Guest Lecture by Mrs. Monica Kalra, American Express

The series of guest lectures at MFC continues with a guest lecture by Mrs. Monica Kalra, American Express, on "Internal Control and Risk Management Systems", on February 1, 2003.

The highlights of the discussion are as follows:

• Control means the procedures, practices etc developed by the people to provide reasonable assurance that the business goals are achieved by minimizing exposures resulting from financial losses, brand values, etc.
• The main objectives of internal control are
  • Effectiveness and efficiency in performance
    
  • Safeguarding
    
  • Reliability
    
  • Compliance with procedures, etc.
    
• Control is needed
  
  • To prevent bad things from happening
    
  • To ensure that desirable things happen
• The major components of control are
  
  • Control environment, which includes company values, code of conduct, company policies and procedures, company guidelines, management behavior, attitude of leaders, realistic goal setting, visible consequences, job/business skills, etc.
    
  • Risk assessment
    
  • Control activities - both preventive and detective
    
  • Information and communication
    
  • Monitoring
• According to Dr Donald Cressess, happening of fraud can be shown through the 'Employee Fraud Triangle' which includes the motivation to commit fraud, the need to commit fraud, and the opportunity to commit fraud.

The session was followed by and informal tete - a - tete between the guest and the students.