FAR Practice Note - Audit Committee Involvement and Audit Quality

The audit committee is a key feature of contemporary corporate governance. Despite ever-tightening regulation concerning its independence and expertise, it still is unclear why some audit committees underperform, and how this impacts the effectiveness of the external audit. We argue that, next to having the appropriate skills, audit committee involvement in the audit process is crucial for its effectiveness. Communication, trust, and support between the audit committee and the external auditor, as well as the power and leadership of the audit committee are key features which may affect how the audit committee deals with disagreements between management and the auditor, and to what extent it will critically challenge both parties. However, these “soft” dimensions are understudied, and more insight is valuable for practitioners, academics, as well as regulators on what triggers audit committee involvement, and how this feeds back into the audit process. We aim to demonstrate that an active, involved audit committee is able to create synergies with the external auditor, which can streamline the audit process and enhance audit quality.

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Authors

Prof. dr. Ann Vanstraelen

Ann Vanstraelen is Full Professor of Accounting and Assurance Services at Maastricht University and serves as Head of the department of Accounting and Information Management. She coordinates the multidisciplinary research theme "Culture, Ethics and Leadership". She earned her PhD at the University of Antwerp. Her research interests relate to the broad field of auditing and assurance services, governance, corporate reporting and disclosure, with a specific focus on the quality of accounting and auditing practices.

Dr. Sanne Janssen

PhD Researcher at University of Antwerp & Maastricht University

Dr. Mathijs van Peteghem

Assistant Professor at Maastricht University & Doctoral researcher KU Leuven

Dr. Caren Schelleman

Caren Schelleman is an assistant professor at the Department of Accounting and Information Management at Maastricht University School of Business and Economics. She has also been a visiting professor at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. Caren coordinates and teaches courses on internal control and auditing at both undergraduate and graduate levels. She has presented papers at Annual Congresses of the European Accounting Association, Midyear Meetings of the Audit Section of the American Accounting Association, the International Symposium on Audit Research, conferences of the European Auditing Research Network, and at several workshops and seminars in Europe and the US. Her research interests include auditing, assurance services, internal control, and corporate governance, both from an economic and a behavioral point of view.

Dr. Ulrike Thürheimer

Ulrike joined the School of Accounting at UNSW Sydney in August 2020. Prior to that, she completed her PhD in Auditing at Maastricht University, the Netherlands. Ulrike's research centers around audit quality. She is interested in how inputs to the audit, the audit process and contextual factors affect audit production and audit quality. Specifically, her research investigates the quality of group audits, the effectiveness of public oversight and auditor's incentives from regulation and litigation.

Prof. dr. Ganesh Krishnamoorthy

Professor Ganesh's primary areas of research interest include corporate governance, audit judgment, and internal auditing.

He has extensive work experience in public accounting and in industry that spans several countries including India, Liberia (West Africa), and the United States.

Dr. Rogier Deumes

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