SYNERGISTIC EFFECTS OF INTERNAL AUDIT AND LEAN-SIX SIGMA CONCEPT ON BUSINESS PROCESS IMPROVEMENT

Faced with a series of challenges within the environment in which they operate, companies are more than ever aware of the fact that efforts aimed at improving business processes are some of the basic conditions, not only of growth and development, but also of the survival of the company. Only in this way can the opportunities for achieving different dimensions of competitiveness be created (in terms of costs, quality, delivery reliability, speed of monitoring the changes in demand, introduction of new products, etc.). Business process improvement can be implemented with the support of a number of concepts, among them being lean-six sigma. However, the great potential in this regard also lies in internal audit. In this regard, this paper will first discuss the essence and assumptions underlying the internal audit and lean-six sigma concept, and then review the possibilities of their integration in order to achieve better results.