Newsletter July 2020

In this newsletter:

• Special FAR edition of ESB publication (Dutch)
  
• Q&A follow-up sessions conference 
• FAR Working paper published, entitled “Moving audit teams forward – Designing firm environments for sustainable learning from errors” by Wim Gijselaers, Roger Meuwissen and Thérèse Grohnert 
• FARview podcast #6 with Professor Ganesh Krishnamoorthy 
• FAQ section on website 
• Upcoming events – save the date! 
• Other

Special FAR edition of ESB publication (Dutch)

On 9 July, the ESB (Economisch Statistische Berichten) published a special FAR issue entitled "Accountants doorgelicht” (Auditors screened). 

This issue discusses the current and future desired social contribution of the work of the auditors. The papers reflect the various drivers that affect the role and work of the auditor, such as the environment, the complexity of the audit, the work of supervisors and the influence and expectations of the Supervisory Board. 

The articles in this publication have been written by authors working in practice or academics studying the social significance of the work of the auditor. The issue is introduced by Foundation for Auditing Research chair Henriette Prast. 

You can read the file here.

Q&A follow-up sessions conference

The audience participation during our online conference on 22 June was so vibrant, that there was not sufficient time to answer all the questions raised during the separate sessions. 

To ensure that all the questions posed by the audience are answered, we scheduled follow-up Q&A interviews with the presenters, of which we have published the following two:

• The Q&A session with Professor Alain Schatt on “The economic consequences of joint audit” can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=avFLqTC2_mw
  
• The Q&A session with Professor Jean Bédard on “Auditor judgment on internal control quality and audit quality” is also available and can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoJr9VBvcdE&feature=youtu.be&t=1510
  

For the conference summary, including presentation slides and video’s, you can visit the FAR website: https://foundationforauditingresearch.org/en/news/far-online-conference-22-june-2020-summary-and-videos/

FAR Working paper published, entitled “Moving audit teams forward – Designing firm environments for sustainable learning from errors” by Wim Gijselaers, Roger Meuwissen and Thérèse Grohnert

Over the past ten years, oversight bodies, regulators, governments, and clients have been demanding audit firms deliver higher audit quality, closing the expectations gap. As a response, audit firms have been working on developing and implementing new procedures, structures and audit programs. However, this ‘hard’ approach has not yielded the desired improvements.  

The present project examines the ‘soft’ side of this challenge: the human factor within audit firms that allows teams to respond to a challenging, complex and changing environment. The team researched why some teams have the capacity to learn while doing their work, and others don’t. Through a meta-analysis, a series of interviews, a survey and a case, the project team derived a list of drivers that form an environment for sustainable learning. 

To read the full working paper, please click here.

FARview podcast #6 with Professor Ganesh Krishnamoorthy

There is a lot of variability in audit committee characteristics and their effectiveness. The overall impression is that audit committees are doing a good job and that they are improving over time. An important remaining question is what really drives audit committee involvement in determining audit quality.

In the sixth episode of our podcast series, FARview, our guest is Professor Ganesh Krishnamoorthy (D'Amore-McKim School of Business, Northeastern University). Together with his project team members, he is looking at the determinants of audit committee involvement in the external audit quality and importantly at the impact of the involvement on final audit quality. 

Youtube: https://lnkd.in/gdzQQqF 
Soundcloud: https://lnkd.in/gEhYKc2 
 
For the literature review of this project: https://lnkd.in/g5EyNPX

FAQ section on website

We recently published a FAQ page on our website. Any questions you might have regarding surveys, data and confidentiality can be found here with the answers.  

If you cannot find your question in this list, you can always go to your point of contact within FAR or send an email to info@foundationforauditingresearch.org.

Upcoming event – save the date!

We hope to see you all live next year at the FAR Conference on 21 and 22 June 2021 in Breukelen, the Netherlands. Please save the date in your calendar!”¯

Other

Besides this newsletter and news related to events, we regularly publish literature reviews and practice notes on our website. Of course, you can read all about it in our newsletter, but please also make sure to check out updates on our LinkedIn page as that is where we also share new podcasts and other articles.  

Want to be the first to know? Then don't forget to follow our LinkedIn page.

Do you have suggestions on how to improve our newsletter or news you would like to share with us? Please let us know by sending an email to info@foundationforauditingresearch.org