Insights
Boards commission independent assurance reviews because they need to know whether a major programme will deliver, from someone who does not have a stake in the answer. But “assurance review” means different things to different providers, and the value depends entirely on what is actually examined and who it is reported to. Here is what a good one covers.
By Christopher Fagan
The first thing to understand is what assurance is for. Audit looks back and tests compliance against a standard. Assurance looks forward and tests likelihood of success, while there is still time to change the outcome. A review that only tells you what has already gone wrong has missed the point. The value is entirely in what you do next.
Not whether a plan exists, but whether it is credible. Where the assumptions are optimistic, how fragile the critical path is, and what the end date really is once realistic slippage is applied.
Whether scope is controlled or growing, and whether the timeline has honestly absorbed what has been added. The gap between what was promised and what is now being built.
The workstreams that actually determine outcomes: data, testing, integration, resourcing and the engagement of the business. A review that stays at the level of governance documents and never tests these is not telling you much.
Whether risks are actively managed or logged and forgotten, and whether the significant ones are visible to the people accountable.
The most important and most overlooked. Does the status the board receives reflect the reality on the ground. A programme that has reported green throughout is not necessarily healthy. It may simply be one where nobody feels safe raising a problem.
This is what separates real assurance from theatre. A genuine review reports to the sponsor or the board, independently of the team being reviewed. If the assurance provider reports to the programme, they are marking their own homework, and the review is worth very little.
For most programmes, two to three weeks for a defensible position, with serious problems usually visible in the first week. Assurance can also be ongoing, run at gates or on a regular cadence across a programme’s life.
We provide independent programme assurance reporting to boards and sponsors. See independent programme assurance or get in touch.
If any of this is live for you right now, the senior people who wrote it are the people you would work with.