Is getting the information for your audit like pulling teeth? BusinessOptix process documentation can help.

“How are you feeling about your upcoming audit?” might be the corporate equivalent of asking if you’re looking forward to having a root canal. A corporate audit may feel to some people like having a dental procedure; invasive and painful. It's not a one-off event either, there are a variety of audits a company might do - some are regulatory necessities, some are fiduciary obligations, and some are good business practices... As well as financial, IT, and operational audits, there are internal audits of risks, controls, and governance.

According to The Institute of Internal Auditors, “Internal auditing is an independent, objective assurance and consulting activity designed to add value and improve an organization’s operations. It helps an organization accomplish its objectives by bringing a systematic, disciplined approach to evaluate and improve the effectiveness of risk management, control, and governance processes…the internal audit activity provides assurance that internal controls in place are adequate to mitigate the risks, governance processes are effective and efficient, and organizational goals and objectives are met.”

These are worthy goals. But, even in this digital age, identifying and collecting all the necessary information to understand what is going on under the hood of an organization can be a can be time-consuming and challenging undertaking.

One way to help ensure audit accuracy and efficiency is to have a comprehensive and accurate process documentation system in place for all your operational processes. BusinessOptix enables you to create and share process documentation which can ease the audit effort:

• Reduce Costs: Up-to-date definition of the business processes reduces the audit effort for the auditors and internal staff - preparing for, conducting, and addressing actions.
• Improved Efficiency: Having a process documentation system in place helps streamline the audit process, making it easier for auditors to identify and address any potential issues quickly. By having a clear, organized system in place, auditors can quickly pinpoint any areas that need further investigation or clarification.
• Increased Transparency: Process documentation helps ensure that all stakeholders are aware of the audit process and any potential necessary changes. This increases transparency and helps to ensure that all parties involved in the audit are on the same page.
• Reduced Risk: By having process documentation in place, any potential risks associated with an audit can be identified and addressed quickly. This can help minimize the potential losses or damages incurred if an audit were to go wrong.
• Improved Accountability: Process documentation helps to ensure that all parties involved in an audit are held accountable for their actions. This helps to ensure that all parties are held responsible for their part in the audit process and helps to create a more structured and organized system.

Our customer, SS&C, struggled to manage complex compliance measures in a highly manual environment. Thousands of employees relied on static documents that sat across several shared drives. They had over 1800 undocumented processes and 4,000 procedures. Demonstrating compliance with the audits was very time intensive for the team working with auditors.

Since introducing BusinessOptix, SS&C has:

• Documented 800 processes mission-critical processes
• Delivered automation documentation and work instructions for 1600 of their most used procedures
• Eliminated 100% of the manual auditing through automation and reduced the process that took multiple FTEs weeks to two FTEs completing within a few days

Root canals aren’t pleasant, but at least anesthetics can minimize the pain and discomfort. When you can make something that you struggle with significantly easier, why wouldn’t you take advantage of that? BusinessOptix process documentation capabilities help ensure that the audit process can be carried out efficiently, with more accuracy and completeness. Using BusinessOptix makes your audit less time-consuming, less costly, and less painful!