The Application Governance Gap — Modern Evidence & Data
Many enterprises are investing in identity, security, and spend tools — but without an application-centric governance layer, ownership, remediation, and lifecycle decisions remain fragmented. Below we combine marketing evidence, operational signals, and charts you can reuse or replace with your org data.
| Team | Sanctioned | Shadow |
|---|---|---|
| HR | 30 | 12 |
| Engineering | 60 | 40 |
| Sales | 50 | 30 |
| Finance | 20 | 8 |
| Marketing | 45 | 25 |
| State | Count |
|---|---|
| Assigned owner | 196 |
| No owner / orphaned | 154 |
| Quarter | Median days to remediate |
|---|---|
| Q1 | 45 |
| Q2 | 30 |
| Q3 | 25 |
| Q4 | 18 |
| Q1' | 14 |
| Q2' | 10 |
Taken together these signals show three structural issues:
- High surface area: large counts of shadow apps across functions increase exposure.
- Ownership gap: a sizable portion of apps lack accountable owners, blocking remediation.
- Slow remediation: without clear owners and workflow, fix cycles are long — but they improve dramatically once ownership and governance workflows exist.
Management & Detection
Many tools detect issues and list apps — but detection alone doesn't reduce risk when ownership and lifecycle control are absent.
Application Governance Layer
Governance ties detection to accountability: owners, workflows, remediation, and audit evidence become continuous and provable.
Reduce Attack Surface
Fewer shadow apps and orphaned admins.
Faster Audits
Evidence available on-demand.
Cost Optimization
Rationalize vendors by owner & usage.
Cross-team Alignment
Shared governance reduces friction.
