’t extend across the environment

Most organizations sync AD to Entra ID to support:

• MFA
• SSO
• Cloud application access

Entra improves identity access in Microsoft-centric environments, but it was never designed to act as a system of record for enterprise-wide governance. It was not designed to:

• Govern ERP or infrastructure access
• Enforce segregation of duties
• Manage hybrid workflows
• Produce audit-ready evidence across on-prem and cloud systems

The result is a hybrid identity landscape with no single place for consistent access governance.

Manual reviews create audit and security risk

Without a purpose-built governance layer, access reviews become disconnected from enforcement and accountability:

• Reviews fall back to spreadsheets because access context is fragmented
• Managers approve access they don’t fully understand — or reviews stall and miss deadlines
• Identity teams manually chase remediation across systems
• Evidence is reconstructed after the fact and varies by system

As a result:

• Audits are delayed or incomplete, increasing the risk of findings, fines, and reputational damage
• Unapproved, excessive, or outdated access lingers, creating real security exposure

Reviews may eventually close.

Risk remains — both regulatory and operational.

What Actually Works: Risk-Based, Governance-First Reviews

Organizations that successfully pass audits and reduce access risk share a common approach. They simplify access review by changing how they scope, prioritize, and schedule them.

Focus on risk, not volume

Effective programs prioritize access that creates real audit and security exposure:

• Privileged and administrative access
• ERP and financial system roles
• Segregation-of-duties conflicts
• Orphaned, inactive, or rarely used access

Low-risk access should not consume the same effort — or the same review frequency — as high-risk access.

Align review frequency to exposure

Rather than reviewing everything on a single cadence, successful teams:

• Review high-risk and sensitive access more frequently
• Review lower-risk access on a less aggressive schedule
• Maintain a clear, defensible rationale for both

This improves completion rates, reduces audit delays, and produces evidence auditors trust.

Add governance without rebuilding identity

The most successful teams:

• Keep AD and Entra where they make sense
• Add a governance layer designed for reviews, policy, and audit

• Introduce governance without disrupting existing IAM — and expand when ready

This reduces disruption and accelerates time to value.

Automate what slows teams down

As reviews stabilize:

• Scheduling and reminders are automated
• Access removal is enforced consistently
• Evidence is generated continuously

Operational effort drops as coverage improves.

How OpenIAM Solves This Better

Unlike identity platforms that focus on authentication and provisioning, OpenIAM is built specifically for access governance across regulated, hybrid environments.

With OpenIAM, organizations can:

• Run access reviews without relying on AD group sprawl
• Govern access across AD, ERP systems, servers, databases, and cloud environments
• Apply consistent, risk-based certification and SoD policies
• Generate audit-ready evidence by design
• Start small and expand governance coverage over time

OpenIAM complements existing identity systems rather than replacing them, providing governance capabilities those systems were never designed to deliver.

Typical Starting Points

Most teams begin with:

• A single business unit
• A set of audit-critical applications
• Privileged or ERP access
• A specific regulatory requirement

From there, governance expands only when it makes sense.

Built for Regulated Environments

OpenIAM supports organizations that require:

• Strong auditability and traceability
• Hybrid and on-prem deployment options
• Incremental, low-risk adoption
• Clear separation between identity infrastructure and governance

This includes financial services, public sector, manufacturing, and other compliance-driven industries.

Simplify Access Reviews — Without Rebuilding Identity

Most organizations don’t struggle with access reviews because they chose the wrong identity platform.

They struggle because identity infrastructure — Active Directory, Entra ID, and application-specific controls — is being asked to solve governance problems it was never designed to handle.

Authentication systems excel at enabling access.

Governance requires something different: visibility, accountability, policy, and evidence — consistently applied across hybrid environments.

You don’t need to replace AD, Entra, or your ERP systems to fix access reviews.

You need a governance layer designed for today’s reality:

• Hybrid and on-prem environments
• Complex entitlement models across enterprise applications and infrastructure
• Regulatory scrutiny that demands defensible, repeatable outcomes

OpenIAM provides that layer.

It complements existing identity systems rather than competing with them, enabling organizations to:

• Run access reviews without relying on AD group sprawl or manual workarounds
• Govern access consistently across directories, ERP platforms, servers, databases, and cloud environments
• Apply risk-based certification and segregation-of-duties controls where they matter most
• Generate audit-ready evidence as part of normal operations — not as a last-minute exercise
• Start small and expand governance coverage incrementally, without disrupting existing IAM investments

See What Governance-First Access Reviews Look Like

If access reviews are consuming time without reducing risk — or audits feel harder every cycle — it’s time to separate identity enablement from access governance.

Talk to an OpenIAM governance expert to see how regulated organizations are simplifying access reviews without rebuilding their identity infrastructure.