At the University of Central Florida a Compliance Readiness Audit process was developed and conducted in the year prior to developing the Compliance Certification in order to identify areas in which the institution may have compliance issues or where there is a lack of sufficient evidence to support compliance. By doing this early on, an institution is able to organize for reaffirmation of accreditation and better implement a framework for preparing the Compliance Certification document. At UCF, the Compliance Readiness team had the responsibility of identifying individuals in the institution who would have knowledge or responsibility of the various areas addressed in the standards and meeting with these individuals to interpret the requirements and standards and what they mean for the institution. The team was also responsible for researching accreditation-related processes and problems, developing processes and establishing guidelines for the accreditation activities.

The Leadership Team at UCF recognized early on the importance of not only ensuring that UCF was in compliance with the SACS requirements and standards at the time of reaffirmation, but also that the institution must establish a system to ensure that the institution remains in compliance at all times. Therefore, another purpose of the readiness audit is to identify ways to institutionalize activities or processes that would enable an institution to maintain compliance with the requirements and standards and achieve operational excellence in accreditation, implying that both quality and efficiency in the accreditation process is achieved.

Technology can be a key enabler for achieving operational excellence. As part of the readiness audit a technology support team was established with the purpose of developing documentation systems and facilitating the electronic submission of the Compliance Certification document. Dynamic access to the Compliance Certification reports through a web environment can provide tremendous enhancement to the process of preparing for Compliance Certification. Such a system allows for immediate access to the reports, provides an efficient method for modifying reports, and an efficient and consistent method for reviewing reports. Additionally the technology team was responsible for creating two Web sites; one to demonstrate and present and document the efforts that the institution is undertaking to prepare for reaffirmation of accreditation to the university community and the other for reporting purposes.

In summary, the purpose of conducting the Compliance Readiness Audit was to: