{"id":12182,"date":"2012-01-10T14:08:18","date_gmt":"2012-01-10T20:08:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/?p=12182"},"modified":"2020-02-20T14:15:19","modified_gmt":"2020-02-20T20:15:19","slug":"using-kanban-to-improve-audit-management","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/using-kanban-to-improve-audit-management\/","title":{"rendered":"Using Kanban to Improve Audit Management"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Introduction by Planview AgilePlace COO Jon Terry<\/em><\/h4>\n

One of our New Year\u2019s resolutions at Planview AgilePlace is to\u00a0do a better job of sharing ideas<\/strong>\u00a0for effectively using Kanban with our customers. We pick up some pretty good ideas from working with customers, and we promise that we\u2019ll be working some of those into blog posts from time to time. We are also blessed with a lot of really smart friends in the Lean\/Agile community, a number of whom have agreed to share their wisdom with us and you as guest bloggers.<\/p>\n

The first of these guest posts is from Yuval Yeret of\u00a0Agile Sparks. We\u2019ve known Yuval for several years now and both respect and really like him. He\u2019s a talented Kanban trainer and consultant and a frequent speaker on the Lean\/Agile conference circuit. You should definitely check-out his blog\u00a0yuvalyeret.com\u00a0and his\u00a0presentations on\u00a0Slideshare<\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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Using Kanban to Improve Audit Management<\/h3>\n

Every time we at\u00a0AgileSparks\u00a0get a chance to go out of our comfort zone of technology delivery organizations, it excites us. We believe that the thinking, principles and practices we use for technology delivery are very relevant in other knowledge-intensive domains as well, and keep looking for opportunities to test that belief. Our work with technology delivery organizations exposes us to other supporting activities in organizations. I recently wrote on my blog about an HR group that we worked with (and I have more updates about that group that I need to write about\u2026). This time I want to talk about another type of activity \u2013 Audit.<\/p>\n

An\u00a0<\/a>Audit\u00a0<\/a>group within an organization is charged with auditing systems and processes mainly as part of Risk Management. Let\u2019s look at what Agile\/Kanban might mean in this context.<\/p>\n

The Context of Audit<\/h3>\n

The work in an Audit group can range from scripted audits to verify adherence to standards, to investigative research type activity to explore what is going on and identify risks. When talking to a couple of people from such an organization, I was reminded of Scripted Testing and\u00a0Exploratory Testing<\/a>, and running many, many learning loops as part of the investigation being what makes a great auditor.<\/p>\n

Audit groups can be very powerful in an organization. Healthy organizations try to maintain their independence so they have them report very high in the org chart, sometimes directly to the board. With this power comes great responsibility. You really need to make sure you are doing things the right way. Your findings need to be correct. But more than that, you want to get buy-in to your findings from the audited group. If you run a one-sided show, it will be hard to maintain trust and open lines-of-communication. All this typically means lots of interactions between senior managers, especially as findings are being reviewed and prepared for publication, and a lot of attention to detail and quality.<\/p>\n

What are the Challenges in Audit?<\/h3>\n

One of the huge and unique challenges is the funnel shape of the work. Imagine a group of 20 auditors. Each of them is working on their own audit project. The first steps of scoping, research, preparation of report they can and do quite autonomously. But as they approach milestones such as \u201cFirst Draft sent to audited group\u201d and \u201cPublication\u201d, they need more and more involvement by the more senior auditors and managers of the group. This is due to the sensitive nature I mentioned earlier. This can create a bottleneck or at least lots of variability when you need a non-instantly-available resource like a VP of the group or it\u2019s GM.<\/p>\n

Another challenge is that, of course, the auditor needs to work with the audited group. She needs them to share documents, allocate time, provide access to IT systems, and various other aspects. Remember that, while she does serve a master that is high above the audited group, they are still mainly focused on their day-to-day activities and typically consider the audit unwanted interference. Even if they INVITED the audit they still have their daily activities to take care of, so the auditor might have to deal with lots of non-instantly-available resources \u2013 with having to wait.<\/p>\n

Side note: This by the way is very similar to the challenges of the Agile consultant when working with a group. Regardless of who invited us in, whether we are serving a very high level directive, or invited by the group itself, it is quite hard to get the group to dedicate attention to us in the midst of the daily challenges that are consuming it. Actually, if we look at what we talk about with Kanban and Lean, we aim to build organizations that know how to\u00a0effectively balance the important<\/strong>\u00a0(improving capabilities) and\u00a0the urgent<\/strong>\u00a0(delivering current work). Maybe in some years more organizations will do this effectively, but for now, we shouldn\u2019t be surprised to see the problems we are coming in to help organizations with\u2026<\/p>\n

These challenges in getting time and attention from the teams who are being audited and the executives who must review the results, thus leading to lots of stop-start work, would tend to push many organizations to load down the auditors with many projects to keep them utilized.<\/p>\n

And, in the midst of all that stop-start it\u2019s inevitable that there will be changes in priorities \u2013 events triggering a need for a special audit, shifting business concerns and priorities, etc. This can wreak havoc on an annual audit plan. With all the variability, it is hard for managers to know when to expect completion, or to understand which projects are going well and which are struggling.<\/p>\n

What Would a Great Audit Group Look Like?<\/h3>\n

Considering the challenges above a great Audit group would have the following\u00a0characteristics:<\/p>\n