What evidence do auditors commonly ask for on 10.1 Continual improvement?

An improvement register or log with sources such as audits, reviews, incidents and metrics; Evidence improvements were implemented and their effect assessed; Trends showing ISMS performance over time; Management review decisions driving improvement.

What is the most common gap auditors find on 10.1?

Improvement is limited to closing audit findings

ISO/IEC 27001:2022 · Clause 10

`10.1` Continual improvement

The organization has to keep making its ISMS more suitable, more adequate and more effective.

Source: ISO/IEC 27001:2022, 10.1. The statement above is our statement of the clause, read from the published text and cited so you can check it against the official text, not the instrument verbatim. Open ISO/IEC 27001:2022 in the compliance library.

Clauses 4 to 10 are the management-system requirements: none of them can be excluded when an organisation claims conformity. The 93 Annex A controls are a reference set: one may be excluded with a justification in the Statement of Applicability. Certification bodies assess conformity; the evidence lists here are what auditors commonly ask for, not a list the standard prescribes.

artefacts

held by a system

at each review

moderate

to go live

SIEM / log platform

where the evidence lives

teal = a system already holds it · olive = produced at each review. To go live: easy when half or more of the artefacts are already held by a system, moderate from a quarter to a half, hard below a quarter.

These are the artefacts auditors commonly ask for on this requirement, our guidance rather than text from the standard. Your assessor decides what is sufficient in your context, and asks for samples across the period when a report covers one.

system holds itEvidence a system already holds

An improvement register or log with sources such as audits, reviews, incidents and metrics · SIEM / log platform

periodic reviewEvidence produced at each review

Evidence improvements were implemented and their effect assessed · Document repository
Management review decisions driving improvement · Policy repository / GRC workspace

governing documentDocuments that govern the control

Trends showing ISMS performance over time · Document repository

First move

Start with the 1 of 4 artefacts that already live in a system (SIEM / log platform); keep the periodic reviews but log each one as a dated record with a named reviewer.

Common gaps auditors find

Improvement is limited to closing audit findings
No record of improvements over time exists
The effect of improvements is not assessed
Improvement opportunities from incidents are not captured

Do this for your whole sheet

Paste the rows you run your controls from and get this mapping for every control at once, with the periodic-review ones flagged and a first move per row. No account for the first run.

Build my evidence sheet

9.3.3 Management review results · 10.2 Nonconformity and corrective action