Scoping out the audit of the future

After revolutionizing tax and accounting over the course of decades, technology finally looks poised to reshape the third major service of the traditional accounting practice: the audit. Machine learning, data analytics, ever-more-powerful and mobile computers, and new tools like blockchain will do more than just change the way auditors do their job -- increasingly, they'll change what that job is. To get a glimpse of what the audit (and auditor) of the future will look like, Accounting Today convened a virtual roundtable of experts in the field. Sharing their thoughts on the future of auditing here are: Mark Baer, managing partner of the audit services group at Top 10 Firm Crowe Horwath; Frank Casal, vice chair of audit at Big Four firm KPMG; Cindy Fornelli, the executive director of the Center for Audit Quality; Joel Shamon, the national audit leader at Top Five Firm RSM US; and Jimmy Thompson, an audit partner at Texas-based MaloneBailey. Which trends -- whether technological, regulatory, economic or otherwise -- should auditors be paying the most attention to over the next five years? Casal: Audit professionals' work is fundamentally about "trust."