Opening meetings that establish the right footing

Ten minutes that shape the whole engagement.

The opening meeting is treated as a formality and does real work. It establishes what will happen, what a finding means, how disagreements will be handled, and whether people are going to speak freely.

The most useful thing to say is that findings are about the system rather than about individuals, and to mean it. Staff who believe an audit is looking for somebody to blame will answer narrowly and accurately and tell you nothing.

It is also worth being explicit that saying I do not know is a complete answer. Interviewees invent explanations under audit conditions, out of helpfulness rather than deception, and those inventions send auditors down false paths.

Logistics matter more than they appear: who will accompany the auditor, whether that person will answer for interviewees, and whether the auditor can speak to people alone. An escort who answers every question has ended the audit's access to the workforce.

Setting the closing meeting time at the opening prevents the common failure where findings are delivered hurriedly to whoever is available, which is how findings get misunderstood and disputed later.

It is worth adding that the opening meeting should establish what happens with information the auditor is given in confidence. Staff occasionally disclose something significant on the understanding it will not be attributed, and an auditor who has not thought about that in advance handles it badly in the moment.