When speaking with new clients that have engaged our firm to perform audit or attest services, I often hear stories of how their previous auditors were adversarial and less than personable or friendly.  They relate examples of how other auditors take a “gotcha” approach to the audit.  A “gotcha” approach, in this instance, refers to an auditor that is simply trying to find anything they can, large or small, that may be wrong in the organization, so they can expose management and demonstrate their value or justify their services.

At HintonBurdick we believe in a different approach to working with auditees.  While we understand the importance of maintaining auditor independence as a professional standard, we believe and have demonstrated that an audit can be complementary to an organization instead of adversarial.  We believe in partnering with our clients to gain a thorough understanding of their organization and responding with a thoughtful audit approach that considers the important details of their organization.  We strive to lift our clients by building trusting and friendly relationships that encourages open communication and information exchange.  With frequent, open communication, we can deliver the depth and breadth of our firm resources into the hands of our clients for their benefit.  Even if an auditee has a question outside of the normal audit process, we encourage them to call and consult with us as their trusted advisors.

Another common problem that I hear from new clients relates to audit staff rotation.  Auditees are very tired of having to retrain the audit team every year due to changes in audit personnel.  This is a wide-spread problem with many firms that hire as many recruits as possible out of the university with a business strategy of working those recruits to exhaustion, leading to high turnover, and causing only a few recruits to remain for top positions in those firms.

Since HintonBurdick is a regional firm with a long-term business strategy focused on staff retention, our personnel stay with the firm year after year because they love where they live and have made a decision to carry out their careers with our firm.  As a result of less staff turnover at HintonBurdick, you can plan on seeing the same friendly faces each year and you won’t have to relearn their names, show them where the files are again, or reintroduce new people to your personnel every year.  A consistent audit team means a more thorough audit from year to year due to the institutional knowledge held by the consistent audit team.

For more information on how the HintonBurdick audit approach can lift your organization.  Please contact me, Chad Atkinson at 888-566-1277.