The profession of internal audit has over the last 3 decades undergone dramatic changes. Over the last decade there has been a steep generation of internal audit activity within various Industries. The collective benefit provided by the profession to all industries has reached unfathomable heights.

The profession has now changed its posture to that of a Corporate Advisor from being a watchdog or a bloodhound. As they have access and depth of understanding of the industry to a level, it has enabled them to procure a multi-perspective vision into finance, accounting and reporting, operations, and IT. This has helped the profession to achieve an impeccable profile as corporate learned visionary.

As the years of practice in the profession increases, the expanse of knowledge over multiple industries and specific practices followed by each of them to suit the business environments becomes exposed to the person. As a singular repository of all such knowledge and wisdom, with impartial and unbiased thought process expected in the practice of internal audit, they become wise and achieve a higher level of understanding and outlook into the broader business world.

Presently there has been a shift in the internal audit paradigm to advocate and execute the role of a strategic advisor to the client not only on controls but also on business enhancements through backward integrations and diversification, market understanding in cost of material, labor, and equipment.

The consistent interaction with operational, financial, accounting, and IT process owners of various industries has provided avenue to increase the knowledge of the individual practicing the profession of internal audit. The consistent need to keep oneself well-read and continued value addition through CEP demands of the profession has enabled the internal auditors to be well informed and educated to provide valuable consultancy to various businesses.

The depth of review required by the internal auditors to perceive the controls perceptions from multiple arenas of the corporate infrastructure viz. operations, accounting and reporting, regulatory and legal, and IT design and structure in the organization, for each of the business activities has made them more and more intellectually capable of handling the control needs in any industry. This has effectively made them a value adding machinery in the business world. Further, they can apply synergy in their recommendations from the best practices of various industries to suit other industries or businesses under the same industry.

Internal auditors have been on the lookout for potential fraud schemes which could be practiced in any Industry. This has required them to focus beyond theory and into the technical and operational functioning of the industry. The various innovative schemes, which are invented by the fraudsters and persons of unethical culture, have become very complex over the years. A specialized approach can be executed by the internal audit into the various fraud strategies and the flexible application of such schemes across multiple industries. This would also need a synergic audit approach with a cross industry outlook. Auditors capable of developing an internal audit approach with such complex aspirations would be most suitable for sustaining the profession of internal audit.

The movement of individuals over their home country with strength of knowledge and cross cultural acceptance in the working territory has facilitated the modern corporates to work under a common code of functioning which is termed as the corporate culture. Internal auditors need to understand the philosophical, psychological and cultural borders of the various peoples when addressing a solution package on specific areas where the most important resource are the people.

The internal audit process facilitates the team role play alongside the process owners in developing valuable recommendations on the gaps identified during the internal audit process. Such Control Self Assessment (CSA) methodology when applied through the process owners, has helped in reducing the change management challenges while implementing the audit recommendation.

Internal auditors also reveal the lack of appropriate application of operational principles in the areas of inventory, purchase, asset management, etc. which has led to an increase in the business expenditure to unimaginable levels. Further the different strategies of pricing and cost escalations applied by the various suppliers are researched by the internal auditors to provide a more educated and considered recommendations which results in immense cost reductions in the organization.Internal check and controls are reviewed not only from a singular aspect of accounting and reporting, but also from operational and IT control facility in the business. This has enabled the organizations to avoid duplicate control mechanisms thereby reducing the cost of controls.

The ethical level expected to be practiced by the position is highly demanding and the need tomaintain discipline of life in the corporate, social, and regulatory circles has pushed the personnel etiquettes of internal auditors to a very high level.

Internal Auditors are quite different from financial auditors especially due to the consultative role in the organization, unlike the certifying capacity of the statutory auditors. This role has planted a higher level of responsibility on the internal auditors to embark on exploratory road in its process which needs to be backed with logic, facts, best practice understanding, fraud scheme awareness, and understanding on the market, economic and regulatory changes. The meaning of internal audit is quite far reaching and one cannot attribute the unction to mere review of controls. The profession of internal audit needs to be understood in its real nature of practice rather than just a definition. The internal audit function can be measured only by the extent or level of professionalism, knowledge, wisdom, and sensibility applied in the practice. It is to be construed as a profession which fully exercises the role of an advisory to the organization in all activities of its business to the very hilt, while maintaining the noble stature of the practitioner.