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In this course the candidates will learn targeted communication strategies, effective influencing tactics, and proven change implementation skills that use a tested equation and will raise their professional profile while increasing audit value to the organization. They will master tools and techniques they can use to enhance your communication, interview, and change implementation skills, including when working with global audit teams and audits. The candidates will cover the steps they can take to build good client relationships and tackle such thorny issues as interviewing executive management, dealing with disagreement before it gets out of control, understanding cultural differences, delivering bad news, partnering with their clients to help them successfully implement audit findings, and more.

By the end of this course delegates will learn about:

• How your work style impacts communication
• Communicating and working in a multicultural & virtual work setting
• Building your communication skills & plans
• Influencing styles and approach
• Building your change implementation skills to help gain acceptance of your findings
• Partnering with your client to implement audit findings
• Resolving difficult situations: how to take corrective measures when things go wrong
• Conducting the interview

Internal Auditors, Financial & Operational Auditors, Finance Personnel, External Auditors, Audit Managers and Supervisors, IT Auditors, Senior and In-Charge Auditors, Team Leaders and Directors

How Work Style Impacts Communications

· Assessing your style to understand how it impacts the way you communicate

· Styles of behaviour

· Determining the general preferences of your style

· How your style impacts the way you communicate, solve problems, make decisions, and address conflict

· Discovering your strengths and what happens when they are overused

· How to recognize the styles of other people

· Increasing your awareness of how others interpret your behaviour

Communicating, Working in a Multicultural and Virtual Work Setting

· How other cultures approach time

· Information planning

· Decision making

· Relationships, power, and change

· Solving problems and addressing conflict situations using multi-cultural strategies and styles

· Global competencies

· Applying culture-specific information for your clients to build optimal relationships

· Virtual team success factors, assessing your virtual team for success

· Managing in a virtual team environment

· Communicating virtually

· E-mail

· Collaborative tools

· Telephone

· Face-to-face meetings

· Team processes

· Standards and agreements

· Work planning

· Availability

· Roles

· Facilitating virtual meetings

· Leveraging technology

Building Your Communication Skills and Plans

· Tailoring your communication style and message for maximum effectiveness

· Analysing your audiences/stakeholders position

· Recognizing and working with resistance to achieve buy-in

· Choosing influencing strategies that will achieve results

· Engaging your audience/stakeholders

Influencing Styles

· Determining your influencing style

· Other styles and why it matters

· Identifying and assessing influence opportunities

Building Your Change Implementation Skills to Gain Acceptance of Your Findings

· The successful change equation: what it is and how it works

· Applying change implementation success levers and specific tools to getting your findings accepted/implemented

· Defining the desired future state, clarifying and agreeing on scope with your client

· Understanding organizational and business impacts if the findings are implemented

Partnering with Your Client to Implement Audits Findings

· Using change implementation consulting skills to help your clients build a roadmap for implementing requested changes

· Working with clients to help them understand the change equation and framework

· Providing clients with an understanding of how to integrate the critical change levers and related tools to implement your recommendations

Diffusing Difficult Situations: Taking Corrective Measures When Things Go Wrong

· Assessing conflict styles

· Good ways to deliver bad news

· Guiding principles for constructively managing disagreement

· The six basic steps of negotiating

· Dealing with disagreement before it gets out of control

· Eight critical mistakes to avoid

Conducting the Interview

· Asking questions that provide the information you are looking for

· Effectively and efficiently gathering information and providing feedback to executive management

· Listening effectively

· Meeting set-up

· Setting the tone for the meeting

· Choosing the appropriate location and physical arrangement of the room