Chong
Kian Soon
(Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG))Advisory Board Member
Kian
Soon, the CEO of IA Essential for the last two decades, is a member of
Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand (CAANZ), a Certified Public
Accountant of the Malaysian Institute of Certified Public Accountants (MICPA),
a Chartered Member of the Institute of Internal Auditors Malaysia (CMIIA) and
Certified QAR Assessor of IIA. He served as an elected regional council
member of CAANZ Malaysia from 2019 to 2021.
Kian Soon is a regular speaker for his specialised areas on governance,
sustainability, anti-corruption and bribery, risk and assurance. Over the
years, he has contributed his leadership thoughts to accountancy journals. He
has led risks and internal control projects for pre- and post-IPO exercises for
Bursa Malaysia and SGX listings.
Kian
Soon has also advised many listed boards on governance practices since the
inception of the Malaysian Code on Corporate Governance in 2001 by setting the
group-wide oversight structure for listed boards and operationalising board
governance policies.
In recent years, his advisory role expanded to a broader horizon with the new
governance oversight requirement on sustainability. Since then, Kian Soon
has advised and assisted his clients in embarking on the sustainability journey
and establishing the sustainability framework for corporate accountability,
performance, and reporting.
Other engagements Kian Soon has undertaken include advisory work on risk
management transformation and assurance engagement on the investigation,
financial due diligence, review of internal audit functions of financial
institutions, and anti-corruption readiness.