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A multi-objective competency-based decision support system for the assignment of internal auditors to multiple projects

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Abstract

Internal audit is an independent function that provides objective assurance and advisory services to business partners in the form of projects. As the skilled human resources, internal auditors play a significant role in ensuring audit quality and thus should be managed properly. However, there are only very few studies on auditor-project assignment problems at the operational level. Also, many studies on general team formation problems neglect the real-life implications of simplifying mathematical models to enable practitioners to understand and implement. To bridge these gaps, this study presents a new integrated two-phase approach to assign internal auditors to multiple projects. In the designed decision support model, a harmonious level index is firstly proposed, measuring the suitability between auditor capability and project characteristics using a simplified fuzzy filter ranking method. Then, Min–Max multi-choice goal programming (MMCGP) model provides the assignment solution that balances internal auditors’ multi-dimensional fit to the projects and their preferences, and thus optimizes the productivity of internal audit projects and staff’s job satisfaction. A real case study is presented to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed model and its solution. The comparison results further show that the proposed model outperforms the manual operations and the exiting approaches in the literature. This research extends the existing literature on auditor assignment problem by developing a flexible decision support tool and a practical classification of auditor competency. The MMCGP approach also provides an ideal staff assignment solution by setting multiple aspiration levels for each goal and balancing the unwanted deviations among goals.

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Acknowledgements

This work is an outcome of the doctoral thesis of the first author, undertaken at the University Institute of Lisbon (ISCTE-IUL), Portugal, and the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China (UESTC), P. R. China.

Funding

This work was partially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 71971044) and Major Program of National Social Science Foundation of China (No. 20&ZD084).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. ISCTE Business School, BRU-IUL, University Institute of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal

    Xiong Wang & Fernando A. F. Ferreira

  2. School of Management and Economics, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, People’s Republic of China

    Xiong Wang & Pengyu Yan

  3. Fogelman College of Business and Economics, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN, USA

    Fernando A. F. Ferreira

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  1. Xiong Wang
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Appendices

Appendix A

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Table 11 Appendix A Auditor-capability matrix (\(M_{kij}\)) and weight corrector (\(w_{kj}^{o}\))
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11.

Appendix B

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Table 12 The weighted and corrected decision matrix (\(N_{kij}\)) and auditor’s suitability (\(H_{ij}\))
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12.

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Wang, X., Ferreira, F.A.F. & Yan, P. A multi-objective competency-based decision support system for the assignment of internal auditors to multiple projects. Ann Oper Res 338, 303–334 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10479-024-05855-3

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