The internal audit (IA) function is vital to the health of any nonprofit, regardless of mission or scope. The audit committee and its individual members are crucial partners in safeguarding the integrity, purpose and, ultimately, the success of organizations. They often face challenges navigating a strained regulatory environment, all while trying to do more with less. Here’s a list of the top 10 challenges keeping internal auditors up at night, and possible remedies to help continue the critical work.
1. CHANGES TO OPERATIONS OR STRATEGY : Change is inevitable. As the needs of communities, internal dynamics, priorities and leadership transform, nonprofit managers adjust their mission and strategies. While this dynamism is essential to further the work, change can create strain for internal auditors. Whether it’s expanding operations to a new location, working with new donors or rolling out a new organizational structure, internal auditors are often left scrambling to ensure compliance.
THE REMEDY: Compliance headaches don’t have to be unavoidable. Managers should be proactive about integrating internal audit into large scale organizational changes. This means…
