Something to Consider September 2018 – Is Internal Audit Hitting a Home Run?

Have you had a particularly good audit report recently?

Richard Chambers, President and  CEO of The Institute of Internal Auditors, has written much to dispel the myths surrounding auditors and their profession. At times, Internal Auditors can be isolated from the rest of the organization, dismissed as ‘number crunchers’ or the ‘Police’. But this is an outdated view and one that means we aren’t realising the full value that the audit function can provide. Richard’s article focusses on the significant impact auditors can have after a particularly good audit report.

Firstly, when your internal audit reveals an unrecognized risk or ferrets out a major fraud – this is a big win for an auditor and a timely reminder that technology alone is not able to replace the work that they do – in our recent webcast we shared the statistic that just 3% of fraud was found via analytics versus 44% via people, showing the power of people over technology.

Secondly, operating management seeks out the auditors advice on related or additional issues surfaced in a recent audit report. This echoes our view that Internal Audit is evolving to no longer be an isolated function but an integral trusted advisor to business leaders and their decisions, seen as adding value, beyond their ‘number crunching’ reputation.

Thirdly, the audit discloses (and management agrees) that culture is a root cause of one or more findings in your report. Any internal auditor who can clearly identify culture as a root cause in an audit report may well be heading toward the “hall of fame”. This reiterates the fact that audit has moved beyond its original accounting walls to flag up a variety of areas that require management focus.

For more on this topic and the other three impacts that are signs of a great audit, read the full article here​​​

Our ‘Something To Consider’ snippets are framed as small, digestible, ‘dashes of insight’ around the pillars of what we define as “World Class Finance” – Process Optimization, Financial Control and Compliance, and Risk Assurance, all underpinned by technology enablement and integration.