So far, it is evident from the SAI’s monitoring system that the pursuit of the strategic priorities is contributing to strengthening the SAI’s institutional, organisational and professional capacity. This has facilitated the SAI’s ability to demonstrate the value and benefits it is contributing to the citizens through its services. The steady rise in public trust and the earned goodwill of the oversight Chairperson in the Guam Legislature on the SAI’s independence, provide additional evidence that the implementation of the SAI’s strategy is on an upward trajectory.

But how did a small SAI with only 14 staff manage to successfully take the results of its SAI PMF assessment, develop and implement a new strategy? SAI Guam’s impressive results are anchored on strong commitment by SAI leadership. The Head of SAI allocated staff time and authorised staff directly involved in the SPMR initiative to attend the IDI training activities. SAI Guam is not eligible for development assistance under the Organisation for Economic Co-operation Development (OECD-DAC) assistance arrangements. As a result, the SAI participated in all the activities of the initiative at its own cost. By any standard, this level of commitment by the SAI Guam leadership is exemplary.

SAI Guam has made its mark at the regional level by sharing its experience in the SPMR initiative with other SAIs within and outside the PASAI region. A resource person from the SAI, Mr. Jerrick Hernandez, is providing technical support to the strategic management team of SAI Philippines, one of the largest and leading SAIs in the ASOSAI region. In addition, Mr. Hernandez is occasionally invited by the IDI to participate in delivering regional SPMR training courses as a co-facilitator.

The strategic management journey embarked on by SAI Guam through its participation in the SPMR initiative is a demonstration of commitment to the principle of continuous improvement advocated by INTOSAI P-12. Against all odds, SAI Guam completed a SAI PMF assessment to establish a baseline for its performance, developed and implemented a streamlined strategic plan and focused on enhancing its ability to deliver value and benefits to the citizens. There is tangible evidence indicating that the implementation of the SAI’s strategy is yielding the desired results. Despite its size, SAI Guam has also made significant contributions to the regional and global implementation of SPMR.

SAI Guam’s participation in the SPMR initiative has been a worthwhile undertaking for the SAI.

Of particular interest, the strategic development plan refers to the Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index to measure its impact on the improvement on the management of public affairs.

The strategic development plan is supported by an operational plan covering the same period. This approach provides an overview of the 60 activities to be delivered throughout the five years period to implement the strategic development plan.

The operational plan sets clear and measurable targets and provides information on resources needed to execute it. Having clear targets is again a key element of a strategic plan as it helps to assess the performance of the execution of the plan.

The Tribunal de Contas has developed its own Planning, Monitoring and Control Guide which requires a mid-term review of the strategic development plan reflecting strategic management best practices. Indeed, while a strategic plan is usually set for a period like 5 years in the case of Cabo Verde, strategic management always requires flexibility. To that end, assessing the strategy effectiveness is key and that it the purpose of the mid-term review that the Tribunal de Contas decided to conduct.

The first thing to do was to prepare the terms of reference detailing the objectives, scope, methodology, and timeline together with the resources necessary to conduct the review.

The SAI decided to conduct this mid-term review through its Planning and Quality Control unit using the activity reports produced by the Tribunal de Contas for years 2020 and 2021 and information directly collected to the operational units for the first part of 2022.

The mid-term review proved to be very positive as it highlighted the areas where improvements are necessary hence allowing the President of the Tribunal to make necessary decisions to prioritize the activities for the second half of the strategy term. Notably, the SAI will focus on measuring the public perception of the SAI and its impact on the management of public resources for the benefit of the citizens.

The team in charge of the mid-term review was very familiar with the strategy and operational plan as its members participated in the SPMR Initiative. Thanks to this training, they were able to find solutions to the methodological issues they face during the review design and execution process.

Despite those impressive achievements, the SAO identified some remaining challenges that called for an update of the strategic plan. One such obstacle is that the SAO does not have the mandate to audit government revenue – a legislative challenge that, albeit outside of its complete control, the SAO strives to influence through its work and communication activities. Another is that, while the SAO aims to enhance its audit activities in the area of IT systems of public entities, particularly in light of the pandemic, this calls for internal strengthening of IT audit capacity. Finally, as the SAO remains committed to acting as a model organisation, it identified that it had some outstanding work towards establishing standard operating procedures for their internal ethics control system, as well as for impact assessments.

Ms. Gathungu quickly realised through her work with Botswana that Kenya shares many of the same organisational challenges as their peers and recommended her SAI to join the initiative. At this point the SAI was in a transitional phase with no appointed AG and a strategic plan about to run out.

At the same time, other SAIs in the region had advanced with the SPMR initiative. This did not discourage SAI Kenya from joining and aiming at catching up on the progress of their peers. On short notice, Ms. Gathungu compiled a team to conduct an accelerated SAI PMF assessment. IDI supported this by organising a SAI-level fast-tracked training for the team in Nairobi.

High levels of motivation among staff members ensured fast initial progress in the assessment; the SAI faced challenges in finalising it, however. The appointment process for a new AG took several months, leaving a leadership vacuum in the SAI, and preventing progress for a while.

After a process that took longer than anticipated, Ms. Gathungu was named the first female Auditor-General in the history of Kenya in 2020. She focused vigorously on finalising the SAI PMF assessment with her team, which was subsequently independently reviewed by an IDI-appointed reviewer. She formed a new team to take forward the SAI’s strategic planning efforts and finalise a strategic plan towards mid-2021.

During all that, Kenya had to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic much like the rest of the world. Intermittent lockdowns and working-from-home arrangements posed an additional challenge to the team while it was working on defining the SAI’s strategic priorities based on its SAI PMF assessment.

The assessment provided an additional priority for the SAI’s strategic plan. This ensures that the SAI will become more gender responsive. It also shows a continuous practice of the SAI to adopt new impulses and to learn from supporting its peers. The strategic planning team is now faced with a wide field of priorities and resource constraints that have become more pronounced during the pandemic.

While the SAI is still working on its final strategic plan, its main priorities are shaping up, based on its SAI PMF assessment, assessment of stakeholder views, and gender assessment: Improving the SAI’s audit work by updating its methodology for emerging challenges, strengthening the SAIs communication towards its stakeholders, and streamlining the SAI’s organisational management to make best use of its limited resources. While SAI Kenya is a provider of support to some of its neighbours, it also has benefited from support by its peers from Sweden for many years. The OAG of Sweden is committed to continue its support and align it to the new strategic plan from 2021 onwards.

OAG Kenya, under the leadership of its AG Gathungu has recently published an abridged version of its SAI PMF assessment and is about to publish its new strategic plan. It is committed to the quality of its audit, to improving organisational practices for ensured implementation of its strategic plan and to contributing to gender equality in its society. With those ambitions, the SAI of Kenya continuous to set standards for the peers in its region.

At a time when Tunisia is facing many difficulties, challenges and scarcity of funds, optimism -in general- leads us to hope that change is possible and that the future will be better than the past.”

Among those was the need for further refinements in the audit methodology, the lack of specialised knowledge in some emerging areas such as big-data audits and public sector innovation, and internal communication and technology in support of the audit process. The SAI subsequently joined IDI’s Strategy, Performance Measurement and Reporting (SPMR) initiative, which builds on the SAI PMF findings to support SAIs in developing robust strategic management processes. The new strategic plan of the SAI developed under SPMR underscores the SAI’s role in supporting digitalisation in the public sector, which has become a critical priority in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.

So how did the SAI build this innovation into its audit and strategic plans? First of all, the implementation of a robust PMF-SAI diagnostic, as well as the analysis of key stakeholders, allowed the identification of an adequate baseline. This included various aspects to work on and capacities to develop, as well as competencies already present in the CGR that would contribute to future strategic objectives of the new ISP.