Course Methodology
This course uses a mixture of presentations, discussions, case studies, videos, and interactive exercises to transform participants’ knowledge into hands-on practice.
Course Objectives
By the end of the course, participants will be able to:
- Distinguish barriers to effective written communication and identify ways to overcome them
- Identify the target audience and adapt writing accordingly
- Structure the audit report for greater impact
- Present audit findings in a clear and concise manner
- Produce a concise and compelling executive summary
- Learn ways to review their own and others’ work constructively and efficiently
Target Audience
This course is suitable for all auditors required to produce and review audit reports.
Target Competencies
- Gathering data
- Presenting data
- Drafting audit reports
- Reviewing audit reports
- Presenting reports
What makes a report effective?
- Good practice in plain language writing
- Techniques to improve writing under pressure
Techniques to organize information gathered during fieldwork
- Traditional report structure
- Mind-mapping
- Outlining
Findings (also called issues or observations)
- Principles of and approaches to writing findings
- Risks vs. failed controls
- Root cause analysis
- Critiquing findings
- Crafting findings
Executive summaries
- Introduction to the principles underlying executive summaries
- Critiquing executive summaries
- Crafting executive summaries
Preparing the final product
- Format, layout and templates
- Reviewing
- Content vs. mechanics
- Peer review techniques
