Managing Spreadsheets in the Sarbox Era

by Patrick R. O'Beirne

"I do not look good in orange," one CEO reportedly commented. What was once good practice has now become a legal requirement. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act (Sarbox) provides for the imprisonment of CEOs who knowingly misreport their financial status. Auditors are charged with reviewing management's assessment of the quality of their internal controls. Willful lack of knowledge will no longer be a defense; CEOs will be held to account over what they should have known. No longer are procedures to be consigned to shelfware manuals; it is now necessary to ensure that monitoring is in place to ensure that they are understood and followed.