Sarbanes Oxley

During the years leading up to the Enron scandal that occurred in 2001 “there were many warning signs and credible studies pointing to serious problems in corporate governance, corporate financial reporting and auditing, and the accounting profession itself” (Franzel, 2014). With the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 being more than a decade ago we need to learn from previous scandals and warnings to not let something like this happen again. To be able to do this we need to be consistently addressing the key issues such as independence, corporate governance, corporate financial reporting and high quality auditing standards so that these problems don’t occur again. We can never decide that we are finished addressing these issues and become complacent when it comes to ensuring high quality financial reporting and auditing standards (Franzel, 2014). Research related to auditing trends and risks, the usefulness and influence of audit oversight being put in place will be important going forward to improve auditing practices and regulation that should help to protect investors and the public interest.

Throughout this paper I will be discussing the areas in the audit profession that could benefit the most from further research and analysis, along with areas of research dealing with audit oversight that the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) could find informative, that could help the organization to deal with current and future regulatory requirements. The paper also discusses areas that could be helpful to audit practitioners, public company audit committees and managers about recognizing and working through developing risks that may occur. The continuance of further research and analysis of the audit profession and audit oversight by the PCAOB will be an important piece to ensure the integrity, independence, and quality of auditing over time to protect investors and the public interest (Franzel, 2014).

In 1996 the General...