Attestation Engagements and
Performance Auditing: Understanding the Standards
• Defining "performance
audits"
• Defining "attestation engagements"
• Understanding the importance of performance audits
• Understanding how attestation engagements add value
• Understanding performance auditing standards: an overview
of chapters 7 and 8 in the "Yellow Book"
• Understanding attestation engagement standards: an
overview of the AICPA's Statement on Standards for
Attestation Engagements and chapter 6 of the "Yellow
Book"
• Understanding the differences between performance
audits and attestation engagements
Streamlining the Report Writing
Process
(typically 3 days)
• Have
an enhanced understanding of:
–the importance of audit objectives and findings;
–the link between audit objectives and audit findings;
–the difference between types of audit findings;
–collecting evidence that meets Yellow Book standards; and
–the tests and types of evidence.
• Be
able to conduct productive report planning meetings;
• Be able to more efficiently summarize findings into a coherent
draft report message;
• Be able to write effective charge paragraphs;
Write report sections more quickly and effectively with
less stress;
• Be familiar with writing tools that make audit reports more
easily understandable and convincing;
• Understand that the report writing process is a team process;
• Recognize that report writing starts during the survey and
planning phase;
• Recognize the responsibilities of the audit manager, the
AIC, and the performance team throughout the writing process;
and
• Be able to apply strategies to overcome report writing challenges.
Reporting and Presenting Findings
• Differentiate between different
types of audit findings,
• Explain the effect objectives have on findings
and message formulation,
• Design a report message that links findings,
conclusions and recommendations to the objectives
• Write findings that incorporate all four finding
elements,
• Write findings that meet the standards of evidence,
and
• Organize findings using charge paragraphs and
topic sentences.
Performance Auditing: The Fundamentals
• What is performance auditing?
• Planning performance audits
• Data collection and analysis
• Elements of a finding
• Audit documentation
• Communicating the results of our audit
Writing
Effective Audit Reports
• Developing
the message from the start of the engagement
process
•
Writing reader-friendly audit reports
•
Using deductive structure to present report
information
•
Writing paragraphs with focus, unity, and coherence
•
Writing effective sentences
•
Choosing words that precisely and directly
convey your message
Interviewing
for Information—A Structured Approach
• An
eight-step interviewing model
• Active
listening
• Effective
questioning techniques
• Team
interviewing techniques
• Handling
difficult interview situations
Public
Speaking for Auditors
•
Planning oral presentations
• Organizing:
Making sense and order of all the information
you’ve collected
•
Employing effective delivery skills
•
Preparing and using visual aids
•
Effective video conferencing
•
Fielding questions
Running
Effective Meetings
•
Key components of effective meetings
•
Managing disruptive behaviors
•
Guidelines for running meeting
•
Entrance and exit conferences
•
Team meetings
Creating
Effective Engagement Teams
•
Defining an engagement team
•
Including stakeholders as team members
•
Five stages of team development
•
Setting operating guidelines
•
Effective engagement team communications
•
Balancing tasks and people
• Supervision,
management, and leadership: What’s
the difference?
Standards
of Evidence and Audit Documentation
• What
the “yellow book” says
•
Sufficiency, relevance and competence
•
Types of evidence
•
Documenting evidence to support findings
•
Indexing and referencing
Data
Collection and Analysis Fundamentals for Auditors
and Analysts
•
Learning data collection tools frequently used
by auditors
•
Collecting primary information
•
Interviewing
•
Questionnaires
•
Analyzing information to develop findings
•
Qualitative and quantitative analysis techniques
Creative
Thinking for Auditors
•
Understanding learning styles
• Thinking “outside the box” to
design and carry out engagements
• Overcoming
writer’s block
•
Generating ideas
•
Analysis
tools you may not have used before
•
Innovative approaches to teambuilding |
