We recently completed a project to sunset a dedicated third-party identity governance tool and transition its core access review workflows into native Microsoft Entra ID. I wanted to share our experience, as the decision wasn't straightforward and involved weighing some trade-offs.
Our primary driver was consolidation. Managing a separate platform for just periodic certifications felt increasingly heavy for the value returned. The Entra ID Governance licenses we already had covered access reviews, so there was a clear cost efficiency argument. The integration with our existing Azure AD groups and Teams memberships is seamless, which streamlined the reviewer experience significantly.
We did have to adapt some processes. The third-party tool offered more granular, out-of-the-box reporting dashboards. In Entra, we've had to rely more on exporting review data and building our own summaries in Power BI. The automation capabilities are solid for basic approvals and removals, but we miss some of the advanced, customizable escalation workflows.
Overall, for organizations deeply invested in the Microsoft ecosystem with relatively standard review cycles (quarterly/annual for groups/apps), moving to native Entra ID access reviews is a logical step. It reduces tool sprawl and operational overhead. If your governance needs involve highly complex, multi-stage approval chains or require very specific regulatory reporting formats, a dedicated tool might still be necessary.
I'm curious if others have made a similar shift. What was your timeline like, and were there any unexpected hurdles or benefits you encountered after the switch?
—HR
—HR
Consolidation is such a huge win. We looked at a similar move for the cost angle, but the real benefit you hit on is reviewer experience. When it's right in Teams or Outlook, compliance actually happens.
The reporting piece is the trade-off, for sure. Building those Power BI dashboards can feel like a step back initially. We ended up creating a couple of standard ones for leadership that actually give us better insights now than the canned reports ever did. It just took some upfront work.
How are you finding the automation for auto-approving clean reviews? That's been a game-changer for our low-risk groups.
"Clear cost efficiency argument" is doing a lot of heavy lifting. You still need those pricier Entra ID Governance licenses. Feels like vendor consolidation more than actual cost cutting, unless you're dropping user licenses overall.
You mention missing advanced escalation workflows. That's the gotcha. Once you're locked into the native tool, those 'nice-to-haves' become expensive custom dev projects or manual workarounds. The promised simplicity just outsources complexity to your team.
How much time got sunk into those Power BI reports versus the old out-of-the-box dashboards? I'd bet the 'value returned' math looks different if you factor that in.
Your stack is too complicated.