Newsletter June / July 2020

In this newsletter:

• Online FAR Conference on 22 June 2020 - summary: "Issuing Going Concern Opinions Resembles COVID-19 approach"
• Online FAR Masterclass by Prof. dr. Eddy Cardinaels and Prof. dr. Kristof Stouthuysen on "The impact of auditor interactions on audit quality" on 5 June 2020
• FARview: new podcast #5 with Professor Bart Dierynck (Dutch)
• Article FAR researcher Prof. dr. Anna Gold in EY's magazine "Zicht op toezicht" (Dutch)
• Save the date: Next year's FAR International Conference on 21 and 22 June 2021
• Other

Online FAR Conference on 22 June 2020 – summary: “Issuing Going Concern Opinions Resembles COVID-19 approach”

The yearly International FAR Conference was held on Monday June 22. Given the unprecedented circumstances, the event took place in an online, Corona-proof setting. Still nearly 200 participants from all over the world registered for this virtual meeting. About 50 percent were academics and the other 50 percent consisted of, for example, practitioners, regulators and government officials. The theme of the conference was purposefully broad: ‘academic and practitioner insights on audit quality’. This theme seamlessly fits with FAR’s main purpose: facilitating knowledge development and knowledge dissemination concerning audit quality. The presentations provided a representative cross section of the current FAR projects, in which knowledge is created as well as shared. During five sessions, researchers from Canada, the Netherlands, Switzerland and the USA presented their FAR research findings and their views on current issues.

Take-aways:

• Researchers and accountants must work on creating strong sustainable partnerships, based on mutual knowledge exchange and shared goals.
• Indirect support from the audit committee leads to more professional skepticism of the accountant.
• The issuing of a Going Concern Opinion by the accountant is similar to taking measures during the COVID-19 crisis: there is high uncertainty.
• The joint audit does not (yet) have a proven positive impact on audit quality and market concentration.

For the full summary, please click here.

For the full videos of the presentations click here. 

Follow-up Podcasts
As far as technology allowed, there was a lively feed of participant questions, led by young auditors from practice. Not all questions were covered during the sessions, due to time constraints. These questions will be answered by the presenters in follow-up podcasts which will be available shortly via the Foundation for Auditing Research website: www.foundationforauditingresearch.org. The (interim) research reports of all project teams can also be found on the website.

Online FAR Masterclass by Prof. dr. Eddy Cardinaels and Prof. dr. Kristof Stouthuysen on “The impact of auditor interactions on audit quality” on 5 June 2020

On 5 June FAR organized its first online event, a Masterclass on ‘The impact of auditor interactions on audit quality” by Prof. dr. Eddy Cardinaels and Prof. dr. Kristof Stouthuysen. It was an interesting session about the important role senior auditors have towards knowledge transfer to junior auditors.

For the full summary report,click here.  

You can watch the edited version of the Masterclass here (1:08 hrs).

FARview: new podcast #5 with Professor Bart Dierynck (Dutch)

In the fifth episode of our podcast series #FARview, Professor Bart Dierynck is our guest. He is Professor of Management Accounting at the Department of Accountancy at Tilburg University.

An accountancy firm can be considered a high reliability organization, just like a hospital, an airline or a nuclear power plant. After all, if an accountant makes a wrong judgement, it can have very serious negative consequences, even if it is more about money than directly about human lives. If we consider an accounting firm as a high reliability organization it is a good way to look at how things can be done better, especially when it comes to learning. Tjibbe Bosman spoke to Professor Bart Dierynck about this interesting perspective.

The podcast can be found on the following channels:

YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8eCUAt4Sdo&feature=youtu.be

Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/auditingresearch/farview-bart-dierynck

Article FAR researcher Prof. dr. Anna Gold in EY's magazine "Zicht op toezicht" (Dutch)

This month, EY included an interview with Prof. Dr. Anna Gold about her FAR research project “How can audit committee support improve auditors’ application of professional skepticism?” in their monthly magazine 'Zicht op toezicht' (View on supervision).

Is there a relationship between audit committee and accountant and if so, what is it? Most studies mainly look at how the quality of the audit committee relates to reporting. Interaction with the accountant is not explicitly addressed in these studies. Nevertheless, it is precisely this interaction that is a hot topic. Anna Gold conducts research into this relationship.

The article can be read here from page 33: https://emeia.ey-vx.com/4985/142440/new-folder/-01-0604-zicht-op-toezicht-juni-2020-internet-spreads-def.pdf

Save the date: Next year’s FAR International Conference on 21 and 22 June 2021

This year, we were not able to host a live conference due to the circumstances around COVID-19.

However, 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 these 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