Chapter 15: Project Auditing

Overview

Auditing is an activity that has unique connotation and context across various industries and within different professional disciplines. A common aspect of auditing across multiple venues appears to be the concept of examination: observing, identifying, evaluating, determining, etc. The uniqueness of auditing across different venues lies in what, specifically, is being examined. Still, there is similarity in that most auditing efforts examine overall efficiency, quality, and value of outcomes resulting from use or nonuse of a process, practice, policy, or capability.

The PMO has an inherent interest in and responsibility for conducting examinations within the project management environment. To that end, prescribed auditing activities will seek to identify the efficiencies, qualities, and values associated with projects and project management. Of course, this normally extends into examination of business and technical aspects of project work as well.

This model also represents that audits are not assessments. We will use the term "assess" from time to time as a general reference to activities within the auditing process, but not as a distinct descriptive of the auditing process. Assessments, in the context of this model, measure and specify competency, capability, maturity, and perhaps other relevant conditions within the project management environment. In contrast, audits measure outcomes resulting from those features and conditions. An audit in the project management environment, in general, will measure results and identify the contributing causes to those results.

This "project auditing" function enables the PMO to:

• Monitor project management contributions to the achievement of business objectives

• Identify and respond to weak or troubled project performance

• Conduct quality management activities

• Maintain professional and practice standards within the project management environment

• Ensure compliance with organizational policies, industry certification requirements, government regulations, and contractual obligations.

The PMO's focus is on implementing auditing processes and procedures that measure results related to project performance. This inherently implies making judgments about those results, generally in terms of acceptable, marginal, and unacceptable. In turn, the PMO will need to construct corrective actions for results judged to be marginal or unacceptable. Ideally, the PMO also will construct favorable recognition actions for results judged to be acceptable.