Not all regulatory standards or frameworks are as simple as a list of objectives. Some are more complex and involve a hierarchy of objectives and requirements. To cater to this, our platform allows objectives to also be broken down into sub-objectives. The sub-objectives must all be satisfied for the parent objective to be satisfied and thus compliant.

To add a sub-objective, click the "Add Sub-Objective" button. You can also use the translucent drilldown triangle at the beginning of the row to drill down into the list of sub-objectives for that objective.

When creating sub-objectives, it's important to make sure that the titles are decontextualized: that is, they should stand by themselves and make sense without need to read the parent objective. This may involve needing to change the official title of the requirement, which you may not feel comfortable doing. In these circumstances, the convention we recommend is to put any additional text in square brackets.

For example, if you have an objective that lays out the requirements for having an Asset Management system, and then a sub-objective that breaks down the requirements, eg. "This system should include reporting of asset activity.", that sub-objective should be changed to stand by itself without having to read the parent objective. So in this example, it could be amended to say "This system [the asset management system] should include reporting of asset activity." That way it is clear which text was inserted, without compromising the original, official text of the standard.

The reason we require that sub-objectives stand alone like this is because that sub-objective may appear in an action report by itself. To make sure that report is meaningful, it's important to make sure that each line in there makes sense.