Digital Transformation of Internal Audit in the Public Sector: A Readiness and Risk Assessment

The accelerated progress of public administration automation is reshaping operational and decision-making processes, generating increasing effects on control structures and expanding the role of the internal public audit function. Despite the pressure to adapt, the actual level of readiness for digitalisation of the internal audit function in public institutions remains insufficiently conceptualized and without a clear assessment method that would enable comparisons. Through a systematic analysis of the literature to identify the most important elements associated with digital readiness, this research includes ten relevant studies indexed in the Web of Science database and aims to build an integrated framework for assessing the digital readiness of the internal audit function in the public sector. The results of the research are materialised in an assessment tool consisting of three dimensions: technology, strategy and professional capital, which allows the analysis of the level of readiness for the transformation of the internal audit function into a digital one, both in terms of distinct components and at a global level. The study has a dual purpose: at a theoretical level, it fills the gaps in research on the integrated approach to the implementation of digital technologies, and at a methodological level, it proposes a tool capable of supporting empirical assessments, on the basis of which strategic decisions can be made regarding the digitalization of internal audit in the public sector.