Auditors are by nature risk-averse and thus slow to adopt new technology. Rarely is internal audit leadership at the forefront of technological innovation.
In fact, in a recent Protiviti survey, internal audit leaders report that their largest skill gaps are in enabling technologies, such as machine learning, advanced analytics, artificial intelligence and process mining. Almost three-quarters (74%) of chief audit executives in North America say that their internal audit functions are not running activities to support transformation initiatives.
So while audit leaders are often quick to identify tech gaps in the rest of the organization, many admit they underperform in their own department. But tech resistance in internal audit departments isn’t truly an auditor problem. It’s not that audit teams necessarily dislike new technology, but leadership influences its use and acceptance.
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Why Audit Teams Hesitate To Adopt New Technologies
The Fourth Industrial Revolution is creating huge numbers of opportunities and millions of new jobs. Yet internal auditors are not adopting these technologies at the same pace as other professionals and peer organizations. At the surface level, you might assume this is because of a general resistance to innovation. But a closer look reveals the hesitation is due to rational concerns.
Accountability Gap
Across each tech wave, internal audit teams have historically been slow to adopt changes:
- Desktops and laptops in the 1980s
- The internet in the 1990s
- The cloud in the early 2000s
- Rising cybersecurity demand in the 2010s
This hesitation reflects auditors’ role as an organization’s beacons, who warn other departments of emerging risks. The risk-averse nature of auditors makes them uncomfortable adopting tools that might compromise internal controls or introduce new risks. Errors tied to new technologies are harder to defend, placing greater personal and professional risks on your auditors.
Unclear Standards
Existing regulations governing GRC professionals have not fully defined organizational accountability for emerging tools. Internal auditing is a rule-based profession that operates within governing frameworks, so traditional audit functions are easier to defend if an auditor’s decisions are challenged.
Tool Overload
When your auditing team views a new technology as too hard to use, adoption drops. A study published on MDPI found that complexity is a significant factor in whether audit teams pursue innovation. Even when a tool is powerful, complexity may mean your auditors perceive it as an additional cognitive burden.
The Leadership Mindset That Slows Adoption
Many industry leaders note that internal auditors can hesitate to adopt emerging technology. But it’s easy to overlook how the leadership mindset contributes to a culture of caution.
When it comes to automating internal audits, leaders may unintentionally impede new tech use by:
- Treating Technology as a Mandate Instead of a Capability: When you introduce new technology as a directive instead of a tool to support judgment, your team focuses on compliance instead of exploration.
- Expecting Immediate ROI without Learning Curves: It’s easy to overlook that new tools require time to understand when you’re looking for quick, efficient gains. Demanding ROI too fast often discourages your auditors from experimenting in favor of relying on familiar processes.
- Rolling Out Tools without Changing Success Metrics: If you still measure success using previous metrics, your team of auditors considers learning and experimentation as secondary. As a result, even a well-intentioned rollout will stall.
- Treating Pilot Programs as Proof of Value: Pilot programs should be protected learning environments. When you consider them as tests of value, auditors can shift to familiar tools to limit risks.
Your audit team will often mirror the tolerance of your organization’s leaders. If the leadership is uncomfortable with temporary inefficiency or imperfect output, new tech adoption will stall.
Practice patience and psychological safety to encourage progress. Remember that innovation promises efficiency and better insight. But true progress comes when audit leaders get curious and run real experiments to make it safe to learn instead of waiting for certainty.
How To Identify Fear of Failure in Your Audit Functions
Auditors may fear new tech failure more than other teams because internal audit practices call for permanent documentation trails. Errors auditors make while learning a new tool can resurface long after the context has changed.
What’s more, audit decisions are subject to retrospective scrutiny by regulators, external auditors and management months or years after work is completed. So it’s only natural that auditors want to avoid tech-driven errors that carry personal reputational risk.
If you’ve deployed new technology, how can you tell that your team is hesitant because they fear failure? These concerns may not appear as open resistance, but show up in small, rational behaviors that allow your auditors to protect credibility and limit risk.
Parallel Work
Your auditors might test the new tool but continue to run legacy processes “just in case.” While parallel work appears prudent, it reinforces the belief that new tools are unsafe for primary use.
Limited Scope Adoption
Some auditors may apply the new technology only to low-risk areas or non-critical procedures, even when broader use cases exist. Others skip documenting technology-driven insights in final reports, choosing instead to translate results back into traditional formats that feel safer.
Silent Non-Adoption
Your team may comply with the rollout requirements but not actually integrate the new tech into the audit process. So on paper, you’ll see the tech implemented, but it remains underused.
What Can You Do Differently as an Audit Leader?
If leadership and fear of failure are the main barriers to technology adoption in auditing, accelerating progress requires changing the environment. Let curiosity be your guide. The instinct to control every variable is often strong with high-performing leaders. But innovative progress depends on curiosity.
Try these best practices when you deploy new tech for audit risk mitigation.
Redefine Success Metrics During Adoption
Successful tech adoption demands robust change management and clear business alignment to address your team’s emotional and psychological needs. Don’t measure immediate efficiency alone during the early stages. Instead, reward experimentation to create an environment where learning is central.
For example, you can normalize partial adoption and parallel runs to allow your auditors to engage with new technology at a comfortable pace and reduce tech anxiety. Along the way, celebrate incremental progress, and incorporate professional development plans to help auditors feel supported in learning new skills.
Create Psychological Safety Around Judgment
Communicate to your team of auditors when and where tech-assisted conclusions workflows are justifiable so they don’t assume worst-case scenarios. Then, proactively address your team’s fears by emphasizing how the new tool can support their roles and eliminate repetitive tasks.
Shift from Mandates to Enablement
Prioritize human-centered strategies with the new technology. Instead of mandating tool usage with context, let your team identify where the new tool solves real pain points. More importantly, don’t focus too much on features but consider how the technology fits into your organizational strategy and enhances auditors’ work life.
Protect Early Adopters
Shield early adopters from legacy performance standards because they take on disproportionate risk. You can publicly reinforce that mistakes made during learning are expected and supported.
The Real Work of Adoption Takes Leadership
Contrary to most people’s assumptions, slow tech adoption in internal audits isn’t an auditor’s problem. For the most part, it’s a leadership challenge. Fear and caution are rational responses in an environment where mistakes are permanent and scrutiny is retrospective. When you’re embarking on technological change in internal audits, the key to fast adoption lies in how you shepherd change within your unique organizational framework.
At Onspring, we offer you more than the latest tech. We can help you see the potential modern auditing solutions deliver when all your auditors fully adopt them. Download our ebook Build a Better Audit Plan for Stronger Audit Outcomes to learn how to address auditing tech anxiety.
