As the saying—attributed to management guru Peter Drucker—goes, “You can’t manage what you don’t measure.” To drive performance, most functions need to measure their operations. In internal audit, some metrics, like the percent of the audit plan completed, often act as a starting point for assessing performance. At the same Read More
Ethics investigations can be challenging for just about any organization. If done right, an ethics investigation can help you identify wrongdoing and unethical behavior and put a stop to it before your organization pays the price for not maintaining a conducive and compliant work environment. A poorly executed ethics investigation, Read More
We all know the common expression, “you only get one chance to make a good first impression.” For internal audit, this chance often comes during the kickoff meeting. This introductory meeting will often set the tone for the entire audit. Its primary objective is to align the auditors and auditee Read More
Let’s be honest, sales and marketing skills may not always come naturally to members of the internal audit community. We often view ourselves as thorough, persistent, independent, brave—I could go on and on—but not sellers. Why is that? Why don’t internal audit leaders devote more time to developing sales and Read More
For many internal auditors, the audit committee is a bit of an enigma. Most of us help the chief audit executive (CAE) or other internal audit leader with materials and content to provide to this subgroup of the board of directors. Much of our work, in summary fashion, ends up Read More
In today’s lightning-fast business environment, the ability to effectively manage risks on the fly is crucial for the long-term success and sustainability of any company. Traditionally, companies have relied on conducting periodic risk assessments, often on an annual or semi-annual basis. With the dynamic nature of risks in today’s business Read More
Imagine this scenario: Your organization is hit with a sophisticated ransomware attack. The team reluctantly agrees to pay the ransom (in bitcoin, of course) and your data-recovery efforts spring into action to get the organization back up and running. But to everyone’s horror, much of the data is missing and Read More
In India, the internal audit function has come a long way since its inception and has undergone significant development in recent years. In the past, internal audit in India was mostly confined to compliance-based activities and was often viewed as a cost center. With the increasing complexity of business operations Read More
We’ve all heard it: “I want this issue to be resolved even more than you do,” a senior member of management told me during a phone conversation following-up on an open audit finding. I was relieved, believing that the higher-ups had finally understood the gravity of not taking action on Read More
According to history, our cave-dwelling predecessors, the Neanderthals, went extinct for a reason–they couldn’t adapt to their changing environment. Maybe they wanted to, but they couldn’t and unfortunately, they didn’t. Eventually, they were replaced by us humans, of course, who were better able to adapt to changing weather, hunting patterns, Read More
