试论审计重要性在现代风险导向审计中的运用

审计重要性是审计理论和实务中的核心概念．合理确定重要性水平对于控制审计风险和提高审计工作的效率和效果具有十分重要的作用。在现代风险导向审计下,审计重要性的作用不仅不能被弱化,反而更应该加强。注册会计师应当在计划审计工作时对重要性水平进行评估．并在审计实施阶段根据情况的变化进行适当修改,在审计工作结束前评价错报的严重程度以支持将要发表的审计意见。     

审计概念的模糊性:基于注册会计师职业判断视角

在审计理论研究和审计实践工作中,通常会运用到大量的审计概念,如审计独立性、审计重要性、审计风险等。这些审计概念往往都没有十分精确的定义,而含有极大的模糊性。这就为注册会计师职业判断的产生和运用提供了极大的空间。事实上,在审计的各个环节,无不含有注册会计师丰富的职业判断在内。因此,揭示审计概念的模糊性与审计人员职业判断之间的依存关系显得十分必要。     

The role of the audit committee in enhancing the credibility of CSR disclosure: Evidence from STOXX Europe 600 members

This study examines the influence of audit committee attributes, namely financial expertise, independence, meeting frequency and size, on the adoption of CSR assurance. The study also offers insight into the effect of audit committee attributes on the scope and level of CSR assurance and the selection of CSR assurance providers. Contextually, this is achieved using a sample of European companies listed on the STOXX 600 index over the period 2012–2018. The findings show that attributes related to audit committee financial expertise, audit committee independence and audit committee meeting frequency and the existence of a CSR committee, are positively linked with the adoption of CSR assurance. Moreover, our empirical analysis further highlights the critical role of audit committee financial expert members in enhancing the scope and level of CSR assurance. Furthermore, audit committee with more frequent meetings lead to higher assurance scopes. Our findings offer significant and multidimensional insights for regulators, policymakers and professionals, regarding the revision and establishment of regulations concerning the audit committee structure.     

The Ability of Internal Auditors to Identify Ethical Dilemmas

This study surveys the internal audit department of a large financial services organization. Respondents were challenged to recognize and evaluate ethical and unethical situations often encountered in practice. Four key demographic variables were investigated: gender, age, years of employment and peer group influence. For the most part, respondents view themselves as more ethical than their peers. There does appear to be a gender effect suggesting females' ability to identify ethical behavior better than their male counterparts. This study contributes to the extant literature in that it has explored a previously unexplored profession, namely, the internal auditing profession.     

风险导向审计模式辨析

如何正确认识风险导向审计再次成为国内学者和实务界争议的焦点。本文就审计理论界和实务界对风险导向审计所持不同观点进行梳理,归纳出控制风险导向审计、经营风险导向审计、诉讼风险导向审计和重大错报风险导向审计四种观点,并对此进行了评析,认为重大错报风险导向审计是真正体现了审计的本质目标。     

The Integrity Factor-Critical to Accounting Education

Integrity must be the organizing principle for accounting education and accounting practice. Without integrity, ethical frameworks can be misused as manipulative devices to support particular interests. The accounting profession has frequently addressed integrity. The professional interpretation, however, has been a narrow rules-oriented approach focusing on identifying fraudulent financial reporting and on traditional views on the nature and scope of the audit report. This paper links integrity to corporate responsibility and to the individual moral responsibility to take the moral point of view.     

对中外审计市场环境的差异分析与应对思考

审计市场环境是决定审计运作质量和效率的重要因素 ,也是制约审计市场机制能否有效运行的关键 ,它深刻地影响着审计职能和目标的实现。任何时期的审计实践都不可能超越审计市场环境的影响和制约 ,审计市场环境的变化 ,必将导致审计实践做出相应的调整     

The Evolution of Audit Regulation in a Russian Market Economy

Abstract

This paper reports on a study of the audit profession in Russia in 1996. It builds on the work of Badykova (1996) in the examination of audit in Russia in the mid-1990s in comparison to the United Kingdom. The paper concurs with the above previous research regarding the moves made towards the internationalization of auditing standards, the role of the auditor in compliance work, and the nature of the users of audited information.

The paper is set in a business context, which includes social and economic changes, to offer a perspective on the lack of any historical evidence of independent audit in Russia and emphasizes the recent change (by Presidential Decree) towards the legal enforcement of auditing standards. The motives for control and inspection are examined in the context of the twin objectives of legal compliance and certification. The role of the auditor in court is considered in terms of impartial fact finding and re-qualification of approved individuals compared with the adversarial system in the United Kingdom. The mandatory nature of audit in Russia by the court or public prosecutor is compared with the powers of the regulatory bodies in the United Kingdom and the findings identify an apparent lack of separation between the business entity and individuals.

The paper further examines the independence of the audit firm and the nature and content of the audit report in Russia along with sanctions for non-compliance. In conclusion, an attempt is made to evaluate the implications of the key differences identified as a basis for consideration of possible developments in Russia. These conclusions are placed in the context of the educational developments in the teaching of auditing processes and the Russian work ethic. The paper emphasizes the necessity to strengthen and regulate the audit profession at all levels by tightening up eligibility and entry qualifications with indigenous Russian auditors potentially replacing seconded staff from western audit organizations.

The social and economic changes that Russia has experienced in recent years include the dissolution of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), policies of 'glasnost' (publicity) and 'perestroika' (economic and social reforms) introduced by Gorbachev (Hosking, 1992), along with the opening up of Russia to traders and travelers alike.     

Going beyond national cultures – Dynamic interaction between intra-national,regional, and organizational realities

Cultural studies in international business have focused intensively on country-level analyses and have been criticized for their limited efforts to conceptualize and measure much richer, more dynamic and multi-level cultures. Drawing on literature from economic geography, we propose a new perspective that takes intra-national regional culture as the unit of analysis. Combining this perspective with acculturation theory and the concepts of cultural strength and embeddedness, we develop a conceptual model to analyze dynamic interaction between intra-national regional cultures and organizational cultures and propositions on how such interactions affect firm performance. Implications for future research and business practice are presented.     

Business Practice, Ethics and the Philosophy of Morals in the Rome of Marcus Tullius Cicero

Moral behaviour, and more recently wisdom and prudence, are emerging as areas of interest in the study of business ethics and management. The purpose of this article is to illustrate that Cicero—lawyer, politician, orator and prolific writer, and one of the earliest experts in the field recognised the significance of moral behaviour in his society. Cicero wrote ‘Moral Duties’ (De Officiis) about 44 BC. He addressed the four cardinal virtues wisdom, justice, courage and temperance, illustrating how practical wisdom, theoretical/conceptual wisdom and justice were viewed in Rome of the first century BC. ‘Moral Duties’ is a letter admonishing his son, Marcus. It refers to personal behaviour, business practice and analyses terms such as good faith and criminal fraud. In addition, it contains material which would be suitable for tutorials/seminars and discussions, particularly in the areas of critical thinking in business ethics and general management. A study of De Officiis in respect to present day management and business practice could give a wider perspective to business ethics and management students. If concepts such as moral virtue, moral propriety and moral goodness, many of which seem to be ignored in business situations today, are to be embedded in business leaders of the future, it is reasonable to expect that these qualities will be analysed and discussed by business students today. Further, a study of Cicero’s six-step approach, when preparing an address/speech, could be useful and productive for practitioners and students in this area.     

Project management practices: Then and now

This article uses the results of a survey of 56 American construction project managers to identify some risks and improvement opportunities pertaining to the practice of effective project management. In the process, the most and least important project management variables are identified and ranked. Next, the extent of knowledge, extent of use, and extent of relevance to project success are examined for project managers with and without international project management experience. Results of these analyses suggest improvement opportunity for business and higher learning in terms of training and educating future project managers. Based on the results of this study, it is concluded that both higher learning and business must approach the art and practice of project management from a global open system perspective. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

对审计专业判断能力的思考

所谓审计判断,又称审计职业判断,是指审计人员在不确定的情况下,依据一定的职业规则和自身经验,对某一事项做出分析、判断、选择和决策的能力.审计专业判断是确定被审计事项是否具有某种属性的思维过程,简单说是运用审计及相关学科的知识与经验,从各种可能的工作方案中做出取舍的决策.由此看出审计专业判断存在于整个审计过程,审计专业判断在审计工作过程中具有重要性和普遍性.     

Ethical Behaviour in the U.K. Audit Profession: The Case of the Self-Fulfilling Prophecy Under Going-Concern Uncertainties

External auditors owe a professional duty to the company's stockholders and to society in general. However their remuneration is determined by management. The resulting conflicts of interest are particularly acute in distressed companies where the auditors are required to disclose uncertainties regarding future survival. We focus on the consequentialist self-fulfilling prophecy argument whereby auditors may fail to disclose such uncertainties due to the belief that the disclosure itself would precipitate the company's bankruptcy. We find no empirical support for such beliefs for a sample of distressed U.K. companies with audit reports published between 1986 and 1993. Companies whose auditors disclose going concern uncertainties are no more likely to fail than those without such disclosures; indeed three out of four reports containing going concern uncertaintiesare not followed by failure before publication of a subsequent set of accounts. Instead we find that it is the degree of financial distress that drives both bankruptcy and the auditor's going concern disclosure rather than that the disclosure itself causes failure. Belief in the self-fulfilling prophecy effect nevertheless persists, and this despite the profession's clear ethical guidelines that audit opinions should provide an objectively true and fair view, paying no regard to possible consequences. It may be that the continued attractiveness of the self-fulfilling prophecy belief is due to its providing a means of resolving intense auditor/management conflict in what is a particularly complex decision situation. We argue that, if the profession's clear ethical guidelines are to play a greater role in this area, issues such as enforcement will need to be addressed.     

Holding up the mirror: The impact of strategic procurement practices on account management

Procurement has grown up. It is now a strategic business function that increasingly recognizes the importance of strategic supplier relationships, a reflection of key account management. It is time to assess the impact of this shift on the profession and practice of account management. This paper examines customer adoption of strategic procurement and then discusses the implications this has for account managers at the suppliers serving these customers. New techniques are emerging in these special relationships, including the use of psychological contracts and co-measurement and monitoring. Perceived fairness will also have a major impact on the customer's view of their suppliers. Account managers must recognize these changes or fall victim to supplier delusion: the belief that they are performing better than they really are.     

Headhunter-assisted recruiting practices in foreign subsidiaries and their (dys)functional effects: An institutional work perspective

This paper applies the institutional work perspective to elucidate how and why dysfunctional effects are reproduced by HRM practices. Our analysis of headhunter-assisted recruitment of local employees in foreign subsidiaries demonstrates how mutual dependence, self-interests, and a stratified labor market lead to specific candidate search criteria and limit the scope of search. It also shows how these practices result in limited positive effects from the key actors’ perspective, but in the long run reproduce voluntary turnover, communication-competence misalignment, and limited use of local talent pools. However, because these practices have become commonly used, the actors are unwilling and/or unable to change the system.     

Some unresolved ethical issues in auditing

Independence is a fundamental concept to the audit. There is a clear relationship between independence and conflict of interest in all professions. This paper examines this relationship in the auditing profession and in the context of three specific practices. The paper analyses these practices by using the Davis model of conflict of interest. The results of this analysis give rise to some interesting questions for the ethical practices of the auditing profession.Sally Gunz teaches business law at the School of Accountancy, University of Waterloo, Waterloo Ontario. She is a former legal practitioner whose research interests include ethical and legal issues of concern to auditors and studies of the corporate counsel profession.John McCutcheon teaches accounting at the School of Business and Economics, Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario. His research interests include analyses of alternate approaches to the liability of auditors for negligence and various issues in management accounting.     

Influences in Ethical Dilemmas of Increasing Intensity

This study attempts to extend the literature in ethics research by developing and testing a model of an individual's ethical system which identifies the sources of influence on the decision process. The model is developed from an interdisciplinary literature review and includes six subsystems or spheres that exert influence on an individual: the workplace, family, religion, legal system, community, and profession. The study also examines the role of materiality in the decision-making process.Using this model, empirical tests identify the spheres that exert the most influence on the decision-maker facing an ethical dilemma. In addition, the relative importance of the spheres and the interaction among the spheres is examined. Findings show that: (1) individuals rate variables at different levels of importance as the materiality of the breach changes and (2) the spheres that are considered most important for minor ethical breaches are different than the spheres considered most influential in a major ethical situation.Exploratory factor analysis suggests that the variables representing the spheres can be summarized by three factors. Further, it indicates that these factors change with materiality.     

Ethical Theory in German Business Ethics Research

This article offers an overview over the wide scope business ethics has reached in German speaking countries; works which in their majority are not yet available in English translation. The proposed concepts range from a focus on the individual manager and a focus on moral education of managers, via the procedural model of discourse ethics to pressure group ethics and business ethics from a Christian point of view. Other authors suggest an economic theory of moral behaviour, or see ethics as an assurance for decisions under uncertainty or argue for a more enlightened concept of economic rationality.     

浅析会计行业的职业道德建设

会计职业道德是会计人员从事会计工作应遵循的道德标准.本文探讨了会计行业的职业道德的定义和现状、会计职业道德建设工作的重要意义及基本方法.     

New audit partner identification rules may offer opportunities and benefits

From the WorldCom and Enron accounting debacles that triggered the demise of Arthur Andersen to Ernst & Young’s 2013 and 2015 settlements of claims that its audits facilitated massive accounting fraud by financial services firm Lehman Brothers, large-scale financial scandals have led to increasing scrutiny of public auditors. Investors are justifiably eager to ascertain the quality of audits of public companies when making investment decisions. In the U.K., the reputation of the audit partner is recognized as a signal of audit quality, and as such, the names of the lead partners have been disclosed to the public since 2009. The U.S. standard of providing the auditing firm name without identifying the lead partner recently changed to match the U.K. and EU standard after much debate. As of May 2016, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board has adopted—and the Securities and Exchange Commission has approved—new regulations that will require the public disclosure of the individual audit partner responsible for each public company audit, as well as the identification of any additional accounting firms that contribute to the audit. This article examines the new rules in light of disclosure requirements imposed on other professionals, as well as international auditor disclosure requirements. The accounting profession has generally opposed the new disclosures, but this article suggests opportunities and benefits for the profession as a result of the changes, including the opportunity for audit partners to develop individual reputations for quality and specialization. In addition, this article makes recommendations for business managers, owners, and investors for making the best use of the information the new disclosures will provide.