The importance of the supportive control environment for internal audit effectiveness – the case of Croatian companies

The paper investigates whether a supportive control environment is associated with the internal audit effectiveness and what characteristics of a control environment are important in this respect. A survey was conducted via a questionnaire on 54 mostly large companies in Croatia. Appropriate methods of statistical analysis were used in order to analyse the survey results. According to the research results, in the case of a supportive control environment there is a greater chance that the internal audit will be effective and that its recommendations will be taken into account to a greater extent. In addition, the survey results showed a statistically significant correlation between perceived internal audit effectiveness and a higher level of supportive control environment.