“What’s your fraud IQ” (Journal of Accountancy) Mar1.2013

The recent news articles and discussions regarding the over testing or improper testing of students to measure their progress in the basics brought to mind how much education each of us as fraud fighting professionals maintain to continue our professional certifications; those lovely alphabet letters that follow our name. As a fraud fighter, I tend to feel that these letters mean little without the experience and ability to apply said education to my professional work. I could have lots of alphabet soup after my name, but without the ability to apply this knowledge to each case and think outside of the testing box, I have just become adept at passing tests. Which brings me to my point, and I do have one, once we take the path to become credentialed, how do we know we are or have maintained our ‘fraud IQ’?

The ongoing issues regarding the students’ continual testing and preparation for the testing are important; “when does an education become a required process instead an education of how to apply knowledge?”  And so I ask myself, am I honestly building my skill sets or am I just meeting my requirements to maintain my CPE credentials. If tested, would the result be a true measurement of my abilities or instead my ability to accurately recall information. Can you accurately measure an individual’s ability to apply information by the methods of current testing?

I think the article of “Whats your fraud IQ” posted in the Journal of Accountancy dated March 1, 2013 is an interesting way to find out how you test. How would you approach these questions? How would you redesign this test? How much do you really remember? Should CFEs test like Auditor’s – in case work scenarios? What to do you think? Talk amongst yourselves.