You’ve invested in strategy. You’ve implemented controls. Your program is running. The question now is does it work?

Too often, organizations stop at implementation. Policies are in place, tools are deployed, and there’s a general sense of “we’re covered.” But maturity doesn’t come from building a program—it comes from validating that it performs under pressure.

The Overlooked Step: Testing Your Program

A client recently asked, “What do we do now that our cybersecurity program is built?” It’s a good question—and one that deserves a clear, proactive answer.

Testing is essential. Even with solid planning and implementation, technologies age, processes break down, and team members change. Without testing, you can’t be confident that your security program will hold up under real-world conditions.

Here’s how we advise clients to structure their approach to maturity:

1. Plan

Start with a strong foundation. Document your:

  • Policies
  • Procedures
  • Security objectives

Clearly articulate the intent behind your cybersecurity efforts. This will be your blueprint for everything that follows.

2. Build

With the plan in place, construct your program using a balanced mix of:

  • People
  • Processes
  • Technology

Structure your architecture around the CIA triad—Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability. These principles remain central to evaluating any element of your security strategy.

3. Test

Here’s where many organizations fall short. Once your program is up and running, you must test it, early and often.

There are a few methods to consider:

  • Tabletop Exercises stress your incident response planning. Roles, communication, timing—does it all click under pressure?
  • Red Team Engagements simulate real adversaries. You’ll find weaknesses you didn’t know existed.
  • Purple Team Exercises are where things get serious. Map tactics to the MITRE ATT&CK framework. Validate detection. Prove prevention. Tune your SIEM, sharpen your SOC, and move from theory to proof.

By continuously testing, you ensure the program behaves as designed. This also uncovers areas for improvement before they’re exploited by real attackers.

Once you’ve tested your program, use the findings to refine and optimize. This cycle of planning, building, and testing should be ongoing.

Final Thoughts

No program is finished. Testing exposes the friction points and failure paths. Acting on those findings by tightening gaps, automating responses, adjusting controls is what moves you from capable to confident.

If you’ve built your program but haven’t tested it, you’re standing on a foundation you haven’t inspected.

It’s time to get to work.

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