Information Technology Audit Quality: An Investigation of the Impact of Individual and Organizational Factors

Major news stories demonstrate the importance and vulnerability of information technology (IT), highlighting the need to understand how to reduce risk. This study investigates the key factors affecting IT audit quality (ITAQ), focusing on individual auditor and organizational factors. We utilize multiple approaches to understand professionals' general perceptions of ITAQ and results from specific audits. Our results suggest that the importance of IT audit quality factors differs between participants' general perceptions and those reported for specific IT audit experiences. Participants' general perceptions indicated that the most important factors for ITAQ were auditors' knowledge and skills, specifically IT and business process knowledge. By comparison, actual audit experiences suggest organizational factors as more important, specifically audit planning and the auditor-client relationship. We believe these differences between general perceptions and reported results suggest a potential opportunity to improve ITAQ via additional education and upfront development of the audit teams and processes.