ATIA - Mike Jacka Retires MP3.mp3

Transcript

00:00:02 Speaker 1

Hi, I'm Ann Milledge, content director at the IEA. Welcome to the All things Internal Audit podcast. Today we have a special episode as we say goodbye to an iconic blog in the internal audit community. The mind of Jacka after 16 years and 900 post. Mike Jacka, the blogs founder and longtime author, is stepping away.

00:00:22 Speaker 1

Mike is a true veteran of the internal audit profession, known for his expert knowledge, insightful commentary and, of course, his signature humor that has made his writing stand out for so many years.

00:00:33 Speaker 1

In this episode, I'm thrilled to sit down with my longtime friend to discuss his journey, why he's decided it's time to bring the blog to an end, and what the future holds. The grab your headphones and join us as we dive into a conversation about Mike's incredible blog adventure filled with Wisdom, laughs, and of course, some great stories from the world of internal auditing.

00:00:54 Speaker 1

Hi, Mike.

00:00:56 Speaker 1

Hello, how are you?

00:00:58 Speaker 2

I'm doing fine. How are you Anne?

00:01:00 Speaker 1

I'm fine. I was trying to remember how long we've known each other. I seriously don't remember the first time we met. Do you, I mean.

00:01:06 Speaker 2

I know it was before you were married because at one point I got an edit on, I believe, A blog post or an article.

00:01:13 Speaker 2

Well.

00:01:14 Speaker 2

And I said, oh, who is this person? And I said this very nice e-mail. And then later I realized it was you. And I told you I'd been much.

00:01:21 Speaker 2

Meaner in the.

00:01:21 Speaker 2

E-mail if I'd known it cause you.

00:01:22 Speaker 1

I do remember that, OK, so.

00:01:26 Speaker 1

900 blog posts you're finally running out of words.

00:01:30 Speaker 1

No, no, just that's my family. I don't need to. What made you decide to end the mine? To Jack after 900?

00:01:39 Speaker 2

900 was a good round Number. I've been thinking about it earlier. I kept calling it semi retired because I quit working with farmers insurance about 12 years ago and was doing.

00:01:48 Speaker 2

This.

00:01:49 Speaker 2

Semi full time doing the training, doing the speaking and doing the writing.

00:01:53 Speaker 2

And I just found myself thinking, what else do I want to do in which other directions do I want to go?

00:01:59 Speaker 2

And there was an interesting thing too. I started feeling like I was repeating myself, which, you know, at 900 you probably are, which kind of raised questions in my mind. One then why are people paying attention? 2 Why do I repeat myself? And is anybody listening? That would be the number 3.

00:02:19 Speaker 2

So it was just seeing the right time based on what's going on with everything. And no, I and it times out nice. I'm also turning 70 in July. So all these nice round numbers.

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Together so.

00:02:31 Speaker 1

Question just for me specifically. Have you ever had a thought about a post that you didn't include in the first draft of the art?

00:02:39 Speaker 1

Oh.

00:02:42 Speaker 2

So what you know is because and I used to also have the column in the magazine, which I think you gave me 300 words or something. I mean it takes me that long to say hello and I worked with David Salerno that time and I told him, look, I started about 3000 words.

00:03:00 Speaker 2

And then I have to cut it down.

00:03:02 Speaker 2

And the blog post is very much that way and it's not necessary I try and keep the basic thoughts, the basic ideas. It's the fluff and draws around it that I've got to decide what is important, what isn't rearranging it. It is an interesting thing, you know, it's it's like the old line. This letter would have been shorter if I've had.

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The.

00:03:19 Speaker 1

Time from the very beginning and I just added in here.

00:03:22 Speaker 1

Of time. You brought a much needed humorous land to both your articles and your blogs. You know, starting with on the lighter side in the magazine and continuing with I humor and the mind of Jack.

00:03:35 Speaker 1

Logs so you know often your humor is a hit, but every once in a while I guess my question is how do I get to audit land? And then how did you know there was a fly in?

00:03:46 Speaker 1

Your head.

00:03:48 Speaker 2

Wow, we're, we're we're going right for the jugular. Aren't well. The audit land 1 is a is a hoot. I know. That's why you brought it up. So I would write these pieces when I was doing the pure humor ones. And I'll go back to one of the other comments. When we first talked about this, I submitted 3 different ideas to the committee to see if they thought it was worth.

00:04:07 Speaker 2

One person wrote back. These two are funny, but this one's insulting. Somebody else wrote back and said, well, this first one is insulting and the next two are funny. The next one, next person said. None of them are funny and the last person said they're all hilarious and I think I talked to you at that point and said get ready. This will be the response you're seeing the range of.

00:04:23 Speaker 2

And so I'm going to sidetrack from yours. One of my favorites was I did auditing carols, Christmas carols, auditing base. We got a couple of people who said, oh, they're just reinforcing the stereotypes of the and it's like, that's the humor, folks. That's the part that's supposed to be funny.

00:04:38 Speaker 2

Again, if this if the profession takes itself too seriously.

00:04:42 Speaker 2

It's in as much trouble as anything, but to your point, I wrote one about audit land and I made a comment. It was about how the CIA was going to build an amusement park. I said the only people will get all these jokes. There's about 5 people in the world that will get all the jokes because it was in jokes about audit and in jokes about Disneyland.

00:04:58 Speaker 2

Then you guys got a question from somebody a legitimate question.

00:05:03 Speaker 2

When was it going to open and how did they go?

00:05:05 Speaker 2

Sit there.

00:05:06 Speaker 2

And you fired that to me and said, can you come up with a response for them?

00:05:11 Speaker 2

Expertly, expertly dodging the issue. And so I wrote back. You know, I really appreciate people understand the humor and, you know, come, you know, kind of trying to give them the benefit of the doubt on it. And I believe a year later, the gentleman was on a tour and actually, again, legitimately asked you guys what was going on with all.

00:05:30 Speaker 1

Yeah.

00:05:30 Speaker 1

You've taken you seriously.

00:05:32 Speaker 2

And you have to explain the fly. I'm sorry. That was you.

00:05:36 Speaker 1

Well, I think you know your column was so unique. You're so unique to anything else that's in the magazine. We had to add something special to it and the fly on the head to us was just funny and, you know, was just the right touch. But we did.

00:05:51 Speaker 2

I thought it was hilarious and you know, it's one of those where people would go. Why you fly and it's almost like, well, if you.

00:05:57 Speaker 2

Have to ask it. You don't get it.

00:05:58

Yeah.

00:06:00 Speaker 1

So yeah, and we got a question from somebody, somebody who read it, who said, you know, do you know he has a fly on his head?

00:06:07 Speaker 2

So then when I was my last day on the committee, you guys had a nice cake with my picture and a fly on its.

00:06:12 Speaker 2

Head. I remember that. Yeah.

00:06:14 Speaker 1

You know, one of the most popular posts that you did and was actually recently was get off my lawn.

00:06:21 Speaker 2

Popular being a relative term, the one that was most viewed and commented on is that a better way to put that?

00:06:25 Speaker 1

Yeah. Well, no, I think it, I think it was, yeah, that's a better way to put it. But people really got into it and wanted to comment on it and and and it even spawned a a follow up post by someone else. So yeah, it received 48 comments, a lot of conversation that you were you were saying.

00:06:44 Speaker 1

Like a grumpy old man. Get off my lawn. That remote auditing does not work, and people had a lot of opinions about that. Why do you think this one created such a sensation?

00:06:54 Speaker 2

Well, for one, I did take the pendulum all the way over. Very often I try and take, you know, both sides of the story a little bit like that. And this one I just went all the way with it and kind of the way I feel about it too. So I think that's why so that.

00:07:08 Speaker 2

People were more active about what they were seeing and some liked it a lot, didn't like it, and in my mind I don't that whole discussion of working from home, as you may know, some people may know you try and raise your kids right. But my son became an internal auditor.

00:07:27 Speaker 2

So what could you?

00:07:27 Speaker 2

Do and he and I again this weekend.

00:07:30 Speaker 2

For having this very discussion about how do you work from home if you're an internal auditor, how do you do it part time? And because right now you're seeing more and more companies trying to bring people back in. OK, that's a tough, tough shift for people who are suddenly used to the other way of doing it.

00:07:47 Speaker 2

All saying that at the end of the conversation with my son, I said I've got to be honest with you. I don't know. I've never had to work in it. I just know what worked for me as I think again that that it it is an active discussion going on right now. And I think that's why people jumped on it. It's something a lot of people have very, you know, based on my son they.

00:08:05 Speaker 2

Are very serious about their feelings on.

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That subject.

00:08:08 Speaker 1

Did your did you say is your son working from home or?

00:08:11 Speaker 2

He is currently three days in the office and two.

00:08:14 Speaker 2

Days at home.

00:08:15 Speaker 2

So you know it's hybrid like most people are. I don't even like hybrid. But again, I'm an old man. What can I say? I, you know I what I grew up in grew up in, in internal audit with farmers insurance. We were in the office and everybody was in the office. But we had a very popular and turn a lot of department people would just come and talk to us. That doesn't happen if you're not sit in your desk people then call up and say hey let's have a zoom call and just chat.

00:08:37 Speaker 2

You know when you walk into somebody's office and you, well, OK. So I had a meeting with somebody recently with the City Council, and I went in. And the first thing I noticed on the side.

00:08:48 Speaker 2

There was a shovel, but it had a guitar neck as the handle.

00:08:52 Speaker 2

Instantly started. Say what's going, what it is, was from the groundbreaking. I think of like Gibson, Gibson or Fender. I can't remember factory in town. Well, that's the kind of thing that happens when you're in person, not on the phone. You know, you start saying, oh, what's that? Hey, let's talk. And you're you're starting to make connections, which is so fundamental to the success of any internal audit department.

00:09:12 Speaker 2

So you got me going. It doesn't take.

00:09:14 Speaker 1

Much, no. People writing in about this.

00:09:15

Hello.

00:09:17 Speaker 1

We've mentioned a couple of your your popular ones are most commented on ones. What are the ones that are your favorites and why few of them just a few of them?

00:09:27 Speaker 2

Yeah, I know, I know. I'll be honest with you. I that's an off the top of the head. I cannot think of anything I like when I'm done.

00:09:36 Speaker 2

And I my final run through on these things is to read them out.

00:09:40 Speaker 2

Loud.

00:09:41 Speaker 2

A habit I picked up a long time ago, and when I'm done, if I get to that last line and I go, yeah, that was it. Then I've done what I like, you know, the the lawn 1 was great just because of the discussion it had. I like any of the humor ones I threw in there because that's just me. I haven't written many of those in a very long time, but those can be hilarious.

00:10:00 Speaker 2

Just have so much fun writing them, but other topics.

00:10:03 Speaker 2

Well, I'll tell you an interesting one. This will go back a number of years because it was the beginning of social media and I put a couple of posts out about. I suddenly figured out. I've told this story places before, but my kids went to Comic Con all the time. My daughter goes to Comic Con, comes back. She's real upset. This is a lot of years ago, obviously. And I said, what's up?

00:10:23 Speaker 2

She goes well. Warner Brothers had this thing and if you were following them on one of the like may have even been before Twitter. Then if you went to this room, you got a bunch of swag and she didn't.

00:10:34 Speaker 2

Something about that resonated with me and I went, wait, wait, social media is more than narcissistic naval gazing. It's more than listing what you had for breakfast. It was.

00:10:42 Speaker 2

A real thing.

00:10:44 Speaker 2

And so I actually did two or three posts on the subject.

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Just because it was brand new, nobody else was doing it. It turned out farmers insurance, I think, was one of the first auto departments to do a full social media audit within the organization because we got the jump on it.

00:10:58 Speaker 2

But for me it led to a lot of other things, but more importantly, it was that opportunity to opportunity to get the word out and say, hey, here's something big going on. Pay attention. And as we all know now, it was a big thing. I just looked into it from the get go and the other part was like this. I did do training on it. The interesting thing about doing that training was I told people look there.

00:11:18 Speaker 2

I'm not going to be able to tell you that much.

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But you're still going to know more than 99%.

00:11:22 Speaker 2

Of the people in your company.

00:11:24 Speaker 1

It's kind of like with AI now, right?

00:11:27 Speaker 2

Yes.

00:11:28 Speaker 2

That well, I tell you, that was another fun one because it was the response to it, so I can't remember. I threw into ChatGPT something simple like give me a give me an audit report of accounts receivable or accounts payable. One or the other and it spit it out. And so the whole post was basically that. But I ended it with the point that.

00:11:46 Speaker 2

Is this any different than what you're writing right now?

00:11:49 Speaker 2

You know, it looked like the bad audit reports I've seen forever.

00:11:52 Speaker 2

And so you know, again, one more time we can be replaced and that was the point of it and that's what we all know about AI. Now we can be replaced.

00:12:01 Speaker 2

If we aren't doing more than what a computer can do.

00:12:05 Speaker 2

I thought I'd try and make some real.

00:12:06 Speaker 2

Points while we had this discussion.

00:12:08 Speaker 1

That's the need for a good editor, right? One thing you and I do share in common. This is very serious.

00:12:16 Speaker 1

Is we both have a very strong dislike for the word utilize. No, I'd love to know. What are some other words?

00:12:24 Speaker 1

That make you cringe?

00:12:26 Speaker 2

Cringe. No.

00:12:28 Speaker 2

Well, obviously, mute point. That's that's just one that will drive me crazy.

00:12:33 Speaker 2

Not using the Oxford comma will drive you not not supposed to go down that road, are we?

00:12:39

OK, you know.

00:12:40 Speaker 2

That's that's one of the big ones. The bigger one, I we won't go into news too much other than the fact that news readers really should read what they're going to say before it comes up and we're going down a different Rd. for example.

00:12:52 Speaker 2

Just recently a newscaster here in Phoenix was talking about Belarus and she called it Belarus.

00:13:00 Speaker 2

Mispronunciations of things that you're supposed to know that in general Mispronunciations will drive me crazy.

00:13:09 Speaker 2

There's certain phrases it'll be what it'll be. Yeah, I know it will be. OK, let's go. I mean, use judiciously. It's OK, not utilized judiciously, but used judiciously, you know, cliches and and trust me, I live and die on cliches. One of the things I used to try and watch for when I was writing was when I used to.

00:13:29 Speaker 2

Cliche. And if nothing else, turn it.

00:13:30 Speaker 2

Into an audit 1.

00:13:31 Speaker 2

You know, get our ducks in a row. You just simply say get our mechanical pencils in a row, something like that, you know.

00:13:37 Speaker 1

Change.

00:13:37 Speaker 1

So.

00:13:38 Speaker 1

OK, now I'm going to get a little more serious.

00:13:41 Speaker 1

So you've helped the magazine, you know, with our as we were talking about earlier with our editorial content as far back as I can remember, as a writer, as a committee member, as a member of the magazines editorial Advisory Board.

00:13:54 Speaker 1

What first drew you? I guess, to the CIA and to the magazine specifically into its committees. Just the love of writing. Or was there?

00:14:02 Speaker 2

Well, we'll start with the IAA and just so everybody knows how long ago we're talking, I started working in internal audit in 83 and at farmers, we were getting the magazine. So I was seeing the magazine.

00:14:17 Speaker 2

And I saw the certification and so I actually was one of the first people at farmers insurance, not the first, but one of the first to get the designation by taking the test. Most everybody else who had it had grandfathered in.

00:14:30 Speaker 2

So I continued to read the magazine. I was learning the information from, so it became right off the bat. It became a great resource for a new auditor to find out what was going on.

00:14:39 Speaker 2

In the world.

00:14:40 Speaker 2

Then I mean I just writing something that I've always wanted to do one of these days, I'm going to get something published in a science fiction magazine.

00:14:47 Speaker 2

Is crossed.

00:14:49 Speaker 2

But I've always kind of written at things and so.

00:14:52 Speaker 2

There was something that came up and I thought, hey, let's give this a shot so.

00:14:55 Speaker 2

I sent it to the magazine.

00:14:57 Speaker 2

And that was Anne Graham was the editor then. Did you ever work with Ann? I know. I mean, may.

00:15:02 Speaker 2

Have been a short time, but no but.

00:15:03 Speaker 1

Weird, wonderful things about it.

00:15:04 Speaker 2

Yeah. Anybody who worked with her absolutely fantastic and part of the reason the magazine is as was as good as it was when you were able to be involved, to take it to higher levels. But I do that for you, but.

00:15:18 Speaker 2

I got back one of the nicest rejection letters you ever.

00:15:20 Speaker 2

Saw in your life?

00:15:22 Speaker 2

And it was great and it would. It drove me to want to do more.

00:15:25 Speaker 2

And I think my second or third one got accepted or something like that. OK so.

00:15:30 Speaker 2

Yes, for the story, you're gonna get the whole.

00:15:31 Speaker 2

Story.

00:15:33 Speaker 2

Here, Arizona State University has a Western branch, ASU West.

00:15:38 Speaker 2

And so we started talking to them about internships and some people out there may remember Stanley Chang. He was very active in the IEA, and he was one of the professors there. He said, oh, you submitted something. I said yes. And he said, hey, let me do this. And he put me on the committee. You're saying, I know he's nominating me for the committee and I'm knee deep in it. And so.

00:15:59 Speaker 2

All right, that's fine. You get into it, but right off the bat, interesting group of characters, a lot of fun, a lot of those early days had some interesting people. I won't use their names out loud. But you know the battles I'm talking about and that we're going.

00:16:12 Speaker 2

On and so that.

00:16:13 Speaker 2

It just grew from that. So the more I got involved, the more I got back, the more fun it was, the more interesting it was.

00:16:19 Speaker 2

Got into the training aspect of it, actually published a couple of books through the I it was just all you know it meshed perfectly with what, as a professional, I was trying to do.

00:16:29 Speaker 1

So as you've mentioned, you've been in the profession for many, many years, and you've written.

00:16:34 Speaker 1

A lot about it.

00:16:36 Speaker 1

What have you seen as the the professions biggest challenges and then what are you? What are your thoughts on where the profession is today? Two big questions.

00:16:45 Speaker 2

Yeah. I think the biggest challenge, let me go down an interesting Rd. We are seen as the secondary to the accounting world. We are perceived that way. People go get an accounting degree and I guess I'll wind up an intern lot and it is a mindset that's out there. There's a lot that don't. I had an auditor working for me who actually went to school to become an internal audit.

00:17:06 Speaker 2

He used to pick on him mercilessly for that.

00:17:08 Speaker 2

But we still have that image issue and we still have a lot of auditors that are ticking in time. We still have a lot of auditors who are doing old school work.

00:17:18 Speaker 2

I could even get off on a rant about socks right now, but I'm not going to do that because we get stuck in our old ways and I talked about that creativity and that ability to do that. That's how we get out of it. I think the biggest challenge has always been for us to be seen as more than accountants, more than just suppliers of information. But to, you know, we we used to talk about.

00:17:38 Speaker 2

Being a major partner.

00:17:40 Speaker 2

Now it's almost being on the right hand of the CEO. That role is so important for us to try and get up into. I see also, and this may be related to it, we are not fast adapters and I'll use AI I'll use.

00:17:56 Speaker 2

Data analysis all of that.

00:17:58 Speaker 2

I've been to a lot of.

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Conferences.

00:18:01 Speaker 2

Where they talk about, you know, wow, we need to do this in data analytics. We need to do.

00:18:05 Speaker 2

This.

00:18:05 Speaker 2

In cats, we need to do this. I would guess that 20% of what people talk about trying to accomplish, they actually do. I got busy with an audit. I got busy with this. It's about refocusing on the important things I made-up the 20%.

00:18:17 Speaker 2

By the way, I don't know.

00:18:19 Speaker 2

So that's the challenge. Now keep in mind, having been in this profession this long, the changes I've seen have been phenomenal. I mean, when I started an audit.

00:18:28 Speaker 2

We used to write an audit report and here's what's wrong. Bye. And we were out.

00:18:32 Speaker 2

You know, now we work. Most audit departments work consultative rely, but a real word. Sure, why not? With the client to come up with solutions that really will make a.

00:18:41 Speaker 2

Words.

00:18:42 Speaker 2

We used to say you got 63 files wrong. Talk to you later. Now it's OK. Why? What's the process? What's happening? Not just that, they're wrong. So right off the bat, that's just been so huge for us. And part of why we do have value, why we haven't just been thrown into the dustbin of history, we're able to do those kinds of things. And so, you know, we just, we talked a second ago about AI.

00:19:04 Speaker 2

How are we going to adapt it? How are we going to adapt robotics? How are we going to adapt all these things that we're talking about and that needs to happen to continue that forward thrust that you know, I've seen over 30 years?

00:19:16 Speaker 1

So the editor of the magazine, Tim McCullum, had wanted me to ask you this question.

00:19:21 Speaker 2

Oh no.

00:19:22 Speaker 1

He said, you know, we all know you're a big.

00:19:24 Speaker 1

Disney fan.

00:19:25

M.

00:19:26 Speaker 1

So if you were going to send the Disney Imagineers to reimagine the profession, what would you want them?

00:19:31 Speaker 1

To do.

00:19:35 Speaker 2

You don't know what a wheelhouse you hit here.

00:19:38 Speaker 2

We were having, you know, me. You asked a question. I go somewhere.

00:19:41 Speaker 2

Else.

00:19:42 Speaker 2

With it right, we were having at farmers insurance discussions about what to do with internal audit and how to make it different.

00:19:49 Speaker 2

And I was on the the shuttle at LAX and y'all any of you've been to LAX? You know, how exciting that can be.

00:19:55 Speaker 2

And a bus went by that was a Disney bus, and I thought, man, you know, that would be fun. And then suddenly it hit me. How do we make working with internal audit like Disneyland? And that became the thrust of all our meetings. We had 10 regional offices. We had separate meetings. You know, we went out and visited them all. And that was the thrust of our conversation. How do we make it?

00:20:16 Speaker 2

Like going to Disneyland? What would Imagineers do with it? Well, First off, they probably come up with an audio animatronic cafe. But besides that, you know I think that's where they would.

00:20:26 Speaker 2

Focus of Disney is about experience.

00:20:29 Speaker 2

And it's about immersive experience. You know, you walk past, you take Disneyland, you walk past the berm, and suddenly you're immersed. You're not in the world. You're on Main Street or you're in Tomorrowland, or you're in whatever one. The rides are very immersive. You go on the new Star Wars rides, you are in the middle of.

00:20:46 Speaker 2

It all OK.

00:20:47 Speaker 2

How do we make an immersive experience? They would try and make it.

00:20:50 Speaker 2

An immersive experience where people suddenly are in somewhere they want to be and that again that speaks to what our internal auditors doing that will make things better and different for the organization.

00:21:02 Speaker 2

I like to think we came as close as anybody could at Phoenix at the Farmers Audit Department because once a year we'd have an open house. And by the way, if you give.

00:21:12 Speaker 2

People free food.

00:21:13 Speaker 2

They will show up. Trust me, you can go and turn on department, but people would come in and they were suddenly in this internal audit department. We had a very weird one, as you know, a little bit. Like what you could see behind me on the screen here.

00:21:23 Speaker 2

Uh, I'm sorry. They, they.

00:21:24 Speaker 2

Can't you can see and.

00:21:27 Speaker 1

Missy.

00:21:30 Speaker 2

They became, you know, they were seeing the experience of being a part of. It's like the immersive experience is the part. And so I think it's important for audit departments, auditors, anybody, what do you think that immersive experience should be? What is the experience that customers should have? One of the fascinating things that I did in some training with some people.

00:21:49 Speaker 2

Was to go through and talk about what the customer wants and needs, and I said wait a minute. Your turn audit though this isn't your organization. What do your clients expect at the end of this? What do they want at the end of it and most internal?

00:22:02 Speaker 2

Auditors that makes.

00:22:03 Speaker 2

Their heads hurt. They do not think in terms of what is success to the client.

00:22:09 Speaker 2

Other than getting you out.

00:22:10 Speaker 2

Of their office.

00:22:11 Speaker 1

Right.

00:22:12 Speaker 2

And so, I mean, I think that's where it all needs to go. That audit the audit departments need to take spend the time, drop one on it, what what's going to happen to the world when you don't do that.

00:22:21 Speaker 2

Petty cash on it. Drop out on it and spend the time exploring what you are doing and how the customers care. The clients care and which direction you need to go to get to that point. And with that, I'll get off.

00:22:33 Speaker 1

My pulpit go ahead. Great answer. So what would your advice be for other internal auditors about writing or about following their passions?

00:22:43 Speaker 2

In the writing aspect of it, I've I've actually told a couple of the people this about articles about presenting.

00:22:49 Speaker 2

Very often you think everybody already knows what you know.

00:22:52 Speaker 2

And there's a good chance they don't.

00:22:54 Speaker 2

Or they don't know it the way you do or the spin you have on it.

00:22:58 Speaker 2

So take a swing at it. Now I know I'm real big about. I'll just write it and see what happens. And I know a lot of people can't do that. They're better off working with the outline, and I know the magazine will work closely with them if they're given an outline to work from.

00:23:12 Speaker 2

But ultimately, that's it. You think you got a good idea enough to put together an article and flesh it out and talk about it. I will say that one of the big things that's important for so much of.

00:23:22 Speaker 2

The.

00:23:22 Speaker 2

Writing is as much practical as you can get into it. You know there's that that's one of the problems I always have. I'll have a lot of great theories, but what does it really mean? And do I have proof of work?

00:23:32 Speaker 2

So there's that, that goes on, but there's Part 2 which is follow your passion to that whole thing. And for my in my case, the passion aligned with what was going on with.

00:23:41 Speaker 2

In turn, a lot.

00:23:41 Speaker 2

Of but you got to find what's fun. What is it you enjoy? What are you doing? Maybe it'll work in with it. Maybe it won't. It's also about working your brain and doing different things with your brain.

00:23:52 Speaker 2

Just internal audit again to that making those connections or whichever way you go, that's huge.

00:23:59 Speaker 2

In allowing yourself the flexibility to just be a human being, one of the things I have a slide in one of.

00:24:05 Speaker 2

My presentations that.

00:24:07 Speaker 2

Says simply be a human being, and I've had more than one person come up and go. That's the most important slide you gave all day, which may speak to the other slides too, but at least it is that piece of it. We are humans and we have to be humans and.

00:24:18 Speaker 2

We have humans around others and that means more than just internal audit.

00:24:22 Speaker 1

Excellent. So what's next for Mike Jacka?

00:24:26 Speaker 2

Well, see, I'm going to New York in June because my wife and I love Broadway, actually. So I did this whole retirement thing. And then next thing I know, I get.

00:24:32 Speaker 2

A.

00:24:33 Speaker 2

Contact from training department and they need somebody to Co facilitate in New York. In December, my wife said you do not turn down December jobs because we love going to Broadway. So you know, it's not like all that is going to end. I'll still be doing stuff.

00:24:46 Speaker 2

You and I have discussed the fact that, yeah, feel free to send you guys things, real articles, new blog posts, whatever tickles my brain and makes something weird come out. So I mean, that's a piece of it, but there's just a lot of stuff that I half joked about.

00:25:00 Speaker 2

And so you know, I'm working with some ideas. Like I still write a lot. Whether it's worth anything or not, that's another thing entirely. But fiction type things, music's still a big part of what I do. I put myself through college two different times playing country rock band. My favorite thing is song parodies, by the way.

00:25:15 Speaker 2

Don't go answering waterfalls. That'll make the blog go on too long. Yeah, so the music part is still a piece of it. Our band is having going to have its 50th anniversary, so we're still playing Disneyland will be a part of it again. I'm turning 70. I, as you know, and I was born the day Disneyland opened. Literally.

00:25:35 Speaker 2

Date and year. So for my 70th birthday, we'll go to Disneyland 70th birthday.

00:25:39 Speaker 2

I still like to travel a lot. I don't know. I'm making up as I go along. That's been my entire career. Make it up and dumb luck.

00:25:45 Speaker 1

Thank you very much for talking with me and seriously congratulations on 900 blog posts. That's incredible.

00:25:53 Speaker 2

Yeah, you know, I I think I make made the comment in the post, how did you get to 900? Well I started with 899.

00:26:02 Speaker 1

No.

00:26:03 Speaker 2

It's easy. Yeah, it just happens.

00:26:06 Speaker 1

So I just want to point out readers can read Mike's final blog post titled 900 Posts Now what on Internal auditor.org now. Thanks again Mike.

00:26:15 Speaker 2

Oh, thank you. Fun.

00:26:18 Speaker 1

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