GRC Trends 2026: Five Shifts and What Each One Asks of You

Governance, risk management and compliance sit close to the centre of how an Australian organisation is run.

Regulations keep changing, technology keeps moving, and an organisation that does not adapt collects the same three costs: wasted operating time, avoidable financial exposure and compliance failures that were visible in advance.

Most writing on GRC trends describes a mood.

This page lists what changed in Australian law, when it commenced, and the one thing each change asks you to be able to produce. If you want the definitions first, start with what GRC is and how the three pillars fit together.

This article is general information for Australian organisations, not legal advice. Obligations differ by entity type, size and industry, and commencement dates can change. Confirm what applies to you with a qualified professional. Correct as at September 2026.

The Five Changes Behind These GRC Trends

Most lists of GRC trends describe a direction. These five have commencement dates, and five dates do more work than any forecast.

The trend	The change behind it	What you must be able to produce
AI governance	The National AI Centre published Guidance for AI Adoption on 21 October 2025, setting out six essential practices and evolving the ten-guardrail Voluntary AI Safety Standard	A named owner for AI use, a risk assessment per use case, and evidence of human oversight
Workforce compliance	Intentional wage underpayment criminalised from 1 January 2025; psychosocial hazard duties now apply in every jurisdiction	Accurate pay and hours records, and a documented process for identifying and controlling psychosocial risk
Proactive compliance	Regulator expectation has shifted from “did you fix it” to “would you have seen it coming”	Evidence that a control was tested before an incident, not only after one
Cyber and privacy	The Cyber Security Act 2024 added mandatory ransomware payment reporting; the privacy tort commenced 10 June 2025	A breach response that starts on awareness, and a defensible record of what data you hold and why
Climate disclosure	Sustainability reporting under Chapter 2M of the Corporations Act, with climate-related disclosures prepared under AASB S2 and administered by ASIC	Assured, auditable climate data sitting alongside the annual financial report

Trend 1: AI and Automation Move From Principle to Practice

Artificial intelligence and automation are already inside compliance work.

They draft policy, summarise incidents, screen documents and flag anomalies, and predictive analytics are increasingly used to surface a risk management issue before it escalates rather than after.

What changed in 2025 is that Australia now publishes what good governance of that looks like, in language an auditor can use.

The National AI Centre’s Guidance for AI Adoption, published 21 October 2025, sets out six essential practices: decide who is accountable, understand impacts and plan accordingly, measure and manage risks, share essential information, test and monitor, and maintain human control. It evolves the earlier ten-guardrail Voluntary AI Safety Standard.

It is guidance rather than law. That distinction matters less than it sounds, because guidance of this kind becomes the reference point for what a reasonable organisation should have done, and because the last practice on the list is the one most AI compliance pilots skip.

The depth version of this, including what AI can and cannot do inside a compliance function and how to test a vendor’s claims, is in the future of AI in governance, risk and compliance.

Trend 2: Workforce Compliance Becomes the Enforcement Frontline

For years the sharp end of compliance was financial or environmental. In Australia it is now employment and safety, and the shift is visible in what carries criminal and personal exposure.

• From 1 January 2025, intentional underpayment of wages or entitlements can be a criminal offence under the Fair Work Act. It does not capture honest mistakes, but it does mean payroll accuracy is now a governance matter rather than an administrative one. See the Fair Work Ombudsman on criminal prosecution.
• From 1 July 2026, maximum penalty amounts for certain Fair Work Act contraventions increase, which changes the arithmetic on tolerating a known records gap.
• Psychosocial hazard duties apply in every Australian jurisdiction, requiring the same identify, assess and control discipline as physical hazards.
• Officers carry a personal due diligence duty under work health and safety law that cannot be delegated. See duties under WHS laws.

The scale is not theoretical. Safe Work Australia’s Key Work Health and Safety Statistics, released in October 2025, records 146,700 serious workers’ compensation claims in 2023-24, more than 400 a day, with mental health conditions now 12% of serious claims and a median time lost almost five times that of other injuries.

This is why joining GRC to the systems that hold people data stopped being an efficiency project.

Training records, policy acknowledgements, screening expiry and pay and hours records are the evidence a regulator asks for first, and they usually live furthest apart.

Trend 3: Proactive Compliance Stops Being a Slogan

“Move from reactive to proactive” has been on trend lists for a decade without ever specifying what would be different on a Tuesday. Here is the practical version.

Reactive looks like	Proactive looks like	The evidence that separates them
The control is reviewed after an incident	The control is tested on a schedule whether or not anything happened	A dated test result from a quarter with no incidents
Regulatory change is noticed when a client or auditor mentions it	A named person owns horizon scanning and reports what is coming	A standing agenda item with a record of what was raised and dismissed
Risk ratings are set once and inherited	Ratings move when incidents, near misses or audit findings say they should	A risk register with a change history, not just current values
Training completion is reported as one percentage	Completion is reported by role and site, with the gaps named	A report that can show the worst-performing segment, not the average
Incidents are closed	Incidents update the risk that produced them, and repeats raise a trend	A link between the incident record and the risk record

The distinction that matters to a regulator is narrow: can you show the control was working before the day it was needed?

Nothing in the right-hand column requires new technology. It requires the record to exist before the question is asked. The operating rhythm that produces it is set out in the keys to effective GRC management.

Trend 4: Cyber and Privacy Leave the IT Department

Cyber security used to be reported to the board as an IT metric.

Two Australian changes moved it into the governance column, and both create obligations that a technical team cannot discharge on its own.

What changed	What it means in practice
Cyber Security Act 2024, which received Royal Assent on 29 November 2024	Introduces a mandatory ransomware and cyber extortion reporting obligation for certain businesses, minimum security standards for smart devices, a limited use obligation for the National Cyber Security Coordinator, and a Cyber Incident Review Board
Statutory tort for serious invasions of privacy, commenced 10 June 2025	Individuals can pursue serious invasions of privacy directly in the courts. It is broader than the Privacy Act and reaches entities that are not Australian Privacy Principle entities. The OAIC does not administer it
Notifiable Data Breaches scheme, ongoing	The assessment clock starts when you become aware of a possible eligible breach, which means the response has to be rehearsed rather than designed under pressure

Trend 5: Climate Disclosure Joins the Financial Report

ESG spent years on GRC trends lists as a reporting preference. In Australia the governance half of it now sits inside the Corporations Act.

Under Chapter 2M, entities that must prepare an annual financial report and meet a sustainability reporting threshold in section 292A must also prepare a sustainability report.

It carries climate-related financial information required under AASB S2, it is lodged alongside the financial report and directors’ report, and it is subject to an auditor’s report.

ASIC administers and monitors compliance with it. Climate is currently the only component, and Parliament may add others.

• The data has to be assurable: A number a consultant produced once is not the same as a number an auditor can trace.
• It is a financial reporting deadline, not a marketing one, and it moves at the same pace as the rest of the annual report.
• Thresholds phase in, so an organisation outside scope this year may be inside it next. Confirm your own position rather than assuming.

For most organisations the practical consequence is unglamorous: someone has to own the collection of the underlying data, on a schedule, with a trail. That is a GRC problem wearing a sustainability label.

What These GRC Trends Have in Common

Read the five GRC trends together and the through-line is not technology.

It is that Australian regulators and courts have moved the test from what you intended to what you can evidence, and shortened the time you get to produce it.

The old question	The 2026 question
Do you have a policy?	Who acknowledged which version, and when?
Was the training delivered?	Who is overdue, by role and site, right now?
Did you respond to the incident?	What did the incident change about the risk?
Is the data secure?	What do you hold, why, and who can reach it?
Do you report on sustainability?	Can an auditor trace the number?

An organisation that can answer the right-hand column is ahead of all five trends at once.

One that cannot is exposed to whichever of them lands first. That is also why the strongest single response is structural rather than topical: get the records into one place, with owners and dates attached.

The case for joining them up is in the benefits of integrating GRC into your operations, which covers regulatory compliance, risk mitigation, operational efficiency, corporate transparency and reputation protection in detail.

How Australian Organisations Stay Ahead of GRC Trends

You cannot run five programmes at once, and you do not need to. These four moves improve your position against all of the GRC trends above, in the order that produces evidence fastest.

1. Automated compliance monitoring: Real-time tracking of what is due, overdue and expiring, so regulatory change is implemented rather than noted. Anything with a date attached is the highest-value thing to automate first.
2. Integrated HR and GRC systems: Training, policy acknowledgement, screening and records in one place, because that is the evidence set most often requested and most often scattered.
3. Cyber security inside the GRC framework, not beside it, with a rehearsed breach response and a current view of what personal information you hold.
4. Proactive risk assessment. Controls tested on a schedule, ratings that move, and incidents that update the risks that produced them.

Where to Go Next on GRC

If you are asking	Go to
What is GRC, in plain terms	What is GRC? Governance, risk and compliance explained
What does AI realistically do inside GRC	The future of AI in governance, risk and compliance
What do we gain by joining the three pillars up	The benefits of integrating GRC
How do we run the rollout	How to implement a GRC system
What tends to go wrong during implementation	Overcoming GRC implementation challenges
What does the ongoing rhythm look like	5 keys to effective GRC management
What changes in the first 90 days after go-live	How a GRC system transforms your compliance strategy
What would a system look like	Sentrient’s GRC system · GRC software

Frequently Asked Questions About GRC Trends

1. What Are the Key GRC Trends for Australian Organisations in 2026?

Five, and each has a date rather than a forecast behind it. AI governance moved from principle to published practice with the National AI Centre’s Guidance for AI Adoption in October 2025. Intentional wage underpayment became a criminal offence on 1 January 2025 and Fair Work Act maximum penalties increase on 1 July 2026. Psychosocial hazard duties now apply in every jurisdiction. The Cyber Security Act 2024 added ransomware payment reporting and a privacy tort commenced on 10 June 2025. Climate-related disclosure now sits inside the annual financial report under Chapter 2M.

2. What Is the Single Biggest Change Behind These GRC Trends?

The test moved from intention to evidence, and the time allowed to produce that evidence got shorter. Every one of the five converts something an organisation used to assert into something it has to be able to show on request. The subject matter differs; the demand does not.

3. Is AI Regulated in Australia for Compliance Use?

There is no single AI statute. The National AI Centre published Guidance for AI Adoption on 21 October 2025, setting out six essential practices, which evolves the ten-guardrail Voluntary AI Safety Standard. It is guidance rather than law, but guidance of this kind tends to become the reference point for what a reasonable organisation should have done, so treat it as the benchmark.

4. What Does Criminalising Wage Underpayment Mean for Compliance Teams?

From 1 January 2025 intentional underpayment of wages or entitlements can be a criminal offence under the Fair Work Act. Honest mistakes are not captured. The practical effect is that payroll accuracy and record-keeping became governance matters with board-level visibility rather than administrative ones, and from 1 July 2026 maximum penalties for certain contraventions increase.

5. How Has Privacy Risk Changed for Australian Organisations?

A statutory tort for serious invasions of privacy commenced on 10 June 2025. Individuals can now pursue serious invasions directly in the courts, and it reaches entities that are not Australian Privacy Principle entities. Separately, the Cyber Security Act 2024 introduced a mandatory ransomware and cyber extortion payment reporting obligation for certain businesses.

6. Do We Have to Report on Climate Now?

It depends on whether you must prepare an annual financial report under Chapter 2M of the Corporations Act and meet a sustainability reporting threshold in section 292A. Entities in scope prepare a sustainability report carrying climate-related information under AASB S2, lodged with the financial report and subject to an auditor’s report. Thresholds phase in, so confirm your own position each year rather than assuming last year’s answer holds.

7. What Should a Small or Mid-Sized Organisation Do About These Trends?

Do not try to address five programmes. Make everything with an expiry date visible in one view, put a named owner against each obligation, and test one control on a schedule so you have a dated result from a quarter when nothing went wrong. Those three moves improve your position against all five trends and none of them require a large budget.

8. How Often Should We Revisit Our GRC Priorities?

Quarterly for the register and the overdue list, annually for the framework itself, and immediately when a commencement date lands that touches you. The failure pattern is not reviewing too rarely, it is reviewing without a record, so the next review starts from memory instead of from the last one.

Disclaimer: This article is general information for Australian organisations, not legal advice. Obligations differ by entity type, size and industry, and commencement dates can change. Confirm what applies to you with a qualified professional. Correct as at September 2026.

Sources

National AI Centre – Guidance for AI adoption: implementation guidance

Department of Industry, Science and Resources – Voluntary AI Safety Standard: the 10 guardrails

Fair Work Ombudsman – Criminal prosecution and criminal underpayment offences

Fair Work Ombudsman – Record-keeping

Safe Work Australia – Psychosocial hazards

Safe Work Australia – Duties under WHS laws

Safe Work Australia – Key Work Health and Safety Statistics Australia 2025

Department of Home Affairs – Cyber Security Act 2024

OAIC – Statutory tort for serious invasions of privacy

OAIC – Notifiable Data Breaches scheme

ASIC – Sustainability reporting

Read More

• What Is GRC? Governance, Risk And Compliance Explained
• The Future Of AI In Governance, Risk And Compliance
• The Benefits Of Integrating GRC Into Your Business Operations
• Overcoming GRC Implementation Challenges
• 5 Keys To Effective GRC Management
• How A GRC System Can Transform Your Compliance Strategy In Australia