CMMC Compliance and Managed IT for Georgia Defense Contractors
Georgia isn’t just a logistics hub — it’s a significant defense contracting state. Between the presence of Robins Air Force Base, Fort Eisenhower (formerly Fort Gordon), and the dense ecosystem of manufacturing and engineering subcontractors throughout metro Atlanta and middle Georgia, hundreds of small and mid-sized firms here touch Department of Defense (DoD) contracts in some form.
If your company handles Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) or bids on DoD contracts, CMMC 2.0 isn’t a future concern. For many contractors, it’s already a present-day requirement — and the assessment clock is running.
Here’s what you need to know, and how Century Solutions Group helps Georgia defense contractors move from confusion to compliance.
What CMMC 2.0 Means for Georgia Subcontractors
The Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) 2.0 framework is the DoD’s mechanism for verifying that contractors and subcontractors protect sensitive federal information. The updated 2.0 framework, now being phased into contract solicitations, simplified the original five-level model into three levels:
- Level 1 (Foundational): Covers 17 basic cyber hygiene practices. Self-attestation by a company official is permitted annually. Applies to contractors handling Federal Contract Information (FCI) only.
- Level 2 (Advanced): Aligns directly to all 110 practices in NIST SP 800-171. Most contracts involving CUI require Level 2. Depending on the contract’s sensitivity, assessment by a certified third-party assessment organization (C3PAO) may be required — or self-attestation may be accepted with a signed affirmation.
- Level 3 (Expert): Reserved for the most sensitive programs, based on NIST SP 800-172. Less commonly required for typical subcontractors.
For most small-to-mid-sized Georgia defense subcontractors — manufacturing firms, engineering companies, IT services suppliers — Level 2 is the relevant target. That means demonstrating compliance with all 110 NIST 800-171 controls, documenting your security posture in a System Security Plan (SSP), and maintaining a Plan of Action & Milestones (POA&M) for any gaps you haven’t yet closed.
The rule of thumb: if your contract contains a DFARS 252.204-7012 clause, CMMC requirements apply to your organization.
The 110 NIST 800-171 Controls: Where Most Small Contractors Fall Short
NIST SP 800-171 organizes its 110 security requirements across 14 domains: Access Control, Audit and Accountability, Configuration Management, Identification and Authentication, Incident Response, Maintenance, Media Protection, Personnel Security, Physical Protection, Risk Assessment, Security Assessment, System and Communications Protection, System and Information Integrity, and Awareness and Training.
That list is comprehensive by design. In our experience working with small and mid-sized firms, a few domains surface as consistent trouble spots:
Access Control (22 requirements): Many firms haven’t implemented role-based access controls, multi-factor authentication across all CUI-adjacent systems, or session termination policies. Shadow IT — employees using personal devices or unauthorized cloud storage — creates access control gaps that are hard to detect without proper tooling.
Incident Response (3 requirements): A documented, tested incident response plan is required. Most small contractors either don’t have one, have one they’ve never exercised, or have a plan that doesn’t reflect their current IT environment.
Audit and Accountability (9 requirements): Logging is required across systems that touch CUI. Without a centralized log management platform and defined retention policies, this domain is almost impossible to satisfy — and harder to prove to an assessor.
Configuration Management (9 requirements): Baseline configurations, change control processes, and software inventory management are required. Ad-hoc IT environments common in small firms rarely meet these requirements without remediation.
System and Communications Protection (16 requirements): Encryption in transit, network segmentation, and boundary protection controls often require infrastructure changes that small contractors haven’t prioritized.
None of these are insurmountable — but closing gaps requires knowing where you stand first.
How Century’s Managed IT Stack Maps to CMMC Practice Domains
Century Solutions Group’s managed services are designed with compliance-sensitive clients in mind. Here’s how our core capabilities map to CMMC requirements:
| CMMC Domain | Century Capability |
|---|---|
| Access Control | MFA enforcement, zero-trust network access, privileged access management |
| Audit & Accountability | SIEM deployment, centralized log management, retention policy configuration |
| Configuration Management | Endpoint management, patch management, software inventory tracking |
| Incident Response | 24/7 SOC monitoring, documented IR plan development, tabletop exercise support |
| Media Protection | Endpoint encryption (BitLocker/FileVault), removable media controls, secure disposal procedures |
| System Integrity | EDR/MDR tooling, vulnerability scanning, real-time threat alerting |
| Identification & Authentication | Identity provider configuration, MFA policy enforcement, credential hygiene auditing |
We don’t just deploy tools — we document the controls those tools satisfy, which matters enormously when it’s time to complete your SSP or prepare for a C3PAO assessment.
The Gap Assessment Process: What to Expect
A CMMC gap assessment is the essential first step before you can build a realistic compliance roadmap. Here’s what that process looks like when you engage Century:
Week 1–2: Scoping and Discovery
We define your CUI boundary — which systems, applications, and locations touch or could touch controlled information. This scoping exercise determines the size of your assessment environment and is one of the most consequential decisions in the entire compliance process.
Week 2–4: Control-by-Control Review
We evaluate your current environment against all 110 NIST 800-171 requirements. This includes interviews with your team, review of existing documentation, and technical testing of key controls. Each practice is scored: Met, Partially Met, or Not Met.
Week 4–5: Gap Report and Remediation Prioritization
You receive a scored gap report with remediation recommendations prioritized by risk and assessment impact. Not every gap requires the same urgency — we help you sequence remediation in a way that’s practical for your team and budget.
Ongoing: SSP and POA&M Development
Your System Security Plan documents your security architecture and how each of the 110 controls is implemented (or planned). Your POA&M tracks open gaps with assigned owners, target dates, and interim mitigations. Both documents are living artifacts — they need to be maintained as your environment changes.
For a typical 50–150 person defense subcontractor, the gap assessment phase takes four to six weeks. Remediation timelines depend heavily on your starting posture, but most clients in this segment should expect six to eighteen months of active effort to reach a defensible Level 2 posture.
SSP and POA&M Documentation: Why It’s Not Just Paperwork
Assessment bodies don’t just look at your controls — they look at your documentation. A well-implemented control that isn’t documented is, from an assessor’s perspective, unimplemented.
Your SSP needs to describe:
– The boundary of your CUI environment
– How each of the 110 controls is addressed
– Responsible parties and system interconnections
– Policies and procedures that govern each domain
Your POA&M needs to be honest. Assessors expect to see open items — they want to see that you know what’s not done, have a plan to close it, and have interim mitigations in place. A POA&M with nothing in it is a red flag, not a gold star.
Century’s team helps you build and maintain both documents in formats that align with assessor expectations. We’ve seen the documentation pitfalls that trip up otherwise well-run programs, and we build your SSP to hold up under scrutiny.
Ready to Know Where You Stand?
If you’re a Georgia defense contractor or subcontractor with CMMC requirements on the horizon — or already in your contract — the best move you can make right now is understanding your current posture.
Download our CMMC Readiness Checklist to do a quick self-assessment across the 14 NIST 800-171 domains before you engage with an assessor. It won’t replace a formal gap analysis, but it will tell you which domains need the most attention and help you walk into an assessment conversation prepared.
[Download the CMMC Readiness Checklist →] (link to gated form)Or if you’re ready to talk through your specific situation, reach out to Century’s team for an initial consultation. We work with defense subcontractors across metro Atlanta and throughout Georgia and the Southeast — and we understand the stakes of getting this right.
Century Solutions Group is an Atlanta-based managed IT services provider serving compliance-sensitive industries including defense contractors, manufacturing, legal, and healthcare. Our cybersecurity and compliance practice includes CMMC readiness support, NIST 800-171 gap assessments, and ongoing managed security services.