PRESS RELEASE
8 December 2015
For immediate release
COSO Frameworks pushed for implementation among organisations in Singapore to
raise standards of corporate governance
MOM, MND, ISCA and SID among key stakeholders to put forward their recommendations in
roundtable organised by the Protiviti-SAC COSO Academy
Singapore, 8 December 2015 – The COSO Frameworks will benefit Singapore-based companies in
raising their standards of corporate governance and should be pushed for national adoption. This was
a unanimous consensus among participants in a roundtable that covers salient points on how COSO
can be adopted and implemented in Singapore.
Participants of the roundtable represent key stakeholders that are well placed to influence the
widespread introduction and adoption of the framework in Singapore. They include the Institute of
Singapore Chartered Accountants (ISCA), Institute of Internal Auditors (Singapore), Ministry of
Manpower (MOM), Ministry of National Development (MND), Singapore Exchange, the Singapore
Institute of Directors (SID) as well as the COSO Board.
Developed by the Committee of the Sponsoring Organization (COSO), the COSO Frameworks is
widely acknowledged as a yardstick for good risk management and internal controls and is applicable
to organisations of all sizes, industry and maturity. Its simplified approach towards enterprise risk
management helps organisations to design and implement internal control in view of the evolving
business and operating climates.
Despite its global credibility, Singapore has yet to fully embrace the COSO Frameworks. The
participants agreed that COSO implementation should be done on a national level and it should aim
to become a preferred means for organisations to cope with the volatility of today’s business
environment. They also offered various factors for measuring the success of COSO implementation in
Singapore, such as more cross-sector collaboration and a heightened awareness of risk throughout
the organisation.
Dr. Sandra Richtermeyer, a member of the COSO Board said, “Successful national adoption of
COSO provides a common platform for various organisations and bodies to support high quality,
consistent and integrative approaches to internal control and risk management. It also has the
potential to enhance and support the overall business climate by enabling opportunities for
collaboration and development of best practices.”
Across the table, education is agreed to be the key strategy towards COSO’s successful adoption in
Singapore. This can be in the form of outreach by regulators, strategic goals set on an organisational
level and getting buy-in from the board and management.
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Some beginning steps recommended for board and management include:
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Producing a board risk guide that highlights the need for COSO
Drawing on the experience of directors who have benefitted from implementing enterprise risk
management
Putting in place a national incentive for implementation or adoption, to help offset the
associated costs
Getting IA to frame COSO adoption as a control self-assessment, so that other departments
are more willing to try it out
Mr Uantchern Loh, Chief Executive of SAC and co-founder of COSO Academy said, “Great things
always start as small but good ideas. The COSO Frameworks for Singapore is a good idea and the
participants at this roundtable believe that this idea will lead to great things for Singapore. By getting
key stakeholders to advocate its implementation and giving it time to build up awareness, the COSO
Frameworks will form the basis for good corporate governance and internal controls among
organisations in Singapore.”
This latest roundtable and report comes on the heel of the COSO Academy’s first-year anniversary in
December. Since its inception, four organisations - Institute of Internal Auditors Singapore, Singapore
Management University, Securities Investors Association (Singapore), Singapore Institute of Directors
- have joined the Academy as strategic partners, underscoring the importance of the COSO
Frameworks as best practices among different stakeholder groups, sectors and industries.
Mr Sidney Lim, Managing Director at Protiviti Southeast Asia and co-founder of the COSO Academy,
added, “There’s unanimity that the COSO Frameworks will benefit organisations using them. What is
needed next is an approach for these organisations to adopt the COSO Frameworks and realise the
value-add to organisational performance and corporate governance.”
For the full report, please visit www.sac.gov.sg/cosoframeworksforsingapore
- End -
For more information, contact:
Lin Shuzhen
Senior Editor,
Singapore Accountancy Commission
Tel: 9820 4551
Email: lin_shuzhen@sac.gov.sg
Sharon Seetho
Marketing and Communications Manager
Protiviti Southeast Asia
Tel: 9009 8495
Email: sharon.seetho@protiviti.com
About the Protiviti-SAC COSO Academy (www.cosoacademy.com)
The Protiviti-SAC COSO Academy was launched by global risk and business consultancy Protiviti and
Singapore Accountancy Commission on 3 December 2014. The COSO Academy offers company
directors, senior management executives and practitioners in Singapore access to insights and tools
to better understand how the COSO Frameworks can work for their organizations. The COSO
Academy is supported by The Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission
(www.coso.org), which is jointly sponsored by the American Accounting Association (AAA), the
American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA), Financial Executives International (FEI),
the Institute of Management Accountants (IMA), and The Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA).
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About the Singapore Accountancy Commission
Established in April 2013 as a statutory body of the Singapore Government, the Singapore
Accountancy Commission (SAC) is the lead agency in spearheading the development of the
accountancy sector in Singapore.
The SAC’s Vision is for Singapore to be the Leading Global Accountancy Hub. This will be achieved
through developing for Singapore a vibrant accountancy sector that enables the economy to grow,
businesses to thrive and talent to flourish. In fulfilling this mission, the SAC seeks to uphold the values
of being relevant, insightful, collaborative and advocative.
For more information, please visit www.sac.gov.sg
About Protiviti
Protiviti (www.protiviti.com) is a global consulting firm that helps companies solve problems in finance,
technology, operations, governance, risk and internal audit, and has served more than 40 percent of
FORTUNE 1000® and FORTUNE Global 500® companies. Protiviti has been named to Fortune
magazine’s 2015 100 Best Companies to Work For® List.
About the COSO Frameworks
The COSO Frameworks is the only internationally recognized framework which integrates internal
control and risk management. They incorporate the methodologies needed to ensure that controls
and risk management processes are in place within organizations. This helps to raise levels of
corporate governance, preserve long-term enterprise value and facilitate effective fraud risk
management. The COSO Frameworks have been widely adopted by publicly traded companies in the
United States, Japan and China.
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