Worldcom

ACC 646 Final Project Milestone Two Guidelines and Rubric

Overview: Forensic accounting has been identified as the fastest growing area of accounting. Fraud examiners must understand the legal aspects of fraud and what constitutes fraud. To be successful in this industry, they must be able to determine why people commit fraud and how to prevent it from happening. Through this analytical process, examiners may then provide organizations with recommendations for improving their internal controls, thus preventing further financial losses and additional harm to their reputations. For Milestone Two, you will submit an analysis of the business environment and the industry for your chosen company. Consider the industry-specific challenges, behaviors indicative of fraud, and internal control structure and perform a financial statement analysis for your company. Prompt: Provide the management team of your selected company with an assessment of the business environment and the industry from the perspective of a fraud examiner. Specifically, the following critical elements must be addressed:

II. Business Environment and the Industry

a) What are the industry-specific challenges, such as specialization, competition, or growth, this organization is faced with? How do these challenges relate to the company’s business environment?

b) Based on the case study, what behaviors did employees exhibit that were indicative of fraud? Describe the pressures employees faced from management that might have led to the fraud. How could they have been avoided?

c) Assess the strengths of the organization’s internal controls. Where are the weaknesses and how might these lead to fraud? d) How could you address these weaknesses in order to improve them? What measures could you take to ensure this would improve the

weaknesses? e) What sorts of anomalies were contained within the financial statements or additional financial analysis? How do these anomalies relate to the

potential fraudulent activity? Guidelines for Submission: Your analysis must be submitted as a 2–3 page Microsoft Word document with double spacing, 12-point Times New Roman font, one- inch margins, and at least three sources cited in APA format. Instructor Feedback: This activity uses an integrated rubric in Blackboard. Students can view instructor feedback in the Grade Center. For more information, review these instructions.

Rubric Critical Elements Proficient (100%) Needs Improvement (75%) Not Evident (0%) Value

Business Environment and the Industry: Industry-Specific

Challenges

Determines the industry-specific challenges the organization faces and how they relate to the company’s business environment

Determines the industry-specific challenges the organization faces but does not determine how they relate to the company’s business environment

Does not determine the industry- specific challenges the organization faces

19

Business Environment and the Industry:

Behaviors

Describes the behaviors employees exhibited in the case study that were indicative of fraud and the pressures employees faced from management that may have led to the fraud and how they could have been avoided

Describes the behaviors employees exhibited in the case study that were indicative of fraud but does not describe the pressures employees faced from management that may have led to the fraud and how they could have been avoided or description is cursory or contains inaccuracies

Does not describe the behaviors employees exhibited in the case study that were indicative of fraud

19

Business Environment and the Industry: Internal Controls

Assesses the strength of the organization’s internal controls and discerns the weaknesses and how they may have led to fraud

Assesses the strength of the organization’s internal controls but does not discern the weaknesses and how they may have led to fraud

Does not assess the strength of the organization’s internal controls

19

Business Environment and the Industry:

Weaknesses

Determines how the weaknesses could be improved and what measures could be taken to ensure improvement

Determines how the weaknesses could be improved but does not determine what measures could be taken to ensure improvement

Does not determine how the weaknesses could be improved and what measures could be taken to ensure improvement

19

Business Environment and the Industry:

Anomalies

Determines the sorts of anomalies present in the financial statements or additional financial analysis and directly relates them to the potential fraudulent activity

Determines the sorts of anomalies present in the financial statements or additional financial analysis but does not relate them to the potential fraudulent activity or contains inaccuracies

Does not determine the sorts of anomalies present in the financial statements or additional financial analysis

19

Articulation of Response

Submission has no major errors related to citations, grammar, spelling, syntax, or organization

Submission has major errors related to citations, grammar, spelling, syntax, or organization that negatively impact readability and articulation of main ideas

Submission has critical errors related to citations, grammar, spelling, syntax, or organization that prevent understanding of ideas

5

Earned Total 100%