ASOSAI Sponsored Training Programmes

Workshop on Financial Audit

During the year 2001 two ASOSAI Sponsored Workshops on "Financial Audit" and "Value for Money" were held in Dhaka, Bangladesh and Canberra Australia in September and October 2001 respectively.

SAI Bangladesh hosted the first workshop on Financial Audit at Pan Pacific Sanargaon Hotel which was attended by 16 participant from 16 members of SAIs from September 3-12, 2001. This workshop was an enhanced version of the same named workshop No.1 (RC-1) on certification of "Financial Statement Audit Programming & Documentation" in New Delhi in November-December 1998. It introduced the Fundamental Principles, Concepts and Methods of Financial Audit Planning, Execution and Reporting. The workshop featured a large amount of application exercises and casework that reinforced the practical, hands on sharing of audit experience.

Workshop on Financial Audit in Dhaka

The goal of this workshop was to provide participants with the opportunity to upgrade their knowledge and skills in the financial audit.

All the participants were immensely benefited from this workshop. SAI-Bangladesh also arranged various sightseeing programmes which included visits to Shahid Minar, Dhakeswari Temple, Muktizodha Museum, Lalbagh Fort, Bangbandhu Museum and National Memorial at Saver. The participants thoroughly enjoyed their stay.

Workshop on VFM Audit

AUSTRALIA

ASOSAI VFM Audit Workshop, 23 October-1 November 2001 Canberra, Australia

The Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) hosted in Canberra, Australia the second Value for Money (VFM) Audit Workshop sponsored by ASOSAI. A total of 22 participants, five instructors and two secretariat staff attended the Workshop, representing 23 countries.

Goal and Expected Outcomes

The goal of the workshop was to provide participants with the opportunity to upgrade their knowledge and skills in VFM audit.

At the end of the workshop, participants could be expected to be able to:

Plan a VFM audit of a program or project by gathering information about the entity, identifying key areas and establishing audit criteria.
Conduct a VFM audit by developing audit programs, gathering and analyzing audit evidence; and
Prepare a VFM audit report by developing audit findings, discussing them with management and follow-up issues.

Some participants of Value for Money (VFM)
Audit Workshop in Australia

The Workshop

Held over eight days in Canberra, the Workshop covered everything in the VFM audit process including:

defining what VFM means and selecting VFM audit projects;
defining, gathering, documenting and analyzing audit evidence;
deriving preliminary audit conclusions, discussions with entity management and preparing the audit report and
in a summary session, complete with musical instruments (!), on the last day.

Participants of ASOSAI Value for Money Audit Workshop
Canberra, Australia October 2002

The instructors used a variety of techniques to:

facilitate the participants' increased understanding of the VFM audit process;
maximize the interaction of participants so they understood the importance of working in teams and shared their audit understanding and experience from their own country. This enabled participants to compare and contrast audit mandates and practices across many countries; and
create a learning environment where participants enjoyed themselves and had a lot of fun.
The secretariat staff provided the necessary administrative support to the instructors. This enabled the instructors to concentrate their efforts on preparing and delivering workshop sessions of a very high standard. The participants' evaluated all the sessions and the workshop overall very highly. This suggested that the goal and expected outcomes of the Workshop had been achieved.

The participants were enthusiastic and worked very well as a group and within their smaller teams. Participants, instructors and secretariat staff made many friends from many other countries in the ASOSAI region.

The Sights

As well as working very hard during the Workshop, everyone took the opportunity to see some sights of Canberra and some took the opportunity to visit Sydney. In Canberra, they visited the Parliament House, viewed Canberra by day from the top of a nearby mountain (with plenty of group photos) and saw the wide open spaces surrounding Canberra on a trip to Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve. In the natural setting of the Reserve, the visitors saw many kangaroos, many colourful birds, some emus and a hard-to-find koala bear. Many viewed Canberra by night from the Telstra Tower and looked through a telescope at the moon and some stars at the Mt Stromlo Observatory.

Those who took a bus trip to Sydney enjoyed the views of the Harbour Bridge and Opera House and much more on a cruise of Sydney Harbour, saw many animals from around the world and Australia at the Taronga Zoo, and enjoyed some shopping.

For most, if not all, it was their first visit to Australia. It was sad for the Australian hosts to say good-bye to new-found friends, but also there was happiness that they took with them many memories of Australia and the people they met at the Workshop. Many will keep in contact with one another for many years to come.

ASOSAI Workshop-Introduction to IT Audit

ASOSAI Workshop on introduction to IT Audit was hosted by the office of the Comptroller & Auditor General of India from March 4-15, 2002 at Taj Mahal Hotel, New Delhi. The Workshop was attended by a record number of 32 participants from the same number of SAI-members countries.

This workshop was an Introductory-level IT Audit Awareness course using the participatory approach of the Long Term Regional Training Program (LTRTP). As was in the recent two ASOSAI-sponsored workshops in 2001, this workshop featured many application exercises and casework that reinforced the practical, hands-on sharing of audit experience. There was an introductory session on Computed Assisted Auditing Techniques (CAATs).

Since ten working days was not long enough to offer a comprehensive IT Audit course, this workshop focused on enhancing IT Audit Awareness of participants by introducing various issues associated with conducting financial and performance auditing in an IT environment.

Apart from long participative classes, SAI-India arranged social programes during the evenings wherein participants got a chance to see various glimpses of India. The participants were taken to Agra to see the Taj Mahal and Agra Fort. Within Delhi, they visited the Kutub Minar, Red Fort, Bahai Temple and Humayun's Tomb. A number of participants enjoyed their shopping in Delhi.

Group Photograph of the participants of ASOSAI
Workshop-Introduction to IT Audit on their visit to
"The Taj Mahal", Agra

After the workshop, all the participants felt enriched with their newly acquired skills of IT Audit and their acquaintances with fellow participants. As a souvenir, a small booklet titled "Maitri" was also released, so that the participants could remain close to each other.

For all the above three ASOSAI Sponsored workshops, two CD-ROMs were also issued to all the Participants, Instruction and ASOSAI Countries. The first CD-ROMs contains study materials on the "Financial Audit Workshop & VFM Audit Workshop" whereas the 2nd CD-ROMs contains material on "introduction to IT Audit".