Digital Audit Universe – Continuous Auditing

– risk-oriented rolling-audit planning supported by methods for continuous-audit planning 2.0 –

Objective:

Dynamic risk fluctuations, their global interconnective impact as well as shorter product lifecycles in an environment with significant influences on the corporate business model call for the implementation of an audit function that is up-to-date and operates in a foresighted manner. In order to keep pace with these developments – from an auditing standpoint – it is necessary to switch from an audit-planning schedule that employs a static, annual perspective formulated one year in advance to a more timely rolling method.

At the same time and from a supervisory perspective, audit-capacity buffers of up to 25 percent should be maintained for ad-hoc examinations in connection with an altered audit-risk landscape. This, after all, is highly advisable from an audit-economic standpoint as well.

In this instance, priority is placed on the creation of foresighted audit-intervention options by establishing a digital audit universe. This universe is to be structured in the form of a risk-oriented landscape of early warning indicators for ensuring the timely allocation of limited audit resources.
ARC supports its clients in the establishment of an “audit risk engine” that provides risk indicators for the systematic evaluation of various audit objects. This can be conducted on a continuous basis or in a periodic cycle appropriate to the client. Equipped with such an engine, audit operations are able to conduct their rolling-audit planning in accordance with the relevant actual risk situation within a company’s practical audit environment.

The German Accounting Law Modernization Act (Bilanzrechtsmodernisierungsgesetz = BilMoG) as well as the country’s Corporate Sector Supervision and Transparency Act (Gesetz zur Kontrolle und Transparenz im Unternehmensbereich = KonTraG) places demands on companies – and consequently on their risk-oriented administrative departments as well. Among these requirements are a timely risk assessment regarding the internal monitoring system as a component of the internal-control, risk-management and governance system. ARC assists its clients in achieving this goal in sync with a statement made by Robert Hirth, executive vice president of the California-based global internal audit practice Protiviti Inc., a leading business consulting and internal audit firm.: “We work in a real-time world, and we need to have real-time auditing. Continuous auditing helps us get there.” (Robert B. Hirth Jr., IIA International Conference 2007)

Topics:

  • Differences and areas of application for continuous auditing vs. continuous monitoring
  • Digitization of the audit universe: continuous auditing
  • Blueprint for an audit risk engine for rolling-audit planning
  • Methods and formative options regarding a modern risk-oriented audit landscape
  • Formulation of business-model-specific adjustment levers and risk components for conducting rolling-audit planning
  • Implementation of the audit landscape’s digitization with regard to the audit object
  • Options for selection of the respective appropriate risk-evaluation systematics and consequences for the operative audit-practice environment
  • Performance of rolling-audit planning with the assistance of quantitative and qualitative risk indicators from a business-model-focused risk assessment
  • Extension module: targeted staff allocation in accordance with key risk areas derived from rolling-audit planning
  • Practical implementation examples and adaption of acquired course knowledge to individual audit objects and the client’s audit landscape
  • Support regarding integration and implementation of a company-tailored solution

Management Trainer

About the ARC Institute

With the Audit Research Center, the ARC Institute provides important impulses for the further development of the audit industry. The focus is on networking science and practice. The focus is on further and new development in cooperation with auditors, companies and associations in order to maintain practical relevance and to develop methods, tools and concepts that can be implemented. The results developed in dialogue with industry experts serve as a guideline and adaptation options in practice today, in order to increase the overall benefit of the company in the long term and sustainably with innovative auditing work.

In the spirit of thought leadership, the ARC Institute and the Audit Research Center stand for topic leadership and forward thinking in the area of internal auditing.

Currently, the ARC Institute supports not only leading supranational institutions in the context of research, consulting and personnel development projects, but also numerous listed companies in the three German-speaking countries of Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

 

Terms of participation and price

Each open training day is 890,- Euro plus VAT when booking the modules individually. Inhouse training conditions are based on individual pricing and travel expenses. After receipt of your registration you will receive a confirmation of registration with invoice. Please pay the registration fee directly after receiving the invoice. The registration fee does not include 19 % VAT.  The price includes participation in the lectures of the booked event, lunch, coffee breaks and seminar documents.

How can we support you?

At a glance

Target audience:
Employees and managerial staff from the internal audit function

Methodology:
Interactive workshop, discussion, game-theory strategy analyses according to US-American mathematician John Forbes Nash, Jr., practical exercises, case studies, retrospective summary

Training / Training / Consulting period:
Bookings are based on an audit-situation analysis as well as a personal preliminary meeting (workshops without implementation generally cover 3-5 days of instruction).

Contact:
Would you like more details about ARC’s Audit Training & Consulting Services, or do you wish to book an appointment with its team? Please address your e-mail inquiry to Info@ARC-Institute.com or phone us at +49-2159-6945-904

Registration