2020 - Page 4 of 6 - Audit Beacon

May 18, 2020

Return-to-workplace Risks: Is Internal Audit Stepping Up?

Last week, I urged internal auditors to “roll up their sleeves” and help their organizations navigate risks related to returning workforces to their normal places of business. Part of that examination was a look at internal audit’s role in providing assurance on employee health and safety risks.

I outlined four key questions for practitioners to consider:

Has management adequately identified and assessed return-to-workplace related risks?
Do proposed return-to-workplace policies and controls address the key risks?
Are policies/controls effectively implemented (including communications)?
Is the overall program functioning as intended, or are improvements warranted?

A new IIA poll of chief audit executives in North America provides a decidedly mixed answer to whether organizations are prepared and whether internal audit is sufficiently involved.…

May 11, 2020

Returning to Workplaces Will Be Risky: Roll Up Your Sleeves, Internal Audit

After weeks of uncertainty and anxiety over the COVID-19 pandemic, sporadic signs of normalcy are beginning to appear. A growing number of jurisdictions are easing or lifting stay-at-home directives, and organizations are turning their focus to return-to-workplace strategies. Multitudes from all levels of the economy, from consumers to front-line workers to heads of industry, are eager to return to once-familiar settings and routine business activities.

But these signs of normalcy are only mirages. I am certainly not the first to note that business as we knew it before COVID-19 will likely never return. In less than six months, the pandemic has killed almost 300,000 people globally, wreaked havoc on economies, boosted unemployment to historic levels, and rewritten the rules for the workplace.…

May 4, 2020

Public Servants Are Vital to Defeating COVID-19

Each year, the U.S. celebrates the contributions of government workers during its Public Service Recognition Week, which is May 3–9. At a global level, the United Nations designates June 23 as Public Service Day, which includes announcement of the U.N. Public Service Awards, now in their 17^th year.

These celebrations should take on added significance in 2020, in light of the devastating COVID-19 pandemic. Public health workers around the world — the doctors and nurses who tend to the afflicted in thousands of public hospitals, the government scientists who toil to find treatments and develop a vaccine, the health department workers who operate testing facilities — are the front-line warriors who are giving their time, talent, and energy to fight this terrible scourge while putting their own lives at risk.…

May 1, 2020

President’s Message: Evolving to Meet Your Needs

From its first issue in 1944, Internal Auditor magazine has chronicled the advances, the challenges, and the evolution of internal auditing. Through these pages, we have witnessed the profession rise from a focus almost exclusively on financial matters to its establishment as a major force in governance and crucial to organizational success.

More than ever, Internal Auditor readers are hungry for information when and where they need it most. That shows in increased readership of magazine and online-exclusive content on InternalAuditor.org, launched in 2008. In fact, since the coronavirus was designated a pandemic by the World Health Organization, visits to the magazine’s website have surged 13%.…

April 27, 2020

Fraud Report Affirms Internal Audit’s Value at Critical Time

Each year, the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE) publishes a Report to the Nations, which shares results of its annual Global Fraud Survey. The findings reflect the significant role that internal audit plays, and the value it adds, in detecting and deterring fraud. Indeed, internal audit consistently ranks second only to whistleblower tips as the most effective way to uncover wrongdoing.

This year’s report is no different, except in one very important way: Its message about internal audit’s value is needed now more than ever.

In addition to its deeply serious health implications, COVID-19 is part of any and every discussion about business and society.…

April 20, 2020

COVID-19 Quick Poll: Internal Auditors Cope With Threats While Embracing Opportunities

During the COVID-19 pandemic, The IIA is focusing much of its efforts on providing practitioners information they need to not just survive, but to thrive in this crisis. Our consistent message to members, and indeed anyone associated with our important profession, is bringing internal audit’s value to bear in helping organizations to navigate this crisis.

COVID-19 Impact on Internal Audit, the latest CAE Quick Poll by the Audit Executive Center, provides evidence that many are doing just that. Based on responses from more than 400 North American chief audit executives (CAEs) and directors in a survey conducted April 9–13, the poll found that internal audit functions were actively involved in their organizations’ response to COVID-19.…

April 13, 2020

COVID-19 Is No Black Swan — It’s in Technicolor

At first glance, the coronavirus pandemic threatening populations around the world appears to fit the textbook definition of a “black swan” event. But looks can be deceiving.

The term black swan describes an event that can’t be foreseen but can have serious consequences. Europeans couldn’t imagine an actual black swan until they first arrived in Australia and New Zealand, where black swans are quite common. The term has been used with increasing regularity over the years — sometimes appropriately and sometimes not. Some are referring to this year’s coronavirus outbreak, and the COVID-19 disease it spawned, as a black swan. However, pandemics are hardly unforeseeable or unimaginable.…

April 6, 2020

Are You Sheltering at Home in Color?

It is hard to believe how much has changed in just a few short weeks. The way we work, play, and live our lives has been radically transformed in the blink of an eye. Some are suggesting that life as we knew it may never be the same again. If you are like me, “sheltering at home” has forced a radical change in routine. No longer do we rise in the morning, shower, dress, and commute to work. No longer is our day filled with the hustle and bustle of face-to-face meetings, conversations at the water cooler, and working lunches. Instead, we live, work, and play mostly in the confines of our homes.…

March 30, 2020

Initial Pandemic Responses Didn’t Leverage Internal Audit

In last week’s blog post, I made the case for internal auditors to step up and demonstrate their value ahead of the looming recession. A new Quick Poll by The IIA’s Audit Executive Center (AEC), which looked at how organizations have reacted to COVID-19, provides a decidedly mixed picture of internal audit’s role in the time since the World Health Organization declared it a pandemic.

While most chief audit executives surveyed reported that they are now involved in their organizations’ responses to the coronavirus, 37% said they should have been brought in sooner to discuss the risks and potential responses. Only slightly more — 43% — felt they were involved in a timely manner.…

March 23, 2020

Pandemic and Looming Recession Demand Internal Audit to Step Up

The health crisis spawned by the COVID-19 virus screams out via daily headlines from around the world. No one would deny that the immediate focus must remain on combating and defeating this insidious virus. However, the virus also brings potentially dire economic consequences.

A survey of economists now places the chances of a U.S. recession at 80 percent, according to Reuters. I fear even that number is too conservative. Regardless of the exact magnitude, no one can dispute that COVID-19 will bring the most significant impact on our economy in more than a decade.

Consider that the U.S. equity markets are on pace to have their worst month since 1931.…