Previous blog posts have featured misappropriation schemes at other universities to highlight the importance of segregation of duties, management oversight, and other control activities. A $500,000 embezzlement at another Kansas Board of Regents university provides a closer-to-home look at what can go wrong when one person has complete control of departmental operations.

Without using the title of your job, tell me what you do. Interim president Rick Muma and more than a dozen others replied to the icebreaker I shared last month. Some were succinct, while others were longer and included a bit of personality or humor. Using our skills to help and support others is the predominant theme.

A theme that struck a chord this year was Rob Walker's "The Art of Noticing." Exploring this theme more closely, Walker asks if you're noticing what you want to notice? Are you noticing the things you care about?

This column is an index of Audit Update blog posts that reference the 蹤獲扦 Policies and Procedures Manual. The context provided by the blog posts highlights why the policies were developed and adopted and how they can guide you toward desired outcomes or combat harmful consequences.

A conflict of interest exists when a person's outside or private interests affect - or appear to affect - their institutional responsibilities and judgment as a 蹤獲扦 employee. What does a conflict of interest look like? Here are four situations where officials at other universities had their judgment or ethics questioned.

蹤獲扦 recently beefed up its conflict of interest reporting protocols. The new requirements are designed to ensure the transparency of relationships and mitigate any appearance of impropriety.

When we first read or hear about a fraud or ethics scandal, it's easy to shake our heads and wonder what they were thinking. But when concocting a scheme, fraudsters don't conduct a cost-benefit analysis or consider bad outcomes.

Being aware, mindful, and diligent are some of the expressions 15 of your colleagues used to describe our security and compliance responsibilities in behalf of the university. All were said in response to my survey about topics appearing in the Audit Update Blog and monthly Case in Point newsletter.

A husband and wife team took a multipronged approach to defraud their employing university. Their case is rich with examples of how to violate a university's trust. Their system worked because they were trusted employees lacking oversight.

A long-running theft at the University of Toledo shows what can happen when policies and procedures about how and where to deposit money are disregarded or not clearly defined. After looking at what happened at Toledo, we'll review 蹤獲扦 policies and procedures designed to counter a similar occurrence here.