The role of internal auditors has become more demanding and accountable. Boards and Audit Committees rely on internal auditors’ reports to understand where the business stands with respect to internal controls and compliance. Auditors need to examine operations from ground-up and assess controls with speed and accuracy, regardless of volumes, to be able to address the regulatory and internal requirements of audit.
Internal auditors are fraught with data from disparate sources. A day in the life of an auditor involves checking e-mails, following-up with process owners, coordinating and reviewing the team’s work, seeking access to data from IT teams, generating exception reports, examining documents, maintaining workpapers, drafting reports, meetings and the list goes on.
Without automation, inherent limitations in existing systems cause challenges such as delays in follow-up, belated receipt, or lack of receipt of data for analysis, inability to analyse complete sets of data, missing files, and duplication of efforts. As a result, meeting the requirements of the Board and Audit Committee becomes a bit difficult and stressful.
Automation can help in the following ways. A small start goes a long way:
Check out our Solutions page for examples or our Technology page for details.