Which outcome focuses on registering the system for management, accountability, coordination, and oversight?

• A. The system is registered for purposes of management, accountability, coordination, and oversight.
• B. The characteristics of the system are described and documented.
• C. A security categorization of the system is completed.
• D. Security baselines are selected.

Answer: (A)

Registering the system creates an official entry in the organization's governance and asset management records. This step establishes who owns the system, who is responsible for its security and operation, and who needs to oversee it. With the system formally registered, management can coordinate risk decisions, assign accountability, and ensure oversight across the lifecycle. It’s the governance anchor that makes subsequent activities—like risk assessment, authorization, and control implementation—traceable and manageable.

Describing the system’s characteristics and documenting them helps with understanding what the system is, but it doesn’t by itself establish governance or oversight. Completing a security categorization sets the impact level and informs control selection, not who is responsible or how the system will be overseen. Selecting security baselines determines which controls to apply, rather than creating the governing record that enables management and coordination.