DAC - Continuous Improvement Directorate

1. presentation of the management

A little history

1.1 In 2012 - Creation of the Internal Audit Department, the IAD

The creation of this department was provided for in the founding text of Aix-Marseille University established in 2009. Internal audit did not exist in any of the 3 constituent universities of Aix Marseille University. The implementation was carried out gradually during 2012 with:

• The recruitment of an internal auditor in March 2012,
• The first audit report in July 2012,
• The creation of the Audit Committee in October 2012 and its first meeting in December 2012,
• Validation of the Audit Charter by the December Committee and voting at the February 2013 Board of Directors meeting

1.2 In 2014 - Transformation of the IAD into the Directorate of Audit and Internal Control, the DACI:

The IAD quickly realized that it needed to rely on structured internal control. After reflection, the institution decided to extend the missions of the IAD to the coordination of internal control and, at the same time, a specific organization was set up, with the following elements:

• In June 2013, presentation of the organization of Internal Control in the Board of Directors and creation of the Risk Committee,
• September 2013 First meeting of the Risk Committee,
• 1 January 2014 recruitment of the Internal Control Coordinator,
• In 2014, implementation of internal control referents in the divisions,
• In 2017, strengthening of the DACI with 2 internal control coordinators

1.3 In 2018 - Transformation of the DACI into the Continuous Improvement Department, the DAC:

Further expansion of the Directorate's activities by integrating quality and support into the project methodology, making it possible to integrate the Directorate into a continuous improvement approach with the aim of better controlling, making processes more reliable and secure. Here are some milestones:

• Presentation to the Board of Directors in May 2018 of the need to coordinate a quality policy and the need to support project methodology,
• Recruitment in progress of a Qualitician and 2 experts in project methodology.

2. Organisation of the DAC

The internal audit is autonomous (see the diagram below). This independence is guaranteed by the audit charter and the existence of an audit committee.

• Hierarchical organization chart
• Functional organization chart

3. the internal control framework

3.1 The COSO

COSO was defined in 1992. It is the most widely used international internal control framework. That is why AMU has adopted the 2013 version to deploy internal control in the facility.

The COSO framework suggests a three-dimensional vision of risk management. It is visualized as a cube. With this cube, it is possible to determine for each process how the five components of internal control achieve the three COSO objectives:

• Compliance with laws and regulations;
• The effectiveness and efficiency of operations;
• The reliability of financial information.

The COSO cube is divided into 3 categories of objectives x 5 internal control components x n processes. A process must achieve all three objectives and integrate all five components.