1. ALGA WEBINAR NOVEMBER 19, 2013 NANCY HOWE AUDITOR’S OFFICE CITY AND COUNTY OF DENVER Characteristics of Knighton Gold Audit Reports

2. Common Characteristics Gold Award-Winning Reports - 2012 2

3. Common Characteristics All three – “Persuasive”  Methodologies  Conclusions 3

4. Common Characteristics (cont.) All three – “Innovation”  Example – case study technique  Assessed three parks in depth to understand land maintenance strategy  Judges: “ a creative solution to the broad subject matter” 4

5. Common Characteristics (cont.) Two – “non-technical language” or “non-audit terminology” 5

6. Common Characteristics (cont.) Other attributes:  “clear”, “concise”, “not belaboring points”  “report formatting and layout made it inviting and easy to read”  “visual illustrations” and “examples”; visual aid vs. visual clutter  “impactful” and “significant potential for tangible cost savings”  Choice of subject matter – Timely, interesting or unique issues 6

7. What Makes a High-Quality Knighton Submission? 7

8. High-Quality Submission Impact of Judging Process  Process left to judging panels – process and winners  ALGA - wide variety in shop size, structure, reporting styles  Judges bring their background and perspective Result: No “Magic Bullet” for Winning! 8

9. High-Quality Submission (cont.) Source: Judges Survey  Conducted after judging process is complete  “What qualities did you observe in the strong reports?”  “What was missing or detracting in the reports that did not receive an award?”  Four common themes regarding strong reports 9

10. Themes - High-Quality Reports 1. Clear/Concise  “easy to follow”  “to the point”  “succinct”  “straightforward style”  “Short” or short Executive Summary (judges liked Executive Summaries)  “easy to determine the findings”  “directly communicated how the audit added value” 10

11. Themes - High-Quality Reports (cont) Clear/Concise - Missing or Detracting  Lack of logical flow, transitions, conclusions; “hard to follow”  Length - long executive summaries, “not 100 pages”, “wordy”, “verbose”, “repetitive”  “if you have to concentrate too much on the sentences to understand the result…..”  Specifically, avoid flowery or overly technical language, repetition, excessive detail (e.g., don’t need to write about a test or methodology) 11

12. Themes - High-Quality Reports (cont) 2. Persuasive o “well-supported conclusions” o “well-developed effect” o “good use of industry benchmarks as criteria” o “easy to determine findings and impact of negative effect” 12

13. Themes - High-Quality Reports (cont) Persuasive - Missing or Detracting  Lack of support for findings/conclusions  Underplaying the effect of the findings  Recommendations that say “stop doing what you’re doing” without providing specific guidance 13

14. Themes - High-Quality Reports (cont) 3. Layout/Formatting/Visuals  Headers to guide the reader and break up the text - headers can provide the foundational concept of a section  Some reports led with unimportant information, such as the shop’s charter  Strategic use of white space  Tables, graphics, examples – Not necessarily more. Can be very effective when they are clear, easy-to-understand, connected to the text, and illustrate key information 14

15. Example: Visual Aid 15

16. Themes - High-Quality Reports (cont) Layout/Formatting/Visuals – Missing or Detracting  “large blocks of text without headers, white space, or graphics”  tables or graphics not clearly linked to text  excessive graphics can be confusing 16

17. Themes - High-Quality Reports (cont) 4. Impact o “Material, significant findings” o “Significant potential for tangible cost savings” o “Value-added findings” o “Value-added recommendations” 17

18. Reminders These are not the only qualities noted – e.g., judges also liked timely, interesting or unique issues. Readers need information. Primarily, they need to clearly understand the problem and how to fix it, and they don’t have a lot of time to read the report. 18

19. Reminders (cont.) Judges assess the report – audit work may be strong, but needs to be communicated effectively. Five criteria – each category represents 20% of the final score. 19

20. Recommendations Limits on opportunities to influence audit reports. Do what you can! Read audit reports from other audit shops and judge for yourself. What’s good and what detracts? Serve as a judge for the Knighton Award process! 20

21. Thank You! Contact: nancy.howe@denvergov.org 21