Welser Profile and HITGuard - a success story
Growth of the internal control system
About Welser Profiles
Welser Profile is a pioneer in the development of roll-formed special profiles and assemblies made of steel, stainless steel and non-ferrous metals. To date, the international family business has produced more than 24,500 cross-sections, which are used in practically all sectors: from the construction industry, building and industrial technology or environmental technology to the automotive industry. All profiles are manufactured and finished exactly to the customer's requirements. Potential further processing steps include punching, cutting or joining steel profiles. The team of experts at Welser Profile is often involved right from the planning and project development stage in order to support all project phases with their wide-ranging experience and ensure the most efficient process possible. It is an exciting and dynamic working environment in which people are constantly looking for innovative solutions.
"Welser Profile has met the requirements for a functioning ICS for years. However, we expect new legal requirements, such as the EKSG, to impose further requirements. We want to upgrade accordingly in good time and create added value," says Anna De Rose, who works in Governance, Risk & Compliance Management for the technology leader.
The use case: Growth of the internal control system
As a medium-sized family business with 360 years of existence and 2,400 employees, Welser Profile was looking for a software tool to document its ICS. The aim was to optimize processes and, in the next step, to map the risk management process with workflow support. The Group Finance division made the start by recording and evaluating all risks and controls. This was followed by the entire HR department. The risks and controls in the Supply Chain area are currently being worked out. In the coming months, Welser Profile will expand the risk management module and include the strategic and operational risks of other business areas.
Why HITGuard?
"The noticeable customer friendliness and service orientation contributed significantly to our decision in favor of HITGuard. This has been confirmed in the further cooperation and has led to an excellent relationship between Welser Profile and TogetherSecure," says Ms. De Rose, summarizing the decisive points for the tool selection.
Working with the tool
Welser Profile currently uses the ICS to document process risks and establish appropriate controls. The results are reported on a quarterly basis. Daily dashboards with informative key figures are available to users in the tool at all times.
Ms. De Rose also reports: "As Lead of Governance, Risk and Compliance, I have been using HITGuard since 2023 for the ongoing processing of my recorded risks and controls, which I have assigned to different business areas for implementation. HITGuard has proven to be an extremely intuitive and affordable GRC tool."
The seamless integration of different management systems enables comprehensive GRC management. The freely configurable risk analysis and assessment as well as the risk matrix are particularly helpful for Welser Profile. The workflow support helps to keep the risk assessment up to date together with the risk owners and to anchor and expand the understanding of risk within the company.
There are currently 118 checks in the system, which are processed by ten organizational units. The respective control managers find the system preparation very self-explanatory and simple for the users.
The risk matrix, as part of the dashboard in the ICS, is a popular visualization tool for all professionals who work with HITGuard at Welser Profile. The matrix provides an overview of the relationship between the probability of occurrence and the amount of damage and also shows the number of risks per field.
Highlights
For Ms. De Rose, it is obvious that the good customer support from the very beginning made a significant contribution to the success of the pilot project in Group Finance: "The good preparation and support during the ICS tool introduction gave us security and we were able to keep to the project implementation schedule very well.
HITGuard's customer support is outstanding and responds flexibly to suggestions and requests. Product development is strongly oriented towards the needs of customers and the requirements of the market. Like many other companies, we are affected by the complex ESG reporting requirements and are eagerly awaiting the planned options for mapping and integrating these opportunities and risks in HITGuard."
Recommendation
According to Ms. De Rose, HITGuard is a clear recommendation for companies that want to effectively build and develop their GRC department. "Anyone looking for good customer service and innovative solutions is in good hands with HITGuard. The tool is very easy to use and offers an excellent user experience."
| Key data | |
|---|---|
| The company | Welser profiles |
| Industry | Metal processing |
| Head office | Ybbsitz, AT |
| Number of employees | 2400 |
| HITGuard modules and add-ons in use |
Basic modules Risk management, Measures and controls |
| Management systems | 2 |
| active users | 20 |