Focus: The digitisation of assurance

Digitisation, automation and transformation. Machine learning, robotics and artificial intelligence (AI). The lexicon of technology buzzwords has become, for many sectors, representative of complexity, unwanted change and negativity. These perceptions haven’t been helped by reports that millions of global workers will lose their jobs to robotic automation by 2030.1

But these facts don’t look at the whole picture.

Yes, certain jobs of today may be lost to ‘robots’, but the essential role that the human element plays in business success, particularly in the assurance industry, cannot be negated. Technology is invaluable, but only in its ability to automate manual labour, remove unnecessary pain points, and make working lives simpler and faster. Automation cannot replace intuition, ethics and understanding. It can do away with drudge work, help engender deeper trust and client engagement, and revolutionise the industry’s approaches to skills development and management, but it cannot take away the intrinsic value that human thinking and values provide to the client, business and sector.

Consider a company’s employment records – every month, employees earn the same, except increases and bonuses, while their addresses, ID numbers, and bank accounts do not change very often, if at all. Automating the auditing of employee data and payments made to employees is a relatively easy process. Instead of using the hard-won skills of a young professional to painstakingly undertake this simple repetitive process, an algorithm can review every change made, maintaining the accuracy of the data, and do the job with a reduced margin for error in a fraction of the time.

Automation provides the organisation with efficiency gains that improve the quality and speed at which both structured and unstructured data sets are managed. As a result, the organisation can obtain assurance that every transaction has been tested and is accurate, valid and comprehensively managed. But most importantly, it creates the opportunity for the skilled professional to be shifted onto work that demands greater insight and expertise.

When transactions are complex or take place as a single, once-off event (like the purchase of a business, for example), automation is typically either incapable of collating the information to create the right insights, or unable to unpack the variables in ways that are accurate, relevant, efficient or add value. This is where the human element remains essential.

Digitisation in assurance is about removing the pain points as quickly and efficiently as possible so that the organisation can free up brilliant minds to apply themselves to more complex tasks requiring broad knowledge and experience, deep insights, and profound thought. It’s this message that is lost in the hype and the rush to digitise.

People are essential to fully realising the value of data; they are not its barrier.

Perhaps the biggest question that automation asks of the assurance profession is how you train new auditors when low-level tasks and pain points have been digitised. The answer is to revisit how we induct new members to our profession, to review and refine the skills and behaviours that we value in these young professionals. We need to provide them with learning experiences that allow them to think critically, evolve and expand their worldview, and fine-tune their analytical capabilities as they grow in their careers. Now is the time to train people so that they can leverage the potential of the technology at their disposal. There’s nothing remarkable about inspecting invoices and transactions – this does not enable critical thinking – however, collaborating with others, finding solutions to challenging problems, and discovering new ways of thinking are far more valuable to the individual and the organisation. As the world continues to digitise, these approaches will transform the assurance industry in terms of capability, ingenuity and growth.

For many, however, the risks of digitisation remain too great. They’ve been influenced by all the words that begin with ‘mis’ – misunderstanding, misrepresentation, misdirection. Stakeholders, auditors (internal and external), executives still lack the understanding as to what it all means. Digitisation will not replace people – instead, it will replace cumbersome ways of work that limit potential.

Humans make the right decisions. Humans have ethics. Machines do not understand the nuances, nor do they have the know-how to interpret body language or understand societal boundaries and the subtleties of what is right and what is wrong. Algorithms are only as good as those who create them – ethics must be coded, bias has to be removed and behaviours have to be modified. Digitisation is nowhere near the point where systems can undertake, or even replace, the layered critical thinking of a professional.

In my view, South Africa sits at the forefront of this digital revolution and is leading the way in digital assurance globally. Our financial sector has taken remarkable strides in the digitisation of services and modernisation of capabilities. This inventive mindset and innovative approach to digital transformation is not some secret sauce served only in South Africa: it is recognising that its legacy lies in building sustainable foundations that can adapt and evolve to meet changing market needs, and that critical thinking and a broad worldview that can harness the power of digital can change lives. This is the real value of digitisation – an advanced toolkit that’s only as brilliant as the minds that wield it.

Reference
1 Robot automation will ‘take 800 million jobs by 2030’ – report, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-42170100.

Author
Richard Warren-Tangney CA(SA), Partner: Financial Services at BDO South Africa