Announcing a new pair of books for internal audit practitioners

One of the best ways for an internal audit department or individual internal auditors to upgrade their practices is by discussing case studies.

I learned this through a friend of mine, Professor Barbara Toffler, who mentored top executives on ethics. Instead of learning an ethics code, which is not sufficient in guiding action in real life, she led sessions where a team of executives would discuss one or more case studies based on real life situations. This was very effective in helping them think through the implications of the situation and how they should – and should not – respond.

Auditing that Matters: Case Studies is a collection of 20 case studies based (all but one) on real life situations from my years as an internal audit executive.

When an internal audit function holds a team meeting, each member is given a copy of this book (preferably in advance) and asked to think about what they would do. Each case study ends with a number of questions, but the leader can certainly either adapt them or add his or her own.

Then the team leader can facilitate a discussion of the selected case and see if the team can, after exploring the options, come…