In this episode of Third Party Risk Perspectives, host Elliot Berman sits down with Christopher Sindik of Blue Umbrella to explore what clients are truly looking for in today’s third-party risk management and due diligence landscape.
From the growing demand for scalable technology platforms to increased reliance on ongoing monitoring and managed services, organizations are rethinking how they build and maintain effective compliance programs—often while being asked to do more with fewer resources. The conversation also highlights the rising importance of speed, with a notable increase in expedited due diligence requests as companies look to move faster without sacrificing risk oversight.
Tune in for practical insights into how customer expectations are shifting—and what that means for building more efficient, responsive, and resilient risk management programs.
What Customers Really Want - Evolving Expectations - Transcript
Elliot Berman: Hello, my name's Elliot Berman, and I'm with AML RightSource, and I'm here with my colleague, Chris Sindik, from Blue Umbrella. And we're going to share today some insights from clients and what they're looking for to support their third-party risk management. So Chris, good to talk to you again, and let's dive right in.
In the third-party risk management and financial crime prevention spaces, practitioners are always looking for ways to be more effective and efficient. And how are you seeing this play out with customers and prospects in your space?
Chris Sindik: Certainly, Elliot, and glad to be speaking with you again. I really came into this podcast thinking about the unique position that Blue Umbrella has, as an advisor, as a vendor to all types of different companies, large, small, and all sorts of parts of the world and various industries as well.
So I thought it'd be good to give our listeners a glimpse into what we see at the hub of many different types of industries and many different types of organizations as well. I will say too, hey, if any if any clients are listening don't worry. We're not gonna spill any tea as it were, on this, but more just sort of general things that, that we're seeing some trends that are emerging a- again, just based on what we've seen this year so far and even trends from last year too that we see carrying over.
But to back, to go back to your question about, how things are evolving and what we're being asked for, one of the areas that I'm starting to see more growth in is with a technology platform that we have called Status2. There's a lot more incoming interest from companies across a variety of industries about, what it is, how does it work, how can it bridge some gaps in their program? How does it differ in the marketplace, things like this.
And I think that might be for a couple of reasons, but, I think what it really does speak to at a high level is companies trying to do more with less. Maybe they've lost some headcount, maybe they're being tasked with new responsibilities, their companies are growing. The market reach that they have is growing, and they're really just trying to take their compliance program, third-party risk management program, supplier program, however they may wanna brand it, take it to the next level to have it formalized and have it done in an auditable way.
So I would say that the technology is one of the things that we're starting to be asked about more and more in a variety of ways. Outside of just that too there's a couple other things that are really starting to grow for us in terms of interest. And this is, both existing clients and sometimes those just coming to us and having this conversation for the first time.
And the other area would be ongoing monitoring, managed monitoring and managed services. And what I mean by that is for ongoing monitoring, you onboard a new third party or customer, and it's pretty standard to do some initial onboarding efforts, due diligence, research, vetting, screening, et cetera, and that's certainly good. That's table stakes. But what do you do two months down the line?
Chris Sindik may be a good actor today, but in a year from now, who knows if he's been added to a list or had a headline or something like this. And companies want to know about that. We find that there's increased focus on regulators, which is the trickle-down effect for what we see, too that this ongoing monitoring and ongoing maintenance of the program are a really big part of the program.
And the other part that I mentioned in that answer, is managed services. Which is the act of our members of the team coming in and helping with various compliance and third-party tasks, whether that's onboarding, whether it's looking at those monitoring hits.
A very common use case for us is that a client has monitoring set up, which is certainly a good thing, but they haven't had the time to look at all the hits. Maybe it's hundreds or thousands or tens of thousands. Hopefully not any more than that. But they need to go and look at all those that have piled up because that sort of good practice that they have established can become a liability if they're just not able to look at them in a timely manner.
Oops, we we realized that there was a hit on someone added to a watch list, but we didn't act upon it for eight months, and in that eight months, checks were sent to them, products delivered, et cetera, too, and it becomes a liability for some of these companies.
So I, I think at a high level, again, it would be that tech- technology, the ongoing monitoring, and then a variety of managed services to help bridge those gaps sometimes.
Elliot Berman: You mentioned Status. I know you have a number of clients who have been subscribed to the Status product for a long time, but do you see prospects who come to you and say, "Hey, I understand you guys have a platform- ... tell me about it," as opposed to, you and the sales team being out searching for prospects. Do you have- ... reverse cold calls, if you will?
Chris Sindik: Yeah, we always like to get those certainly. We're very lucky here to have a very strong client base and a good word of mouth. A lot of our prospects that we hear from, they heard about it from their other friends and colleagues in the compliance and TPRM space to say, "Oh, hey you need a vendor, go check out Blue Umbrella. Go check out Status. It's worked for us for a while, and, might work for you, too." So it is a matter of those sort of personal referrals or professional referrals coming our way. And, you are correct in that we're always trying to get the word out about what we do and why we think we're the best as well.
But, it is just a growing interest. And I think that happens, as I mentioned before, is doing more with less. Unfortunately, as we've seen there have been layoffs in some companies for a variety of reasons, too.
And the survivors, if you will, are left to pick up the pieces and carry on. The program's not going to stop. The company's not going to go bankrupt at any point. It's just they were trying to get lean and mean. So to do that, they have to get some technology in place to bridge the gap to fill up that headcount in so many ways.
And it can be a matter of, "Hey, we've had this other platform for two years, five years, 10 years," but it's just not giving the value as much as it used to. And sometimes the reasons we've heard is that, that other software isn't updated. Maybe it was really good in 2007, but, here we are today and it hasn't been updated, and it looks like that, and it feels like that.
And, at the time it was cutting edge, but it just hasn't kept pace with what's needed today . So I think sometimes it really is, these clients coming to us and prospects too, just frankly running out of patience with their current provider. There are workarounds, there's compromises and, after a while it's just, hey, how many compromises are we willing to make here for something? And, really is it saving that time and money that we expected all along?
And, I think beyond that of just frustration sometimes and dissatisfaction is, hey, what else is out there? What else exists there that we don't know about? You don't know what you don't know. Our tool, a lot of times it is more automated, it has more connections, more quality of life considerations that help prospects and clients take their program to the new level.
And I'll say too that even looking at our current client base, we're having these regular communications about, "Oh, wow, there's a new feature that opens up a new world to us." And maybe they would have distributors going through Status, and now they're looking at customers, or suppliers, or sales agents. You're looking at additional use cases to bring it under one umbrella, hopefully a blue umbrella and get some more efficiencies out of that.
Elliot Berman: The universe of third parties that any a company of any size deals with gets very big very quickly. And so scalable solutions that can be applied to all the different classes of third parties is really important. So besides the search for a better platform or for our first platform in some cases, what are the other trends you're seeing?
Chris Sindik: We've certainly talked about technology and, I might as well say AI once during this. It wouldn't be a modern-day podcast in 2026 without mentioning AI. But I'll just bucket that off to the side, because I know that's, a topic in and of itself. Certainly the implementation of that and how, how it can benefit everyone, not just our clients, but ourselves, and society at large too.
But, I think that the implications of that outside of just the technology side of it too, something that we're hearing more about is speed. The speed at which we can turn around due diligence reports is becoming an increasing need for us and for our clients.
AI aside, what we're hearing and seeing is that clients and prospects want quicker turnaround times to leverage some of these technologies and move their business along more quickly. As, you and I know, and certainly a lot of our listeners too, the way that compliance or third-party risk management is seen sometimes is another step in the process, and it takes two days, it takes two weeks, it takes two months to go in and review some of these third parties and give it the nice green stamp, and we can go on and do our business.
Just what we're seeing with increased competition, again, the macroeconomic factors in play, it helps to be first sometimes, and it helps to turn things around more quickly, and that customer or supplier or distributor the business partner that you're working with, they appreciate that they can hit the ground running.
If it's another two days or a week that is saved, that's an extra two days in revenue. And maybe that's just enough to meet the benchmark that they need and certainly see some benefits of it. So I don't wanna, dwell too much on statistics, but one of the things that clients can do is request an expedited report.
Say it was a four-day turnaround time for a report. It's possible to, get that done in half the time with a little extra fee for the rush effort that's there. And we've seen an increase in that substantially this year. I think around, depending on how we slice and dice the numbers, around a 22% increase from a similar timeframe, too.
So it does just show the urgency that these deals have and the importance of being able to move quickly on some of these things. First of all, I'll say we are speedy in the marketplace. We really try and get things done as quickly as we can, while not compromising quality.
There's always that need for an urgent report even faster than we are, which is, what we've heard faster than the average provider that's out there . And, certainly we work to meet those requests with the team working overtime, rearranging queues, whatever it might be.
But I think the takeaway from that is that it really just shows that these reports are important in being able to get them done quickly so the business can, quote unquote, "move on" with the business of the company is certainly appreciated too.
Elliot Berman: I don't think there's any question that there's at least a sense that the speed of business continues to increase. Sometimes I think the speed of business increases just because everybody says "let's do it faster." Whether that's really needed or whether it's the best risk approach, that's a different set of questions. But I'm not surprised when you say you're you're seeing an increased demand for expedited reports and things like that.
And you and I both have been in the business long enough that we remember when the timeframes for all different kinds of due diligence and other things that people think of as the minimum turnaround time today, was unimaginable. Back not all that long ago the first time I saw a major automated transaction monitoring system and was working as part of a very large team with a client when they were doing their selection and then installing, those transactions were run as a batch- process at the end of the month. By the time your analysts were getting the output they were working on the previous month's work, and you didn't get it on the first of the month- ... you probably got it on the third business day of the month. So you were running, in some cases, you were looking at five-week-old activity.
Nowadays, the systems are at least near real time in most cases. And now everybody just goes "of course."
So that natural progression of the speed of business is permeating due diligence, it's permeating third-party risk management generally, and transaction monitoring as a subset of that.
Chris Sindik: And it's crazy to think, in that context you said of five week old transactions, that's when it would start to get scrutinized or reviewed in that context too. And, to think that today would be, unimaginable. And we're lucky on the due diligence side of the house in that, we're seeing some practical improvements just where more records are coming online that haven't been there before. There are still some places in the world where you have to walk into a courtroom, or a local judiciary and get records.
Sometimes, and those aren't as frequent as they used to be. So as new records come online all types certainly too, it, it aids in the the speed of business too for hopefully for the better.
Elliot Berman: So as we wrap up, are there any final insights you'd like to share with our audience?
Chris Sindik: So I think, again, we came into this conversation from the unique position of a vendor working with many different types of clients and customers from all over the world. And I'd say, too, that one of the things that we'd like to give some free advice to the prospects and the clients that are listening out there is, "Hey, - talk to your vendors.
If you're having an issue and maybe you don't quite know how to handle it, we might have seen it before. We might have heard about it from another client and talk to us about it. And, it may not be necessarily something that is a core offering a lot of times, but we can at least let you know what we've seen and how other clients have addressed it."
Certainly if there's something that our suite of services can help with, that's a benefit as well. So it can be things like that and also just, the evolution of your vendors, too. If they're a good vendor, they're improving all the time. They have new features and, bells and whistles. And a lot of times those aren't things that you're having your pulse on that you'll learn about it the day it's released. But sometimes if you just ask it's, opens up a world and say, "Oh hey, you see the new module that we launched last month?"
"Oh, no, I didn't know about that." And walking them through that can really be eye-opening and help to solve some problems that's there. So I'd say, see what's new, see how you can leverage it and look at how some of that new technology can help and know that your vendors are willing to work with you.
And if they're a good one, they'll certainly do what they can to help you meet your business needs and let you look good too at the same time. One of the expressions that I heard many years ago and it sticks with me today is you're only as good as your last report.
And, that's something that, that we hold near and dear and, we definitely want to show that value and not just what the last report was, but the next report too. So I'd say keep that communication loop open.
Elliot Berman: Chris, I think that's great advice, and I appreciate your time today. I know you and I are planning to get together and talk about some other topics in the near future. But for now thank you very much and thanks to our audience.
Chris Sindik: All right. Thank you.
