Who Are Agile In Audit Ltd?
History
In Q4 2015, Andy Spence was asked to work with Barclays Internal Audit (BIA) to help them with adopting agility and scrum. Andy’s initial approach was based on kanban. He visualised the present way of working, collected statistics on audit duration and then started looking at reducing waste. This had a significant effect and later metrics indicated that audit duration was decreasing by significant margins.
In Q3 2016, Derek Davidson taught the Professional Scrum Foundations course for senior auditors within BIA. This initial work led to the creation of the BIA Agile Team (BAT) that consisted of three external coaches: Andy Spence, Derek Davidson and Gavin Chapman and three internal coach candidates: Sam Randall, Nadeem Haque and Alexandra Rodrigues.
The work of the BAT over the following 12 months helped revolutionise the way in which Barclays Internal Audit worked. They went from a traditional model to 100% agile, earning the ‘Industry Pioneers’ award along the way.
On that journey, the application of agility helped cut audit times by significant percentage margins. The effect was so pronounced that the external coaches on the BAT were asked to propose techniques from other industries and this led Derek to introduce stable team planning.
Stable team planning is very different from the way in which auditors generally plan and staff audit teams and it met with significant pushback. However, continued work on viability led to the creation of the Audit Planning Simulator that proved what was possible. The technique is now being applied to audits and promises further significant savings in audit lead times. It is an example of the approach we have taken to introduce new techniques to the world of auditing.
In April 2018, Derek and Andy ended their contracts at Barclays and did so in the safe and certain knowledge that the internal coaches were more than capable of continuing the transformation. Andy and Derek both hope to be able to return to Barclays Internal Audit in the future.
Because of the immensely positive experience working with auditors, and also to leverage what was learned during this initial transformation, Andy and Derek setup Agile In Audit Ltd as a bespoke agile organisation to serve the audit community. They have tried, and proven, many agile techniques in an audit context. They’ve learned what works and what does not work. Between them, they have a unique set of knowledge and experience that can help audit teams to benefit from agility quickly and efficiently.
Agile In Audit Meetup Group
In December 2016, Andy, Sam Randall (Product Owner, Barclays Internal Audit Agile Team) and Steve Sanders (Managing Partner, Group Internal Audit at Bank of Ireland UK) created the Agile in Audit Meetup group. This public Meetup has attracted a great, and loyal international following from auditors who attend to share, and hear, experiences of applying agility and scrum in the world of auditing.
To date, AIA Meetup events have been attended by delegates from the following financial institutions:
- Barclays
- HSBC
- Santander
- Lloyds
- Bank of Ireland
- J P Morgan
- Deloitte
- Clydesdale Bank
- Sainsbury’s Bank
- Raiffeisen Bank
- Deutsche Bank
- Nationwide
- Virgin Money
- LV
- Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS)
- Prudential
- Standard Life Aberdeen
- Legal & General
The Meetup group continues to grow and events are always over-subscribed. There is now an international flavour to the group and some members will travel in just for the event. To help broaden the community, we’ll be running events in the USA soon too.
Why not join our Meetup group? Membership is free and there’s much to be gained. We’d love to meet you.
Directors Experience
Derek Davidson has 18 years of experience working in agile environments and five years’ experience as a Professional Scrum Trainer with scrum.org.
Derek also spent 17 years in the Royal Air Force, initially as an RAF Police Special Investigator and latterly as a commissioned officer, specialising in executive roles. The former provides Derek with excellent investigative and analytical skills. The latter provides a firm foundation in leadership.
This experience makes Derek well suited to devising agile transformation strategies, mentoring agile coaches and scrum masters, helping senior management teams with agility and agile leadership and teaching scrum and agility.
Derek’s agile qualifications include:
- Professional Scrum Trainer
- Professional Scrum Master Level III
- Professional Scrum Product Owner Level II
- Professional Scrum Master Level II
- Professional Scrum Master Level I
- Professional Scrum with Kanban Level I
- Professional Scrum Product Owner Level I
- Professional Scrum Developer Level I
- Scaled Professional Scrum
- ICAgile Certified Professional – Agile Coaching
- Certified Scrum Professional
- Certified ScrumMaster
- Certified Scrum Product Owner
You can find more details on Derek’s work experience, as well as testimonials and recommendations, on his LinkedIn profile
Andy Spence has nine years’ experience as an agile coach / scrum master.
Andy’s work experience includes stints as a Tech Support Representative, scrum master and agile coach. He has coached at all levels including at CxO level for a FTSE 25 organisation.
While working at Barclays Bank, Andy helped Internal Audit with agile coaching support. He drew on his years of experience with kanban and scrum and grew this until it became the engagement described in the history section of this document.
Andy’s agile qualifications include:
- ICAgile Certified Professional – Agile Team Facilitation
- ICAgile Certified Professional – Agile Coaching
- Professional Scrum Master I
- Accredited Kanban Practitioner
- Certified LeSS Practitioner
- Certified Scrum Professional
- Certified ScrumMaster
- Certified Scrum Product Owner
You can find more details on Andy’s work experience, as well as testimonials and recommendations, on his LinkedIn profile