Internrevisionens påverkan på organisatoriska beslutsprocesser

Sammanfattning: Internal audit has received an increasingly important role the last years, e.g due to its objective and advisory role, where the function is seen as an important support to the management. Previous studies in the field have been dominated by the concept of agency theory, even though management often is the main counterpart in the daily work and the value they seek from internal audit seems to be out of the agency theory scope. Since decisions often can be seen as a crucial activity in organizations, we intended to examine how internal audit can affect management’s decision-making processes. The thesis consists of a qualitative study where semi-structured interviews have been conducted with three representatives from management and six internal auditors, from a total of six different organizations. The purpose of the thesis is to increase the understanding of the role of internal audit in organizational decision-making processes from an alternative theoretical perspective in terms of decision-making theory. Research that draw attention to the advisory part of the internal auditors’ duties, hence the impact on organizational decision-making, on the basis of alternative theoretical perspectives seems to be limited, why we intend to contribute to the research field by deepen the understanding of the role of internal audit in the decision-making process. This study found that internal audit can influence the decision-making process through various factors both, directly and indirectly, in their daily work.