Review: Audit Spotlight with Essity
"From Audit Management to Data Analytics - Digitalization of Internal Audit at Essity"
Recently, the Audit Spotlights of the IIA Austria took place, to which we were allowed to actively contribute together with our valued customer Essity: Compernass-Küffner, Director Internal Audit, presented on the topic "From Audit Management to Data Analytics - Digitization of Internal Audit at Essity". In this review, we summarize the most important key points and provide you with the recording of the webinar. The video provides a good insight into how Essity's Internal Audit department digitally manages its audit process and the role that the use of SAP based data analytics plays here.
Essity is a leading global hygiene and healthcare company based in Sweden, divided into three business units (Health & Medical, Consumer Goods and Professional Hygiene). Internal Audit consists of 16 employees and an external IT auditor, and can be considered a smaller department relative to the size of the company. So, given the size of the company and the large number of audit areas, how does Internal Audit successfully fulfill its mission and deliver audits in sufficient numbers while maintaining high quality?
Automation and digitalization along the audit process play an important role here. Automated risk assessment in audit planning enables an agile approach with monthly updates that allow the audit plan to be appropriately focused.
Essity has been using data analytics for 20 years, which is now automated in the same way as risk assessment. The elimination of manual steps allows more focus to be placed on monitoring results, rather than generating them. SAP based data analytics is particularly suitable as a preparation for audits, as the auditor can base his audit specifically on the results of the analysis and thus work very efficiently.
But how were these automations implemented technically? Extraction and analysis of SAP data were mapped by Essity's Internal Audit department in an integrated manner on Diligent's HighBond platform. This centralized solution offers extensive audit management functionalities, such as the management of audit programs, the organization of audits as projects, the visualization of analytic results, and the seamless integration of reporting and essential follow-up functions. A particular advantage is that the individual modules are seamlessly integrated, so that results from data analysis can be directly incorporated into audit projects and used for control testing. This makes the audit process more efficient and effective.
Our thanks go to Compernass-Küffner and Essity for these valuable and interesting insights! If you would like to learn more, feel free to watch the recording. Please feel free to ask us further questions about the webinar.