Festive Greetings / Another Big Year
As 2014 rolls to an end, I just wanted to take the opportunity to thank you for your interest and support in what has been another big year for us at TDA.
2014 Highlights
This has been a very big year for us. Here’s a few highlights.
Project Emu
Late last year we launched Project Emu – an initiative to cover more ground with less flight.
Our goal was to be able to talk with clients face to face, in real time without all that messing around with transit, building security, booking video-conference rooms and increased carbon footprint.
We also wanted to be able to service clients irrespective of where they were located, or where we happened to be on any given day.
During 2014 we tested these ideas heavily.
We chaired Audit Committee meetings by video over Lync, delivered training programs over Vimeo, video streamed a national event over Webex, delivered client projects using Skype, kept in touch via Facetime and even delivered a session with our video as the head of an avatar in a simulated lecture theatre at Wollongong University. (Yes, this is all true).
While some of this wasn’t without teething problems, our investment is serving us well and is giving a pretty full experience for our clients and attendees. It also means that we can find a way to connect fairly seamlessly to most clients irrespective of their architecture.
From the client perspective, we find that once the initial apprehension is overcome, there’s no going back. It’s simply a great way to get things done.
Based on the success so far, we’ll be reconfiguring our office as a dual purpose broadcast studio in early 2014.
If you’d like to be able to talk to us regularly using some of these tools, let us know or just have a look at our launch video first.
Project Emu from Todd Davies on Vimeo.
Relocation
In early 2013 we relocated to Adelaide to be closer to family. Adelaide seemed to me to be a smart location to do business nationally and this has proven to the case.
While one of our goals with the move was to slow down a bit, with new technologies in remote collaboration we’ve found that our workload and productivity has increased significantly.
While I continue to spend a lot of time in Sydney and Melbourne in particular, the ratio of “away games” to “home games” with video link in the interim is definitely trending in the right direction.
The good news is that our clients have demonstrated that rather than diminish the level of service, our level of service is actually increasing, and demand is increasing as a result.
Thank you to everyone who trialled Project Emu with us in 2013 to allow us to be able to comfortably service clients nationally and regionally.
Projects
2013 was another big year for projects, appointments and R&D.
Here’s a few things we did during the year.
- Developed the best practice IA strategy for a major listed company.
- Undertook best practice research of leading practices in audit methodologies, reporting and embedded quality.
- Developed and implemented leading practices in each of these areas including objective-centric assurance, dashboard reporting and distributed quality circles.
- Delivered best practice training on audit opinions, rating systems and dashboard reporting.
- Developed best practice models for risk management and internal audit.
- Reviewed, assessed and indexed over 5,000 best practice precedents in audit and risk management.
- Developed automated tools for objective-centric risk assurance.
- Delivered a training program on how to identify and analyse strategic risk for the risk and strategy teams of a major listed company.
- Provided policy advice for regulation of corporate governance in Australia across various sectors.
- Market strategy advice for a GRC services provider.
- Undertook “good, bad and ugly” workshops with executive teams to get the most of their risk frameworks.
- Appointed to the Audit & Risk Committee for an Australian rail icon.
- Ongoing audit & risk committee commitments in health care, health research, emergency services, local government and environment.
- Drew upon the expertise of our expert panel in the areas of strategic risk forecasting, risk strategy, demand-driven assurance and GRC systems selection.
Each of these projects have undertaken significant benchmarking, R&D, and the occasional breakthrough in thinking and practice.
If you’d like to find out more and capitalise on our investment, please contact us.
2014 Outlook
2013 was a busy year and we’re deliberately trying to create some clear air in 2014 to focus on some pet projects:
- GRC systems selection (in particular audit software)
- Strategic risk
- Best practice IA reporting, methodology and quality
If you’re interested in being involved in any of these areas, please drop me a line.
Festive greetings
We’re planning to take a well earned break until mid-January, and I hope you also get the chance to take some well deserved time off.
On behalf of the extended team at TDA, I would like to thank you for your ongoing interest and support and we look forward to working with you with great energy in 2014.
Seasons Greetings,
Todd Davies & Associates