I think you hit a valuable point. So what do you recommend? Do you:
1. Try to recruit technical people and train as auditors?
2. Train the auditors in the process/technical?
3. Have a technical associate with them?
Or, do you run a combination of all three? Which one have you had the most success with?
Possibly, none of the above.............:mg:
My belief is based on getting a number of issues squared away, first: -
The 'scope' and 'criteria' of each audit, in other words what is going to be audited and against what requirements?
Who is qualified/competent to do that audit?
I don't advocate using auditors who are 'from another department'. In most cases, I'd recommend using someone who has experienced the process they're auditing, as long as
they don't audit their own work......This will enable any coaching to focus on the auditor's technique, rather than on their knowledge of the business process.
Now, I know that's difficult sometimes and added to which they may not have been trained. So, to this, I'm going to suggest that the whole thing about internal audits is that they aren't often done to benefit the business, so the audit planning process needs an overhaul.
Not doing a whole 12 month audit calendar of processes or 'ISO' requirements and focusing the audits on customer critical or business critical issues, is more likely to get managements' attention and, therefore, support.
This is, of course, the audit holy grail! So, take some technical people and train them to audit (and then try some of the other things here too!!)
Andy