Internal Controls & Audit Management
Establishing adequate Internal Controls over Financial Reporting (ICFR) is often considered the most costly
and time consuming aspect of Sarbanes Oxley compliance. Documenting and testing important financial controls requires significant effort from both internal and external auditors and is under continually growing levels of scrutiny.
The complexities and resource burdens of Audit program design and management are also challenging organizations. Compliance, operational and strategic audits across business units, geographies and functional areas of a business require effective integration of information to optimize the planning, coordination and execution of audit processes. At the same time, audit executives are being asked to do more with less and to bring distinct value to operational execution and risk management processes.
The Aline Solution
Aline offers a comprehensive Governance, Risk and Compliance solution that includes a proven and powerful internal controls module that is fully integrated with the platform’s enterprise risk and internal controls management capabilities. 
With Aline you can quickly document your controls, test plans and audit programs to provide a clear assessment of your current practices. Even for organizations with mature SOX compliance programs, Aline yields significant cost saving and operational efficiencies while bringing the power of cross-functional analytics to audit program design and risk mitigation strategies.
By leveraging Aline’s integrated information framework, you can map your controls against industry and regulatory best practices. Information integration and insights to process and risk dependencies enables a highly-effective risk scoping approach that optimizes the number of key controls, eliminates unnecessary testing cycles and automates the design and execution of value-added audit programs.
Understandably, organizations are now searching for ways to reduce the total cost of compliance, improve the value of the audit function and more importantly, reduce resource requirements. This allows Internal Audit teams to engage in more value added audit and control design activities, focusing on operational and strategic issues and process improvement challenges that impact business performance.
Solution Details
| Document controls, test plans and audit programs |
Leverage the power of a central database of controls that is integrated with audit, enterprise risk management, IT governance, compliance and corporate performance management. Establish a unified controls framework which allows for geographic, business unit and compliance distinctions as needed. Link and document internal controls to external documents, IT applications and spreadsheets with control implications. Apply a proven best-practice, risk-based approach to internal controls management and audit program design. |
| Apply risk-driven scoping and prioritization to controls and audit |
Use Aline’s top-down controls assessment methodology to bring focus to those controls that carry the highest amount of risk to the enterprise. Ranks and prioritize risks and let Aline define the nature, timing and extent of testing to be performed. Use Aline to facilitate change management and to drive management’s ownership of controls documentation and testing across the organization. Quickly identify and flag controls for specific audit programs and for conducting focused reviews of high-risk areas involving professional judgment. |
| Assign and track audit program activities across the enterprise |
Generate to-do lists with auto-reminders and built-in review and approval workflows. Access real-time dashboards and status reports to evaluate testing and remediation efforts by individuals, functional groups or audit areas. Build a controls mind-set and a sustainable process for ensuring that controls are in place, being performed and working as intended. Create opportunities to hold risk-based dialogue with middle management based on a common language of controls and risk exposures. Automatically define risk driven audit programs. |
| Drive Visibility and Accountability across the Organization |
Share with process owners, external auditors, senior management and board members. Improve audit and controls communications with operating groups about complex operational, compliance and financial issues, as well as risk management challenges. Add value through assessments and consultations and make the audit function more effective, efficient and valuable to the overall organization. Bolster controls and convert the regulatory mandate into shareholder value. |
Key Benefits
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Leverage controls evaluation analytics to substantiate the adequacy of controls, eliminate unnecessary controls, identify control gaps and optimize the nature, extent and timing of controls monitoring and testing processes |
Automatically select and design audit programs based on an integrated view of risks to strategy execution and compliance objectives |
Assure compliance, audit best practices, efficiencies and business value-add through comprehensive planning, workflow, real-time dashboard and management reporting capabilities |
