|
Written by Amanda Noble
|
|
The Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) is evaluating 645 comment letters, testimony from 3 public hearings and 3 user forums, and results of 18 field tests responding to the exposure drafts of proposed amendments of GASB Statements 25 and 27 on public pension accounting. The Board plans to re-deliberate issues - including measurement, timing, cost-sharing, special funding situations, effective date and transition - in its upcoming meetings through spring 2012. You can view comment letters, including ALGA's response prepared by the Professional Issues Committee, on GASB's website at www.gasb.org. (ALGA's response is Letter of Comment No. 82 on Accounting and Financial Reporting for Pensions). GASB is deferring its exposure draft on proposed amendments to Other Postemployment Benefit (OPEB) Accounting and Financial Reporting until December 2012.
|
|
Read more...
|
Professional Auditors write and issue audit reports to improve decision-making and enhance public accountability. As one of more than 300 ALGA member organizations, Portland has entered the Knighton Awards program many times and fared pretty well. In this article, I'd like to make some suggestions for Knighton submissions based on our experience, and information I gathered from Knighton judges and committee members.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
Written by Kymber Waltmunson
|
When planning to hire new staff a frequent obstacle is how to know if the applicants have the "right stuff" to be successful and help the organization achieve its goals and objectives. This article highlights the planning phase of the planning-recruitment-selection hiring process and an approach to ferret out and test for key auditing skills.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
Written by Amanda Lamb
|
To many, the economic downturn has rendered the topic of retention virtually moot. As employees see coworkers and peers laid off from positions that were considered stable three years ago, many assume that workers are so thankful they still have a job that they will not leave their position. However, while retention strategy may not currently seem like a pressing issue, it will be, and soon. Furthermore, the "tried and true" retention strategies that were used on the generation of professionals that are currently gearing up for retirement are highly unlikely to work on the generations that follow them. The purpose of this article is not to describe a fool-proof retention strategy. Instead, it is to first explain the value of having a retention strategy, even in tough economic times, and then to highlight why retention strategies should be different across different generations of employees.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
Written by Michael Eglinski
|
|
A few years ago I sat down with a new auditor who asked me to explain how someone went from new hire to seasoned auditor. Not how to write a query, how to read a financial statement, or how to identify the elements of a finding. They wanted to know how experienced auditors thought. They wanted to understand the progression from where they were to where they wanted to be.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
Written by Toufic Tabshouri
|
I have never met a government auditor who settled on this career choice at a young age. If you are that rare gem, please contact me because I need new material for my next ALGA article. For the recent college graduate, the decision to work in government auditing is not an obvious one, as most students are unaware of our profession. I and most of my colleagues ended up in government auditing because we met a recruiter at a campus career fair who told us about the job and convinced us to apply for it. Nonetheless, most of us have found that the government performance auditing profession provides interesting work and affords the opportunity to work with smart and like-minded people. We also like the culture in auditing organizations, which more closely resembles a graduate school or think tank environment than a traditional workplace.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
|
Written by Gus Rodriguez
|
As the Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) Austin Chapter's Academic Relations Committee Chair, I thought it would be helpful to share with all of you what our committee does to help shape the future of the internal audit profession. We do this by focusing our attention on the following areas: Strategic Partnerships, Student Scholarships, Career Fairs, and Speaking Engagements.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
Written by Olga Ovcharenko
|
Every organization is interested in having the most proficient staff while not spending unnecessary resources achieving that goal, especially in the challenging economy we are in now. In this article I attempt to share various techniques used by our office as training opportunities.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
Written by Erin Noel
|
Audit work requires great thinking, and I am not just saying that because I am a performance auditor. Auditors must sift through stacks of sometimes very technical and complicated data and information and make sense of it so that they can communicate the issues in a clear and concise manner to decisionmakers and other stakeholders. Auditors not only determine the key issues or problems, but must identify creative solutions to address these issues. These are not easy tasks given the tight budgets, competing demands, and need for increased oversight in today's economic and political environment.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
Written by Kristine Adams-Wannberg
|
Do you remember what it felt like to be a brand new auditor? Were you provided with sufficient training or were you thrown into the deep end of the pool to see how well you could swim? Would you have appreciated some extra assistance when you started, without looking like you needed it?
|
|
Read more...
|
|
Written by Russell Needler
|
It's hard to believe there are shops out there having a hard time attracting quality candidates to join the auditing profession. This job is the easiest sell since aluminum siding or those limited edition plates from the Franklin Mint. Who wouldn't want a job where you get to tell everybody else what they're doing wrong?
However, for those of you who are inexplicably having trouble, I have a few ideas on how to let potential auditors know just how great this profession is.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
Quarterly
