Core Concepts
Understand the key building blocks of Dictiva: governance statements, assemblies, domains, the library, and how they connect across the compliance lifecycle.
The Building Blocks
Dictiva is built around a small number of powerful concepts. Understanding these will help you get the most out of the platform.
Statements
A governance statement is the atomic unit of compliance in Dictiva. It's a single, clear requirement that prescribes, prohibits, or permits a specific behavior.
Example:
"All employees must complete security awareness training within 30 days of hire and annually thereafter."
Statement Anatomy
Every statement in Dictiva has:
- Title — A short, descriptive name
- Body — The full text of the requirement
- Domain — The governance area it belongs to (e.g., Information Security)
- Maturity Level — Foundational, Intermediate, or Advanced
- Modality — The obligation level (Must, Should, May)
- Version — Tracked automatically with change history
Maturity Levels
Not all organizations need the same level of governance rigor. Dictiva uses three maturity levels:
| Level | Who It's For | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Foundational | Startups, early-stage programs | "Passwords must be at least 8 characters" |
| Intermediate | Growing companies, established programs | "Passwords must be at least 12 characters with complexity requirements" |
| Advanced | Regulated industries, mature programs | "Authentication must use phishing-resistant MFA for all privileged accounts" |
Policies & Standards
An assembly is a collection of statements organized into a coherent document. Assemblies are what most organizations call "policies," "standards," or "procedures."
Assembly Types
- Policy — Organizational intent and high-level requirements
- Standard — Specific technical or operational requirements
- Procedure — Step-by-step operational instructions
- Guideline — Recommended practices (non-mandatory)
Assembly Lifecycle
- Draft — Create an assembly and add statements to it
- Review — Share with reviewers for feedback
- Publish — Lock the assembly version and make it official
- Acknowledge — Send to stakeholders for acknowledgment
Published assemblies are versioned. When you update a statement and republish, the assembly gets a new version — previous versions are preserved for audit trail.
Domains
Governance domains organize your content into thematic areas. Dictiva uses 15 standard domains:
| # | Domain | Covers |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Data Governance | Data quality, lineage, ownership, stewardship |
| 2 | Information Security | Access control, encryption, incident response |
| 3 | Privacy & Data Protection | Consent, data subject rights, cross-border transfer |
| 4 | Risk Management | Assessment, treatment, monitoring, appetite |
| 5 | Business Continuity | Backup, disaster recovery, availability |
| 6 | IT Operations | Change management, monitoring, capacity planning |
| 7 | Human Resources | Hiring, training, acceptable use |
| 8 | Legal & Compliance | Contracts, regulatory reporting, records retention |
| 9 | Financial Controls | Authorization, reconciliation, audit trails |
| 10 | Vendor Management | Due diligence, contracts, ongoing monitoring |
| 11 | Environmental & Sustainability | ESG reporting, carbon tracking, waste management |
| 12 | Quality Management | Process standards, continuous improvement |
| 13 | Ethics & Conduct | Code of conduct, whistleblowing, conflict of interest |
| 14 | Physical Security | Facility access, visitor management, asset tracking |
| 15 | AI & Emerging Technology | Model governance, bias monitoring, transparency |
The Library
The governance library is Dictiva's curated collection of 10,000+ pre-written governance statements. Library statements are:
- Professionally authored across all 32 domains
- Available at multiple maturity levels
- Mapped to 57 regulatory frameworks
- Ready to adopt into your workspace
When you adopt a library statement, it creates a copy in your tenant that you can customize. Your adopted version is independent — you can modify it without affecting the library original.
Regulations
Dictiva maps governance statements to specific requirements in 57 regulatory frameworks including SOC 2, ISO 27001, GDPR, HIPAA, PCI DSS, NIST CSF, and more.
These mappings let you:
- See which regulations a statement satisfies
- Identify compliance gaps in your program
- Generate framework-specific reports
- Respond quickly when regulations change
Glossary
The glossary provides clear, accessible definitions for governance terminology. Both the library glossary (Dictiva-curated) and your tenant glossary (organization-specific) are searchable from the sidebar.
Use the glossary to ensure your team has a shared understanding of terms like "data controller," "risk appetite," "control objective," and hundreds of other governance concepts.
Frequently Asked Questions
- What is a governance statement? +
- A governance statement is the atomic unit of compliance in Dictiva. It is a single, clear requirement that prescribes, prohibits, or permits a specific behavior — for example, 'All employees must complete security awareness training within 30 days of hire.' Statements are versioned, assigned a maturity level, and can be mapped to regulatory frameworks.
- What is an assembly? +
- An assembly is a collection of governance statements organized into a coherent document. Assemblies represent what most organizations call policies, standards, or procedures. They follow a lifecycle from draft to review to publication, and each published version is preserved for audit trail.
- What are governance domains? +
- Governance domains are thematic areas that organize your compliance content. Dictiva uses 32 standard domains including Data Governance, Information Security, Privacy, Risk Management, and AI & Emerging Technology. Each domain contains statements, glossary terms, and regulatory mappings relevant to that area.
- What is the governance library? +
- The governance library is Dictiva's curated collection of 10,000+ pre-written governance statements across all 32 domains and 57 regulatory frameworks. When you adopt a library statement, it creates an independent copy in your workspace that you can customize without affecting the original.