PCAOB Inspection Readiness Managing Director

The mandate

The Managing Director will make inspection readiness a consequence of sound audit execution, not a seasonal file-polishing exercise. The role will focus on whether engagement teams identify and respond to risk, obtain persuasive evidence and supervise difficult judgement in real time. It must prevent retrospective documentation from obscuring what was actually known and decided.

This permanent portfolio owns regulatory-theme analysis, internal inspections, remediation testing, engagement coaching and quality reporting. It will translate public standards and inspection observations into specific behavioural and methodological changes without revealing firm or issuer identities in this brief.

The Managing Director can select files for internal review, require quality remediation, block internal clearance and escalate unresolved matters to professional-practice governance. Licensed engagement partners retain opinion responsibility. The role will not rewrite workpapers after the fact to create evidence that did not exist.

The first year will deliver a risk-based readiness programme, inspect priority files before and after issuance, validate recurring-theme remediation and strengthen reviewer capability. Success means live audit quality improves and repeat findings decline across files, not merely that inspection correspondence is managed effectively.

What you will own

• Map inspection themes to current methodology, engagement behavior, supervision and system-of-quality controls.
• Select files using risk, judgement complexity, recurring weakness, leadership history and public-interest consequence.
• Conduct in-flight reviews early enough for engagement teams to perform legitimate additional work before report release.
• Inspect completed files for evidence linkage, contradictory information, review quality and impermissible hindsight documentation.
• Analyse deficiencies by root cause in competence, incentives, time, consultation, method or supervision.
• Require remediation to be demonstrated through current engagements and independent retesting rather than policy issuance.
• Report quality indicators and unresolved systemic risk candidly to professional-practice governance.
• Develop reviewers who challenge experienced partners consistently and distinguish consequential defects from form.

Candidate qualifications

• At least 20 years in public-company statutory audit, audit quality or professional practice, including Managing Director or partner-level inspection responsibility.
• Active US CPA licence with current standing and substantial PCAOB-governed audit experience.
• Evidence of identifying a quality defect in-flight and securing additional work before opinion issuance.
• Deep command of PCAOB auditing standards, evidence, estimates, supervision, documentation, quality management and inspection process.
• A case where you rejected retrospective workpaper enhancement because it did not reflect timely audit work.
• Experience proving remediation through changed engagement behavior and independent retesting.
• A record of challenging senior partners while maintaining calibrated, standards-grounded judgement.

Working terms and boundaries

• This ongoing role has first-year gates after theme mapping, in-flight review, completed-file inspection and remediation retest.
• Internal clearance and quality escalation are included; statutory opinions remain the licensed engagement partners' responsibility.
• Hybrid work is centred on secure file review, partner challenge, regulator-readiness sessions and quality governance.
• No document may imply procedures were timely when created after the underlying audit decision or report date.
• Year-one completion requires validated remediation, fewer recurring findings and a capable independent reviewer bench.

Application

Applications for this mandate are received in one way only: through the India Board Terminal's application process. It is automated end to end. Your Executive Passport travels to the mandate holder in its confidential form, your answers to the three questions below are read before anything else in your file, and every stage that follows is recorded on your applications page.

There is no address to write to and no intermediary to call. The mandate holder reads what the Terminal delivers and nothing else, which is what keeps the process the same for every applicant and keeps your name out of it until you release it. Applications close on 9 October 2026. Mandate reference AUD-PER-2026-BOS-46.