If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services.Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation. AbstractPurpose -Aims to examine the New Zealand internal auditor role and conceptualise on the auditor's influence over that role. At its heart lies the question of how an effective internal auditor can overcome the tension of working with management to improve performance while also remaining sufficiently distant from management in order to report on their performance. Design/methodology/approach -An Eisenhardt-inspired multiple case-based approach in which the researcher made observations, examined documents and interviewed senior internal auditors in six New Zealand organisations. Findings -Three concepts characteristic of those who best balanced their role: the internal auditor's external professional status, the presence of a formal and informal communication network, and the internal auditor's place in determining their own role. Informing these concepts is the auditor's ability to manage ambiguity. Research limitations/implications -Limitations of the research include those typical of qualitative study generally and that it is less objectively-measured; however, compensating procedures are employed. Further study could explore each source of influence in more detail and in different contexts, and examine the framework's application elsewhere. Gender studies may be of value. Practical implications -Results reveal how independence dilemmas are addressed by those internal auditors who are most successful in balancing their sometimes conflicting professional role. Originality/value -An original contribution is the conceptualisation of the internal auditor's role as both an independent evaluator of and consultant to management.

Audit professionals are charged with gathering evidence and expressing their opinions on the financial claims made by others. In New Zealand, as elsewhere, these opinions are relied upon for a myriad of decisions as to the economic position and operations of an organisation. The educational experience that future professionals receive in their tertiary study is important because it lays the pedagogical foundation for this role. The aim of this study is to evaluate those teaching practices, subjects and techniques that might be of value to future audit professionals. The analysis is uniquely from the perspective of the professional members who are most likely to benefit from students' experiences. The literature is used to identify relevant questions, and a survey of 360 professional auditors in New Zealand yielded a 36.4% response rate. A triangulated analysis of comments and scaled questions reveals that these professionals are concerned with communication, small business engagements and the relationships between, for example, risk and planning and independence and ethics. Findings also confirm the value of experiential and practice-informed learning and direct us to a few topics that may accommodate non-traditional teaching methods. Conclusions consider implications for teaching and future research.Audit education, New Zealand accounting profession,

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PurposeThis study seeks to examine practices in, and rationales for, internal audit outsourcing in New Zealand (NZ) companies. The purpose is to assess whether practice and preference conform to expectations where small‐to‐medium businesses dominate.Design/methodology/approachSenior financial managers of all 165 NZ Stock Exchange listed companies are surveyed. Questions are drawn from the strategic management and auditing literature. Relationships between size, international association and industry are tested or revealed from descriptive statistics and qualitative analyses. Comparisons to overseas studies, where possible, are drawn.FindingsOf 63 usable responses (38.2 per cent response rate), a comparatively low 57 per cent carry out some form of internal audit and a further 27 per cent claim interest in doing so. International companies are more likely to engage in internal audit, and preliminary findings point to less interest within consumer and equity/trust industries. As to outsourcers, 65 per cent (11) only began doing so recently, Big4 accounting firms are a major source, access to quality is an important reason and most 82 per cent (14 of 17) are aware of independence issues. Conclusions analyse legislative incentive patterns found and suggest further research.Originality/valueRecent scandals and legislation in the USA, UK and Australia highlight the importance of the internal audit function to industry. This study looks at practices in and rationales for internal audit outsourcing found within the NZ corporate sector.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to evaluate threats to dissolve the New Zealand Serious Fraud Office (SFO) as interpreted through the public press.Design/methodology/approachAn institutional approach is adopted in this case, and the analysis is driven by Oliver's understandings of antecedents to deinstitutionalization. Relevant press articles are reviewed, and SFO history and New Zealand socio‐political context inform the analysis.FindingsThe paper identifies over 1,800 articles (September 2003 to October 2008) and analyses the content of those 157 that contain views on the SFO itself. This analysis reveals that while there is a strong political antecedent to the proposed change, the media is dominated by weakly evidenced but emotive functional and social arguments. The susceptibility of the SFO to political influence, and a less‐than‐fully engaged media, is shown to provide a risk of deinstitutionalization to this politically dependent office.Research limitations/implicationsConclusions suggest how a relatively new and possibly politically naïve organisation may be, by necessity, starting to come to terms with its own external dependencies.Social implicationsThe SFO may be evolving new relational norms in response to its own vulnerabilities in a political environment. There may be lessons for others in this analysis of a norming process, and further research into such processes would be a rich area for further study.Originality/valueThe contribution is in forming an understanding of the media patterns and in analysing what they convey as to the threatened deinstituitonalization of the SFO.