Everyone has at one point or another conducted an interview.  Auditors can’t begin their planned procedures until they conduct interviews of a variety of people in an organization.  It is important for them to understand the functions of people in the organization and processes they are to rely on in the performance of the audit.  But when it comes to confronting a target of an investigation, interviewing takes on a whole new meaning.  It becomes a game of psychological warfare and if your interviewer is not trained in the art of conducting an admission-seeking interview, you don’t have a chance of accomplishing your objectives…beyond sheer luck.  This course is designed to teach internal auditors how to increase their success in conducting such interviews.Continue reading→

Without a doubt, the most common type of fraud we see is vendor fraud.  It comes in many forms and can operate in an organization for years without detection.  If your organization is infested with a vendor fraud scheme, it is likely this fraud is leaching money from your bank accounts without your knowledge…and undetected, it could go on indefinitely.  This course is intended for those who “touch documents” and can be specifically geared for internal auditors who investigate fraud, as well as accounting personnel who review supporting documents and post transactions on a daily basis.Continue reading→

The only professional activity that Tom enjoys more than speaking about fraud is conducting seminars to teach students and internal auditors how to investigate suspicions of fraud.

As with his speeches, Tom can tailor his seminars to any specific audience, but here are a few of his more popular sessions:Continue reading→

I have been troubled for some time about our profession…..the profession of auditing.  Since I graduated from college in 1972, 60% of the companies that comprised the list of the Fortune 500 are not only no longer on the list today, they are no longer in business.  In this age of the information revolution if you are not improving upon the products you make and the services you sell you will become irrelevant to the market…and that will occur at a much faster pace than at any time in our history.Continue reading→

When John Wiley & Sons sought-out and contracted with Tom Golden to author A Guide to Forensic Accounting Investigation Tom knew that there was no one person alive who possessed the knowledge, skills and experience to author every chapter that he felt needed to be covered in what was about to be marketed globally as the seminal guide to forensic accounting investigation.  As such, he sought-out experts throughout the world whom he believed possessed the world-class knowledge, skills and experiences to author individual chapters. Continue reading→

Those engaged in the profession of auditing realize that the public expects auditors to do a much better job in detecting fraud even though our professional standards still do not hold us responsible for fraud detection.  With regard to providing greater assurance as to the accuracy of financial statements, everyone in the Corporate Reporting Chain needs to do their part, along with company executives, corporate directors, information distributors, third-party analysts, investors and other stakeholders.Continue reading→

“Message to all Auditors……you were not hired to be human lie-detectors relying entirely on what you are told by company personnel.  Your job is to acquire and review audit evidence in an objective and independent manner and sufficiently verify that the information supports your audit objective for a particular procedure.  Any auditor who trusts without sufficient verification is, quite simply, an auditor not doing his or her job.  It’s really that simple.”

Thomas W. GoldenContinue reading→

The stereotypic understanding of what an auditor does goes something like this. Auditors are like a government agency in that they go into a corporation, have free access to the books and records and have virtual police powers to make sure that all the numbers are right. When the auditor releases their opinion on the company’s financial statements, those numbers and all its attendant disclosures are correct. Why?….Continue reading→

When I was leading the investigation into the highly publicized fraud at the American Cancer Society (ACS) our task was simply to determine many of the typical questions management asks with most fraud investigations…How much was stolen? How’d they do it? How did management miss it?Continue reading→