AI isn’t threatening internal audit’s future — it’s fueling our evolution

Internal Audit Month is an annual reminder of the essential role internal audit plays in organizations. We shape and define our role. If we don’t, external forces will.

The age of AI is both an invitation and an imperative for reimagining who we are now and who we’ll be in the future. Fortunately, CAEs are beginning to envision and plan for a future in which internal audit not only coexists with AI, but leverages AI to enhance its value.

I often highlight the lessons I see in survey data — the signals we should heed, as well as our opportunities to do better. But the data from a recent Optro survey also offers reasons to celebrate, suggesting that as AI’s ROI becomes clearer, CAEs are refining their understanding of its impact. Their views suggest that AI is creating vital space for internal auditors to operate at the higher, more strategic level to which the profession has long aspired.

Internal audit has made meaningful progress with AI. This Internal Audit Month, let’s embrace our lessons learned to empower our profession’s ongoing transformation.

Role impacts: AI’s ROI is coming into focus

According to an April 2026 Optro poll1, many internal audit teams are starting to realize or anticipate ROI from their AI investments. In reviewing how teams are investing and where gains are concentrating, I see three noteworthy themes:

• Teams are gaining the most traction in planning and fieldwork. Nearly half of teams (46%) are seeing or anticipating substantial efficiency gains in controls testing and monitoring, and 35% cite gains in audit planning and risk assessment. A few teams (6%) are finding efficiencies in fraud detection.
• While many teams are still waiting to see real results from their time and resource investments, most are confident the ROI will come. While only 15% say they’re already seeing measurable ROI from AI, many teams expect to see ROI within the next 12 months (21%) or 24 months (23%). Another 12% expect to realize ROI in 2–3 years.
• Increasing AI investment is critical to increasing ROI. Fortunately, the majority of functions expect to increase their investments in AI tools and other software in the next 2–3 years: 48% expect to increase by 10-19%, and 20% by 20% or more.

Staffing impacts: CAEs are cautiously optimistic

In response to these early results, the data suggests that most CAEs have optimistic — but ostensibly realistic — views on how AI will impact internal audit staffing:

• They anticipate higher-skilled workforces doing less repetitive, low-value work, freeing up capacity to address more critical risks and enabling reduced reliance on external resources. When asked to identify all areas in which they expect AI to have the greatest impact on their teams’ compositions, 51% expect a reduction in transactional/data processing roles, 40% foresee a shift in hiring toward higher-skill profiles, and 32% predict reduced reliance on contractors or outsourced staff.
• They predict staffing plans in which entry-level roles still exist and deliver value. Only 14% anticipate the elimination of entry-level positions being a high-impact area for their teams. Time will tell whether this view is realistic, but the optimism feels noteworthy.
• Looking out three years, they don’t think AI will significantly impact headcount. A commanding majority expect headcounts to either stay the same (53%) or be slightly reduced (29%). Another 14% expect AI to require more specialized staff, increasing headcount.

Team development impacts: A roadmap for future relevance

Even as AI’s ROI and staffing impact are still coming into focus, three conclusions seem clear:

• AI will augment human capabilities to create efficiencies, including automating repetitive tasks. For example, AI will increasingly perform much of the analytical work required for assurance, including testing transactions, flagging anomalies, and monitoring controls. Teams will also use AI to draft communications and planning documents, review reports, and perform other administrative tasks.
• The freed-up bandwidth will enable a focus on higher-value activities and improved stakeholder alignment. Internal auditors can spend more time on risk assessments, strategic decision-making, and assurance or advisory services addressing the risks that genuinely matter to stakeholders. AI will enable a shift from an exclusive focus on value protection — advancing us down the path to being the trusted advisors we aim to be.
• The AI expertise gained will support another key value-creation opportunity: Advising and providing assurance on effective AI governance. Internal audit will play a central role in helping organizations close the growing gap between accelerating AI adoption and effective AI oversight and risk management.

Of course, this shift won’t happen by magic. It will occur because CAEs proactively focus on reskilling their teams. Fortunately, most CAEs seem confident that their teams can learn these skills. While 32% of internal audit leaders surveyed in Optro’s April poll said AI had not yet influenced staffing levels, 61% indicated a focus on reskilling existing staff rather than reducing or increasing headcount.

CAEs also increasingly appreciate the need to help their teams cultivate the human “superpowers” AI can’t replicate. When Optro’s 2026 Focus on the Future survey asked internal audit leaders to identify those skills, top responses included professional skepticism and inquisitiveness; relationship-building and communication; ethical judgment; critical thinking; and intellectual curiosity. The World Economic Forum’s 2025 Future of Jobs survey reinforced these findings, identifying analytical thinking; technological literacy; resilience, flexibility, and agility; creative thinking; and leadership and social influence as skills in greater demand across industries.

Making AI central to strategy is a survival strategy

It’s clear that internal audit needs help gaining the skills to move forward effectively with AI. But we can simultaneously applaud how CAEs are looking beyond AI’s efficiency gains to imagine how it can help redefine internal audit’s role and value.

Internal audit’s future in the age of AI requires conscientious evolution to become strategic advisors, investigators, and interpreters of AI-generated insights. To that end:

• Every internal auditor should rethink their career strategy with AI in mind. Develop AI literacy while strengthening — and spotlighting — your human superpowers. Stay apprised of the technology trends reshaping your organization, industry, and profession. Increase alignment with your organization’s risk and governance functions. Above all, be ready to adapt and pivot your skills to find a career path that works for you.
• CAEs should make AI central to strategy. Again, this transformation won’t occur without CAEs’ deliberate efforts to prioritize and support the development of both human superpowers and AI skills, including the capability to advise our organizations on AI use and governance. That means rethinking talent development, hiring, and retention to source, cultivate, and sustain these skills. It also requires strategic plans that acknowledge AI as critical for sustaining internal audit’s value and relevance.

We can help our organizations adapt and stay resilient amid a changing world. But we must adapt first. This Internal Audit Month, instead of feeling anxious about AI, feel empowered by it. AI is key to unlocking ongoing value and relevance.

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1 The “Internal Audit Budget Pressures” survey was open from April 2, 2026, to April 9, 2026, and distributed to internal audit professionals to gather insights on budget trends, staffing, and the impact of AI on internal audit functions.

About the authors

Richard Chambers, CIA, CRMA, CFE, CGAP, is the CEO of Richard F. Chambers & Associates, a global advisory firm for internal audit professionals, and also serves as Senior Advisor, Risk and Audit at Optro. Previously, he served for over a decade as the president and CEO of The Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA). Connect with Richard on LinkedIn.