By: Loren Yager

Many auditors have developed considerable experience conducting each stage of an audit, yet those same auditors often lose momentum when it comes to moving from one stage to the next. One reason is that auditors must get the details right to support convincing findings and conclusions; however, that same focus on the details may prevent an auditor from considering how decisions on one stage will impact the next stage of the audit. Consequently, in addition to developing technical skills needed to execute each stage of an audit, auditors should also develop the ability to think ahead to help an audit move smoothly from one stage to the next. 

One of the distinguishing features of audit organizations and reports is the emphasis on evidence to support findings and recommendations, so any techniques that have the potential to make that evidence more powerful should be given high priority. One way that offers that potential is to closely examine three of the techniques used by audit organizations to collect evidence: surveys, semi-structured interviews, and data collection instruments (DCIs). 

Among the many drastic changes wrought by the COVID-19 crisis has been the sudden shift to a virtual work environment. At the start of the pandemic, some audit offices had already made significant strides toward enabling remote work, while others conducted work primarily in-person, whether to build a collaborative work culture, ensure safe handling of sensitive documents, or due to limited information technology infrastructure or other reasons. The pandemic has presented..

Making informed planning decisions early in the audit process is key to completing audits in a timely manner. Many teams use historical information to determine how long an audit will take. But every audit and every audit organization is different, so it is impossible to…

The behavioral economics field has developed valuable insights on when (and how) people make systematic errors in decision-making due to cognitive biases and fallacies. These insights can deepen the understanding of various factors affecting decision-making and are particularly important to audit work, which aims to…