Agile strategy development and implementation for internal audit departments

Abstract

A rapidly changing business environment is creating pressure on internal audit departments to adopt emerging technologies and implement new processes that can keep pace with the rate of change. Structural mechanisms such as Kanban and Scrum provide potential solutions for project management; however, strategy development and implementation must also be agile. The authors use a combination of prior research and industry experience to develop a potential solution for chief audit executives to facilitate agility within their internal audit departments. This potential solution is the development of a set of Agile Strategy Development and Implementation (ASD&I) teams. The article also provides a roadmap for how ASD&I teams can be incorporated into practice. This research is particularly useful for both practitioners and researchers who are looking for innovative solutions to relevant business problems. The thematic nature of the research provides many potential opportunities to implement and examine the effectiveness of these agile strategy development and implementation teams.