Continuous monitoring: Using AI-powered auditing for efficiency and strategic business value
Board members and executives no longer view assurance as the end goal for their audit teams. Today's leaders demand real-time insights, proactive risk identification, and strategic guidance that drives business performance.
This transformation coincides with unprecedented regulatory convergence — the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board’s (PCAOB) QC 1000 standard takes effect December 15, 2025, SEC cybersecurity disclosure requirements are already active, and updated IIA Global Internal Audit Standards became fully effective January 9, 2025.
The challenge is clear: traditional, backward-looking processes and predefined audit checklists cannot meet these evolving expectations. To serve as trusted advisors and demonstrate business value, internal audit teams must embrace continuous monitoring — shifting from periodic reviews to always-on oversight that provides near-real-time insights.
This comprehensive guide covers:
- What continuous monitoring is and why traditional auditing falls short
- The benefits of continuous monitoring for enterprise audit teams
- How AI technology transforms continuous monitoring for enterprises
- Getting started with enterprise continuous monitoring implementation
What continuous monitoring is and why traditional auditing falls short
Continuous monitoring is an automated, real-time approach to risk management that uses AI and data analytics to evaluate business processes, transactions, and controls on an ongoing basis. Instead of periodic reviews, it provides constant oversight of enterprise operations, identifying issues as they occur rather than months later.
Traditional auditing follows scheduled cycles — typically quarterly or annually — using manual processes to examine historical data through limited samples. Auditors gather evidence, test controls, and report findings weeks or months after events occurred.
The fundamental difference lies in timing and scope. Traditional auditing asks "What happened?" after the fact, while continuous monitoring asks "What's happening right now?" across all operations.
Here’s why traditional auditing falls short in today's environment:
- Limited coverage: Sample-based testing examines only a fraction of transactions, potentially missing critical anomalies and fraud schemes that exploit the gaps.
- Delayed detection: Quarterly review cycles mean issues compound for months before discovery, increasing financial impact and regulatory exposure.
- Manual inefficiency: Weeks of manual evidence gathering consume skilled auditor time that should focus on analysis and strategic guidance.
- Stale reporting: Boards receive historical snapshots when they need current intelligence for strategic decisions.
Continuous monitoring addresses these limitations by analyzing 100% of transactions in real-time, flagging anomalies immediately, and automating routine surveillance tasks. This lets audit teams focus on investigation and advisory work while providing executives with current risk visibility.
The benefits of continuous monitoring
Enterprise audit teams implementing continuous monitoring experience transformation across six key areas. While traditional periodic reviews provide static snapshots, continuous monitoring delivers dynamic intelligence that reshapes how audit functions serve organizations.
This urgency is reflected in The IIA's 2025 North American Pulse survey, where 78% of Chief Audit Executives identified data analytics as their teams' most needed competency improvement — exactly what continuous monitoring delivers. The following benefits demonstrate why continuous monitoring should be your top technology priority.
1. Executive confidence and board trust
Board members and executive leadership make decisions using the most current data available. Continuous monitoring enables audit teams to fulfill this function and establish credibility with organizational leaders.
Real-time data collection and analysis detect errors immediately rather than months later during traditional audit cycles. In fact, organizations implementing monitoring controls achieve 50-60% reductions in median fraud losses — from over $200,000 to approximately $100,000-$120,000 — according to the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners' 2024 Report.
Automation reduces human error risk while rules-based processes optimize accuracy. Teams can view continuous monitoring as an additional control layer, ensuring accounts withstand regulatory scrutiny and stakeholder examination.
Furthermore, continuous monitoring collects more data more frequently, providing audit teams and their executive stakeholders assurance that decisions rely on the most current information available.
2. Expanded risk visibility across the enterprise
Continuous monitoring dramatically broadens audit teams' scope of oversight and analytical capability. Modern audit management platforms access data across the organization — transactions, finances, processes, operations, and emerging risk areas — enabling analysis and targeted deep-dives when needed.
This expanded view strengthens traditional audit capabilities while providing insights into overall business health. Do transaction irregularities in an acquired company indicate control failures or potential fraud? Could subsidiary compliance violations impact enterprise performance?
As regulatory scrutiny intensifies around data privacy, cybersecurity, and corporate integrity, such visibility becomes essential.
3. Proactive risk management capabilities
As audit responsibilities expand into strategic risk management, continuous monitoring provides capabilities for both immediate threat response and future strategic planning.
Ongoing data collection and assessment enable constant risk awareness. Audit teams work with IT and information security colleagues to address threats more rapidly than traditional periodic reviews allow.
Advanced analytics across multiple systems enable pattern recognition and connection identification across the enterprise.
Could rising noncompliance in one division indicate broader organizational trends? How effectively do internal operations align with risk frameworks, particularly as cybersecurity regulations evolve?
These insights position audit teams as valuable partners to legal, risk management, and executive leadership.
4. Real-time performance insights
Board members and executives increasingly want real-time visibility into business operations — which areas perform as expected and where gaps could create larger problems.
Audit teams are uniquely positioned to provide this insight. Their responsibilities span critical business functions:
- Processes
- Objectives
- Risks
- Controls
- Technologies
Continuous monitoring strengthens auditors' ability to contribute to business performance discussions. With data readily available, teams deliver quick, early indicators of program or process effectiveness, identifying gaps requiring immediate remediation.
5. Increased operational efficiency
Managing expanding responsibilities requires time — something most audit teams lack. Continuous monitoring addresses this constraint directly.
Digital audit management solutions prepare accounts faster without compromising accuracy. Organizations implementing AI-powered continuous monitoring can achieve reductions in manual processes and data processing times. This lowers operational costs while improving audit quality.
Automation streamlines time-consuming manual tasks, freeing skilled professionals for higher-level analysis. Continuous monitoring systems enable proactive audit planning, avoiding the peaks and valleys of overwork before major reports or board meetings.
6. Strategic business advisory transformation
The time savings and comprehensive data collection create a powerful foundation for audit teams' evolution into trusted advisors.
Real-time data with an enterprise-wide perspective enables valuable insights into risk, compliance, and broader business issues. Teams can:
- Recommend cost reduction strategies
- Identify operational efficiencies
- Suggest improvements for business performance, revenue generation, and brand reputation
Continuous monitoring brings auditors closer to business processes, strengthening their ability to deliver strategic insights and demonstrate measurable business value across all functions.
How AI technology transforms continuous monitoring for enterprises
Effective continuous monitoring requires AI-powered platforms that process enterprise-scale data in real time and integrate with existing business systems.
For example, solutions like Diligent Audit Management are specifically built to automate, streamline, and unify the entire audit workflow across global operations.
The platform offers AI-powered analytics, continuous controls monitoring, and automatic risk identification, empowering organizations to monitor enterprise risks in real time with full coverage across business units and subsidiaries.
Diligent ACL Analytics — a core component of the audit management suite — delivers advanced, AI-powered analytics that automate testing and analyze 100% of transactional data rather than traditional sampling methods. ACL Analytics enables teams to shift from periodic to continuous oversight through real-time anomaly detection that scales with organizational complexity.
Finally, Diligent’s AI Risk Essentials transforms enterprise risk management through scalable, AI-assisted continuous monitoring. The platform benchmarks, identifies, and evaluates enterprise risks using a library of real-world risk scenarios.
The combination of these AI-powered solutions enables enterprises to transform from reactive, periodic auditing to proactive, continuous intelligence that supports strategic decision-making and regulatory compliance across global operations.
Getting started with enterprise continuous monitoring
Modern audit functions face pressure to provide real-time insights and strategic guidance beyond traditional assurance activities. Continuous monitoring technology enables this transformation by shifting teams from periodic reviews to always-on oversight that delivers business value.
Success requires a focused approach: identify one critical risk domain, implement AI-powered analytics, and demonstrate clear results to executive leadership. This builds momentum for broader enterprise deployment across all risk and compliance functions.
Diligent Audit Management, ACL Analytics, and AI Risk Essentials provide the integrated platform capabilities needed for enterprise-scale continuous monitoring. These AI-powered solutions automate data analysis, identify risks in real-time, and deliver the strategic insights that transform audit teams into trusted business advisors.
Ready to begin your transformation? Request a demo to see how Diligent can accelerate your continuous monitoring implementation and deliver immediate value to your organization.
