Soft Controls:The human angle of an audit!‎

I have recently attended an IIA webinar about Coordinating Risk Management and Assurance. One of ‎the poll questions was as follows:
‎
Soft controls are easier to audit:
‎
‎– True
‎– False
‎– Depends on circumstances

Almost two-thirds of the respondents choose “false” while the other third choose “it depends”.‎
Soft controls in the above-mentioned webinar were characterized as controls that” Tells you what’s ‎really inside the people”.
‎
‎ Having determined the difficulty of auditing soft controls, my question is as follows: Are internal ‎auditors really trained to audit soft controls? Do we need some basic training in human behavior and ‎psychology?

Please share your thoughts and experience.‎

Picture credit:https://executivefinance.nl/

Can a CAE become a CFO ?

I am always asked if a CAE can make the move to operations and become a CFO. My short answer is ‎‎“yes” and my detailed answer is “it depends”.‎

My” yes” answer assumes that the CAE has the experience, educations, and mindset that enables ‎him/her to function as a CFO. I strongly believe that you cannot audit what you do not understand; ‎accordingly, any successful CAE should have a good understanding of the CFO function.‎

My “it depends “answer refers to the fact that CFO roles may be influenced by the complexity and ‎nature of operations of the organization. I believe that there is no “CFO” fits all type of thing. Each ‎organization has specific requirements for its CFO experience and education. An organization going ‎through an IPO, for example, would require a different type of CFO than a small or not for profit ‎organization.‎

I would love to hear from CAEs who made it to the CFO position. Please share your experience, ‎recommendations and lessons learned during this process.‎