Powerful Insights

A diverse, equitable and inclusive board culture contributes to the organization’s success by positioning directors to advise the CEO and add value in evolving markets. Does your board measure up?
Diversity in the boardroom encompasses all dimensions of the human experience, including education, life experience, gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, geography, age and specific areas of knowledge and expertise. The market is driving more attention to the topic of diversity, equity and inclusion. Many institutional investors are sounding the bell not only for gender diversity but for racial diversity as well.
Carol Beaumier, a Senior Managing Director with Protiviti, recently moderated a discussion on diversity, equity and inclusion with Protiviti Advisory Board Member Evelyn Dilsaver and Protiviti Executive Vice President Susan Haseley. Their enlightening conversation builds on information in a recent issue of Protiviti’s Board Perspectives: Risk Oversight newsletter, titled “Dispel the Myth of Fit: Improve Diversity on Your Board.” This is available at www.protiviti.com/board.
Carol Beaumier is a leader with Protiviti’s Risk and Compliance practice and oversees the firm’s Asia-Pacific Financial Services Practice. Evelyn Dilsaver is a recognized leader in building highly motivated teams in the public and nonprofit sector. She is the former President and CEO of Charles Schwab Investment Management. Evelyn is active on several nonprofit boards, including The Commonwealth Club, the NACD NorCal Chapter and Women Corporate Directors. She also serves as Audit Chair on both public and private boards including Tempur Sealy, Health Equity and Blue Shield of California. Susan Haseley is leader of Protiviti’s Diversity and Inclusion initiative. She has more than 30 years of experience in providing risk and technology consulting and internal audit services.
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Philosophies, standards and approaches around environmental, social and governance, or ESG, are among the most talked-about issues in corporate circles today, with the world’s largest companies and investors taking notable stands for the long-term betterment of society. Furthermore, ESG reporting has come into its own as a discipline, with most publicly held companies now issuing sustainability reports. A lot has changed and a lot will continue to change, and there’s so much still to be determined.
In this episode of Protiviti’s Powerful Insights podcast series, Protiviti Senior Managing Director Bob Hirth and Managing Director Chris Wright share their thoughts and insights about a number of ESG-related matters, particularly as they pertain to perspectives from boards of directors and executive management. Bob currently serves as co-vice chair of the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (www.sasb.org). Chris is the global leader of Protiviti’s Business Performance Improvement practice.
ESG is definitely on the minds of today’s CFOs. In Protiviti’s latest Global Finance Trends Survey, CFOs and finance leaders expressed significant interest in ESG, with 8 in 10 planning to increase the focus and frequency of their organization’s reporting related to ESG issues. For more information, visit www.protiviti.com/financesurvey. Protiviti has published other insights on ESG and related issues that can be found at www.protiviti.com.
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The continuing global challenges and potential existential threat posed by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Political divisiveness and polarization. Social and economic unrest. Gridlock. Artificial intelligence (AI), automation and other rapidly developing digital technologies. Rapid shift to virtual, remote work environments. Changes in the geopolitical landscape. Shifting customer preferences and demographics. Fragile supply chains. Wildfires and hurricanes. Volatile unemployment levels and record low interest rates. Escalating competition for specialized talent. Immigration challenges. Cyber breaches on a massive scale. Terrorism. Big data analytics. Future of work.
These and a host of other notable risk drivers are all contributing to significant levels of uncertainties, making it extremely difficult to anticipate what risks may lie just over the horizon. Unanticipated events are unfolding at record pace, leading to massive challenges to identify the best next steps for organizations of all types and sizes, regardless of where they reside in the world. No one is immune to the significant levels of uncertainty, and C-suites and boards need to be vigilant in scanning the horizon for emerging issues. Because no one can possibly anticipate everything that lies in the future, organizations must focus on building trust-based, resilient cultures, led by authentic leaders, that can pivot at the speed of change.
In the ninth annual Executive Perspectives on Top Risks Survey, Protiviti and NC State University’s ERM Initiative report on the top risks on the minds of global boards of directors and executives in 2021 and, in a new dimension to this study, over the next 10 years, into 2030. In this informative podcast, Dr. Mark Beasley of NC State University’s ERM Initiative and Protiviti Managing Director Jim DeLoach discuss a number of notable themes and megatrends revealed in the results.
Mark is the Director of the Enterprise Risk Management Initiative in the Poole College of Management at NC State University. Jim leads Protiviti’s Global Thought Leadership Program and is a member of the firm’s Solutions Leadership team.
For more information on Executives Perspectives on Top Risks for 2021 and 2030, visit www.protiviti.com/toprisks or erm.ncsu.edu.
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Cybersecurity is a critical issue on all fronts today. It’s certainly vital for organizations large and small around the world as they battle bad cyber actors and ransomware attacks. For organizations managing areas of critical infrastructure, the threats include those related to the security of industrial control systems, or operational technology. These risks are all the more significant given the link between industrial control systems and critical infrastructure for energy, water management, transportation and more.

In this episode of Powerful Insights, Protiviti associate director Justin Turner and manager Derek Dunkel-JahanTigh discuss security for industrial control systems. Both are with the Protiviti security and privacy practice based in Houston.

This is the latest podcast in our continuing series on Cybersecurity Awareness, which is intended to highlight ways organizations can be proactive in addressing critical security and privacy challenges. We explore how leaders can dynamically build cyber resilience while maximizing value. In this series, we talk with Protiviti’s cybersecurity leaders who are in the market working with organizations to address these challenges.

For more information, visit www.protiviti.com/security.

Transcriptions of Powerful Insights are available upon request from [email protected]

On our recent live global webinar, Lindsay Dart, Managing Director of Protiviti UK, and David Thomas, Vice President of Protiviti UK Managed Services, had a great chat with Protiviti brand ambassador and PGA Tour member, Matthew Fitzpatrick. Matt, a British golfer who just completed his first season on the tour, did exceptionally well qualifying for the 2020 FedEx Cup Playoffs and also advanced to the BMW Championship. His record for the year included five Top 10s and he impressively made the cut in 12 of his 15 starts.

In this conversation, Matt talks about his game, being a professional athlete during our lockdown, how he prepares for various tournaments, advice for amateur golfers, and why he decided to become a brand ambassador for Protiviti.

For more information, visit www.protiviti.com/golf.

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It’s common for companies expanding through acquisitions to outgrow their in-house capabilities. This is often the case with legal services during acquisitions, when company management might turn to their private equity firm for due diligence and other guidance.

Going forward, it’s not unusual for those companies to continue to work with the same outside counsel on other legal matters. The challenge here is that by continuing to contract with a large,
full-service law firm, companies may be paying for bandwidth and capabilities they no longer need.

Some larger private equity firms have addressed this concern with a variable cost, or “on demand,” model, especially for routine services. This “managed service” approach allows companies to bring in attorneys and legal experts and pay only for the time and talent they need – tax lawyers for tax issues, human resource lawyers for personnel challenges, etc.

By augmenting the in-house legal group with temporary staffing and subject-matter expertise,
companies can manage peaks and valleys without the expense of keeping a full-service law firm
on retainer, and reallocate the savings to other pressing needs. Hear more on this issue in our
podcast featuring Protiviti Managing Director Rob Gould and Robert Half Managing Director
Joel Wuesthoff.

For more information, visit www.protiviti.com/private-equity.

Transcriptions of Powerful Insights are available upon request from [email protected]

Cybersecurity is a critical issue on all fronts. It’s certainly vital for organizations large and small around the world as they battle bad cyber actors and ransomware attacks, among the many threats. And as we learn in this podcast, it affects individual consumers and citizens every day, requiring them to be ever-vigilant.

In our latest episode of Powerful Insights, Protiviti Managing Director Michael Lyons, a leader with the firm’s Security and Privacy practice, shares great insights not only on the work he does for retail and telecommunications companies, but also about his recent personal experience with what could have been a costly phishing scam.

This is the latest podcast in our continuing series on Cybersecurity Awareness, which is intended to highlight ways organizations can be proactive in addressing critical security and privacy challenges. We explore how leaders can dynamically build cyber resilience while maximizing value. In this series, we talk with Protiviti’s cybersecurity leaders who are in the market working with organizations to address these challenges.

For more information, visit www.protiviti.com/security.

Transcriptions of Powerful Insights are available upon request from [email protected]

It’s time for internal audit leaders and professionals to stand up and ride their own wave of transformation and innovation. But the results of the latest Next-Generation Internal Audit survey from Protiviti show that much progress still needs to be made in growing competency levels and next-generation auditing methodologies, in advancing innovation and transformation initiatives, and in communicating with audit committees.

This podcast features our conversation with Brian Christensen, Executive Vice President, Global Internal Audit for Protiviti. For several years, Brian and Protiviti have advocated for internal audit functions to adopt a next-generation internal audit mindset and embrace the wave of transformation and innovation underway in their organizations and the overall market. Little did we know that a global pandemic of historic proportions would alter the very foundations of business operations, practices and processes, as well as bring to light new views and ways for internal audit to perform its critical assurance and advisory work.

So much has changed in society and for businesses large and small during this transformative period. Efforts by organizations worldwide pivoting to remote workforces and transitioning operations on the fly have been well documented. Internal audit certainly has not been immune to the effects on their organizations, with audit plans shifting dramatically and assurance and compliance activities requiring multiple changes and adjustments to meet objectives and deadlines in this new status quo.

The pandemic has raised questions among CAEs and internal audit leaders about how they can best support management and their organizations in navigating the many changes underway. The foundation of next-generation internal auditing lies in principles such as agility, real-time risk and controls monitoring, dynamic risk assessment, and the effective leveraging of data and advanced technologies. The advantages a next-generation internal audit mindset and approach deliver have become further magnified during this global crisis.

To learn more, read Exploring the Next Generation of Internal Auditing, available at www.protiviti.com/IASurvey.

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Most discussions concerning the COVID-19 global pandemic aspire to a path leading to some form of normalcy – a “new normal.” That pathway is often framed in terms of phases, with each phase leading to an equilibrium of sorts. In other words, the state of equilibrium will be defined differently with each phase.

There is no roadmap for what is about to happen soon or next, but each iteration requiring a search for equilibrium results from changes in market and individual behavior, as well as adjustments in business processes to address those changes. That is why resiliency is the North Star that will guide the most successful companies forward.

Protiviti has published a two-part series on finding equilibrium in uncertain times. In this podcast, Protiviti Managing Directors Dolores Atallo and Jim DeLoach discuss key points from Part 2, “Resilience is the North Star.” Dolores is a leader with Protiviti’s Risk & Compliance and Enterprise Risk Management groups. Jim heads Protiviti’s Global Thought Leadership Program and is a member of the firm’s Global Solutions Leadership group.

To learn more, read Getting There Eventually: Finding Equilibrium in Uncertain Times – Resilience is the North Star, available at www.protiviti.com/bulletin.

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Chief audit executives and internal audit leaders are once again focusing on Sarbanes-Oxley compliance work, which has taken on a new dynamic in the wake of the COVID-19 global pandemic. But these leaders and professionals are not the only ones immersed in this work. Chief financial officers (CFOs) and finance leaders and staff continue to perform numerous activities related to financial reporting and attestation work, all in the “new normal” business world in which companies are now operating.

Protiviti recently released the results of its 2020 Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance Survey in a new report, SOX Compliance Amid a New Business Equilibrium. Our report and other materials and insights can be found at www.protiviti.com/SOXSurvey. This episode features our conversation with Protiviti Managing Directors Christopher Wright and Charles Soranno, who offer a CFO and finance perspective on Protiviti’s 2020 SOX Compliance Survey results. They provide some interesting insights on how the work and focus of compliance programs and activities are changing in the wake of COVID-19.

Wright is the global leader of Protiviti’s Business Performance Improvement solution group. Soranno is a leader in the firm’s BPI group and its Financial Reporting Remediation and Compliance practice.

Transcriptions of Powerful Insights are available upon request from [email protected]