Rippling is often introduced as an HR-first platform, and many deployments start with HRIS or Payroll. In practice, Rippling IT can stand on its own as a modern control plane for identity, access, devices, and inventory—even when HR and Payroll live elsewhere.

We recently completed a standalone Rippling IT implementation for a leading mid-market private equity firm. The mandate was clear: reduce IT friction, tighten access controls, and create a repeatable “new hire / exit” playbook that scales across a fast-moving business. This post summarizes what we learned—especially the parts that most teams underestimate when Rippling IT is deployed independently.

Key takeaway: Rippling IT is powerful out of the box, but the “secret sauce” is not the SKU—it’s the operating model and policy design you implement on top of it.

Why standalone IT has become a priority (especially in the mid-market)

Three realities are driving more “IT-first” (or IT-only) deployments:

1. Access risk is concentrated at onboarding and offboarding. Zero Trust guidance emphasizes continuously authenticating and authorizing access based on identity and device posture—not network location. That pushes orgs toward tooling that unifies identity + device context. Source: NIST SP 800-207 (Zero Trust Architecture) (nvlpubs.nist.gov)
2. Offboarding is still failing in the real world. Wing Security reported that 63% of organizations may have former employees with access to organizational data, largely due to gaps in SaaS offboarding and token revocation. Source: Wing Security – 2024 State of SaaS Report (PDF) (Wing Security)
3. SaaS sprawl is an operational tax. Many teams report difficulty managing SaaS sprawl and shadow IT, which turns joiner/mover/leaver workflows into a manual, exception-heavy process. Source: BetterCloud – State of SaaS 2025 trends (BetterCloud)

What Rippling IT does well without HR or Payroll

Rippling’s IT positioning is explicitly built around native user and device data to manage the user lifecycle across Identity, Devices, and Inventory. Source: Rippling IT overview (Rippling)

In a standalone implementation, the capabilities that create the most leverage tend to cluster into three areas:

1) Identity as the “control plane”

Rippling supports central identity and access management constructs (provisioning, access control, and deprovisioning) so IT can manage app access consistently. Source: Rippling IAM overview (Rippling)

Where this shines in IT-only mode:

• Centralized joiner/mover/leaver workflows for SaaS access
• Reduced “tribal knowledge” for who should get what
• Faster remediation when roles change (or when exceptions are needed)

2) Device management and endpoint posture in the same system

Rippling’s Device Management messaging is about securing and managing a cross-OS fleet with real-time user/device context. Sources: Rippling Device Management (Rippling) and Unify Cross-OS Device Management (Rippling)

In practice, that matters because:

• A “user” and their “endpoint” are inseparable for secure access decisions (a core Zero Trust concept). Source: NIST SP 800-207A (model for access control) (csrc.nist.gov)
• Device lifecycle tasks (procure → deploy → support → recover) are where mid-market IT teams lose disproportionate time.

3) Integrations and standards-based provisioning (SAML/SCIM)

Rippling highlights breadth of integrations and custom SAML/SCIM capabilities, which is critical when your “source of truth” is not Rippling HRIS. Source: Rippling IT – Streamline User Authentication (Rippling)
If your environment depends on SCIM, it’s also worth aligning stakeholders on what SCIM is (and isn’t) operationally. Source: Rippling glossary – SCIM (Rippling)

The part most teams underestimate: standalone IT is an operating model design exercise

Buying Rippling IT is straightforward. Making it work cleanly—without HRIS being the upstream driver—requires answering design questions that many organizations postpone until after go-live.

Here are the “big rocks” we recommend designing up front.

1) Define your identity source of truth (and how it propagates)

In IT-only deployments, you must decide what creates/updates a user identity event:

• A directory (e.g., Entra ID / Google Workspace)
• A ticketing workflow approval
• An upstream HR system (even if Rippling HRIS is not used)
• A finance/ops system for contractors

Why it matters: if identities are inconsistent across systems, you get “access drift”—users keep access they shouldn’t, or lack access they need. This is exactly what offboarding research repeatedly flags as a high-frequency failure mode. Source: Wing Security – 2024 State of SaaS Report (PDF) (Wing Security)

2) Build role-based access as a product, not a one-time task

Role-based access control sounds simple until you hit reality:

• People wear multiple hats
• Project-based access is time-bound
• Privileged roles need tighter controls
• External/contractor identities behave differently

Practical approach that works:

• Start with 10–20 “roles that matter” (not 200 edge cases)
• Add “access packages” for common bundles
• Create an exceptions process that’s auditable and time-limited

This aligns naturally with Zero Trust principles (least privilege, continuous verification). Source: NIST SP 800-207 (PDF) (nvlpubs.nist.gov)

3) Treat offboarding as a security control, not an HR task

The research is blunt: organizations routinely fail to fully remove access for departing users, leaving behind accounts, tokens, and permissions. Source: Wing Security – 2024 State of SaaS Report (PDF) (Wing Security)

In standalone IT deployments, explicitly design:

• The “termination event” trigger (who initiates, what system)
• Token revocation and disconnected-app coverage
• Device recovery workflow (and timelines)
• A post-exit audit checklist (what gets reviewed, by whom)

4) Don’t ignore the “disconnected apps” problem

Even mature IAM deployments struggle with apps that are not properly integrated or governed—creating blind spots for entitlements and deprovisioning. Source: Okta help – deprovision reporting (Okta Docs)

What to do about it:

• Identify top disconnected apps early (finance, niche tools, legacy vendors)
• Decide whether to integrate, replace, or manage via a controlled exception path
• Put ownership on specific app admins (not “IT generally”)

When Rippling IT-only is the right starting point

Standalone Rippling IT tends to be a strong fit when:

• You want a single control plane for identity + devices
• HR/Payroll are stable elsewhere and not changing this year
• Security posture and auditability matter (even informally)
• Your IT team needs leverage more than more tools

Conversely, if your org has no clean upstream identity source, no appetite for role design, and no bandwidth for operational change management, you’ll likely get limited value from any IT platform—Rippling included.

A practical “Phase 0” checklist before you start

If you’re planning a standalone Rippling IT deployment, we recommend locking down these decisions before configuration begins:

• Identity source of truth: who creates/updates users, and where?
• Role catalog v1: your first 10–20 roles and their access packages
• Onboarding trigger: what event starts provisioning?
• Offboarding trigger: what event disables access and starts recovery?
• Disconnected apps list: top 25 apps, and which are governed vs. exceptions
• Device standards: supported OS/device types, baseline policies, and recovery timelines
• Exception process: time-limited access, approvals, and audit trail expectations

This is what turns “we bought Rippling IT” into “we operate Rippling IT.”

References (for deeper reading)

• Rippling IT overview (Rippling)
• Rippling Device Management (Rippling)
• Rippling IT – Streamline User Authentication (Rippling)
• Wing Security – 2024 State of SaaS Report (PDF) (Wing Security)
• NIST SP 800-207 – Zero Trust Architecture (PDF) (nvlpubs.nist.gov)
• NIST SP 800-207A – Zero Trust architecture model for access control (csrc.nist.gov)
• BetterCloud – State of SaaS 2025 trends (BetterCloud)

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