ASQ CQA – 3 Auditor Competencies Part 4

7. 3E Interviewing Techniques

So let’s quickly recap those what we learned earlier and then we will look at few other points related to interviewing techniques. So this is the slide which we have seen earlier as well. So when you are interviewing auditing make sure that you have a suitable climate where you can comfortably talk with auditing and then ask a question in conversational way rather than looking at the checklist and asking those questions and take notes quotes and then make sure that whatever questions you are asking those questions are providing you the relevant information and then you should not be suggesting answer. Let AUD answer the question.

And don’t make things emotional, don’t make things personal. So whatever the situation is, focus on the process rather than on auditing or on any other person. So these are a few things which we talked earlier as well and also earlier we talked that when we are having interview there could be three main types of questions open questions, closed questions and clarifying questions. Open questions provide a lot of information, closed questions will give information in terms of yes or no and in clarifying questions we can clarify situation.

So this is also we have talked earlier as well now coming to a few other tips or techniques which you need to understand as auditor. The first one here is use generally open questions because open questions will provide a lot of information. Rather than asking the question which will give the answer in terms of yes or no, ask questions which will give more details how this thing is done. How do you check this? How do you make sure that the component is good? So ask questions in those terms and then once in a while ask a closing question and these closing questions will be to reconfirm whatever you have heard or whatever you have listened during this interview.

Another thing is using active listening and earlier also we have talked that there is a difference between hearing and listening. And here we are talking about active listening where you paraphrase. So whatever audity is telling you, you put that in your own words and repeat back so that it makes sure that whatever your understanding is right and show empathy. Empathy means being in the shoes of the oddity. So that means be aware of the situation in which oddity is. And once again, don’t focus on person, focus on the process and procedures. The third one here is recognize and respond to non verbal clues. So we have talked about this also in communication. Communication could be verbal, nonverbal or written. So make sure that you take hints from nonverbal communication as well.

So audit might be telling you something, but audit might mean something else. And the last one here is determine when and how to prompt a response. So when you are looking for response from auditing, be aware that when supervisor is present, when supervisor is not present, the response of workers might be different. So that’s something which you need to recognize.

And when you are interviewing a group of workers, you might get a different response as compared to when you talk to workers individually. Be aware of these situations. And then another important thing is when you are using translators. So when you use a translator, then you will ask a question. Then the translator will translate that to audit. Then the audit is expected to provide the answer to the question, which translator will again translate back to your language? I have done an audit in different countries with a different language. For example, in South Korea, so where we had one translator, this translator was the audit employee. So we couldn’t afford to take our own translator with the audit team.

So now we have to depend on the translator provided by this audit translator. So let’s say if I ask a question that, how do you receive this material? So translator will translate back to the audit team, and then you will see that audit team starts discussion, discussion, discussion and discussion. At that time, you think that okay, let one person respond back and that’s the answer.

Rather than they keep internal discussion and framing the response, what probably I would like to hear. So be aware of those situations. And there you need to fully handle that and ask for a quick response. Rather than they have their own discussion and then translate or translate something. So be aware of that. So in those situations, you might want to corroborate that information.

Corroborate that information with some supporting things, some supporting evidences. Let’s say if I ask a question that, how do you inspect the incoming material? And then let’s say the response of that is that we have incoming material and then we receive that, we fill in this form, but then you can ask for, okay, can you show me that form? Whatever information you are getting from the translator, you can corroborate that with actual facts or some documents. So these are a few things which you need to be aware of when you’re doing interview.

8. 3F1 Team Building

In the topic of auditor competencies, we have talked about a lot of topics. Here we have talked about auditor characteristics onsite audit, resource management, conflict resolution, communication and presentation techniques. And in the previous video we talked about interviewing techniques. Now coming to this last topic in this list, which is team dynamics.

In team dynamics, we will have three topics which will be covered in three videos. This video will cover team building. The next one will be on team Facilitation. And then the last one in this series will be stages of team development. Let’s talk about team building. When you have audit team, audit team will consist of the lead auditor or the audit team leader and number of auditors. In some audit, this might be just one person only. In some audits this might be a bigger team where you have an audit team leader, number of auditors, some technical experts, et cetera.

So here, once you have a team, either the whole team will be successful in completing the audit successfully, or if they mess up, then the whole team will be responsible for that. So you need to have some team building in the audit as well. Here are a few things which you need to understand about the team building. When we say team building, we are looking at three important aspects here. One is a specific goal. The team will be successful when they have a clear goal and everyone understands that goal. That’s the most important thing in team building. And here I’m talking about the audit plan. So, audit plan will give the overall objective. Audit plan will give the objective of the audit.

Audit plan will give the scope, what is included, what’s not included, what is the criteria of the audit, where is the location, what’s the date, what’s the expected time, et cetera. That audit plan will give the target or the goal which this particular audit team has to achieve. So make sure that all the team members are aware of the audit plan. They are aware of the objective of the audit. Second important thing, in any team, irrespective of whether this is an audit team or any other team in the office, for any project, there needs to be role clarity. Who is supposed to do what? When you have role clarity, then there are less chances of conflict in the theme.

Everyone understands their role. Everyone respects other person’s role in the team. So you have lead auditor. So make sure that everyone is aware of what lead auditor is expected to do. Lead auditor is expected to lead the opening meeting, closing meeting. Lead auditor is expected to take the final decision. If there is any disagreement between different auditors in the team, then you have guides and observers who will be participating. And many at times these guides and observers could be from audit team. But the lead auditor acts as the overall in charge of the audit.

So he or she makes the final call. Make sure that everyone is aware of what is their role and what are the boundaries to what they can go. That’s another important thing in any team building. So we have talked about two things having a clear goal for each of the person and then having clear roles and responsibilities. Third is the interpersonal relationship between the team members, how the team members interact with each other, what are the sort of relationship they have.