Industry Standard Penetration Testing Reports Lack Two Key Enhancements

Penetration testing has traditionally been treated as a point in time exercise centered on identifying and exploiting vulnerabilities. While severity charts and baseline reporting are standard, they often fall short in giving executives the context required for strategic decision making. This article introduces two powerful yet straightforward enhancements, remediation effort mapping and threat model context graphs. Both of these elevate reports into holistic snapshots of an organization’s security posture. By reframing deliverables in this way, penetration testing shifts from a checklist of vulnerabilities and exploits, to a source of leadership insight, enabling more informed, timely, and impactful decisions.