Audit Performance and Practicing Environment Reform: Audit Practicing Environment in Egyp

Abstract

This thesis presents a study to identify and measure the interrelationship between proposed audit environment’s main factors, in order to present a suggested model for audit fundamentals’ reform in Egypt. This model will increase the professional auditors' and practicing regulatory bodies’ roles. Due to the globalization of capital markets, the audit environment becomes more complex and includes many interactive relationships between its main fundamental factors. Recent accountability failures in the United States and other countries raised the fact that the accounting and auditing professional practicing environment needs to be reformed, modernized, and expanded.

Despite the increased global attention to the importance of audit practice reforms, there are a limited number of academic researches that discussed the practicing environment changes and their affects on auditors' responsibility and operating process. An extensive review of the literature revealed a strong relationship between audit practicing and recent financial failures, as well as the subsequent global expansion of practicing reforms.

This thesis makes an important contribution to the audit-practicing global harmonization through developing a theoretical Conceptual Practicing Environment model that has been created and follows a deductive approach, and primary data questionnaires collected from the designated practitioners in different local big audit firms. Data was analyzed according to their descriptive properties and underlying correlation structure. Several principal components were derived from these analyses, which were used in hypothesis testing, in order to examine the interrelationships between the factors associated with audit-practicing environment. Furthermore, implications for academics and practitioners are drawn that indicate the relevance and applicability of this research to audit practice reforms. Research limitations for possible future research are set out. The thesis is organized into eight chapters, which are entitled in the following order: chapter one introduces the overview and the background of the study, chapter two introduces a review of related literatures, chapter three presents an analysis of the relationship between audit practice and recent financial market failures, chapter four examines different internal and external audit-practicing environment variables, chapter five discusses the current environment of audit practice in Egypt, chapter six proposes the suggested factors that affect the efficiency of the audit-practicing environment, chapter seven analyzes the correlation and multiple regressions based on the questionnaire and empirical tests of the hypothesis, and chapter eight provides suggestions for Egypt’s local practice reforms.

The magnitude of each variable in the practicing environment will be differentiated from one country to another based on the local culture and influence power of environment of different variables. The thesis confirmed that the current Egyptian local practice environment is classified as a dormant, complex, and uncertain environment that needs major reforms in order to increase its practice organizations effectiveness. Also, empirical research results raised a consensus between the selected sample answers about the importance of increasing professional accountants’ and auditors’ technical and judgmental capability, in addition to the necessity of increasing the non-governmental organizations’ subscriptions in developing and managing the practicing profession.