Proctor and Gamble 2007 Annual Report Download - page 30

The Procter & Gamble Company
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Exerting rigorous oversight of the business. We continuously review
business results and strategic choices. Our Global Leadership Council
is actively involved
— from understanding strategies to reviewing key
initiatives, nancial performance and control assessments. The intent
is to ensure we remain objective, identify potential issues, continuously
challenge each other and ensure recognition and rewards are
appropriately aligned with results.
Engaging our Disclosure Committee. We maintain disclosure
controls and procedures designed to ensure that information required
to be disclosed is recorded, processed, summarized and reported
timely and accurately. Our Disclosure Committee is a group of senior-
level executives responsible for evaluating disclosure implications of
signicant business activities and events. The Committee reports its
ndings to the CEO and CFO, providing an effective process to
evaluate our external disclosure obligations.
Encouraging strong and effective corporate governance from our
Board of Directors. We have an active, capable and diligent Board
that meets the required standards for independence, and we welcome
the Board’s oversight. Our Audit Committee comprises independent
directors with signicant nancial knowledge and experience.
We review signicant accounting policies, nancial reporting and
internal control matters with them and encourage their independent
discussions with external auditors. Our corporate governance guidelines,
as well as the charter of the Audit Committee and certain other
committees of our Board, are available on our website at www.pg.com.
P&G has a strong history of doing what’s right. Our employees
embrace our Purpose, Values and Principles. We take responsibility for
the quality and accuracy of our nancial reporting. We present this
information proudly, with the expectation that those who use it will
understand our company, recognize our commitment to performance
with integrity and share our condence in P&G’s future.
At The Procter & Gamble Company, we take great pride in our long
history of doing what’s right. If you analyze what’s made our
company successful over the years, you may focus on our brands, our
marketing strategies, our organization design and our ability to
innovate. But if you really want to get at what drives our company’s
success, the place to look is our people. Our people are deeply
committed to our Purpose, Values and Principles. It is this commitment
to doing what’s right that unites us.
This commitment to doing what’s right is embodied in our nancial
reporting. High-quality nancial reporting is our responsibility
— one we
execute with integrity, and within both the letter and spirit of the law.
High-quality nancial reporting is characterized by accuracy, objectivity
and transparency. Management is responsible for maintaining an
effective system of internal controls over nancial reporting to deliver
those characteristics in all material respects. The Board of Directors,
through its Audit Committee, provides oversight. We have engaged
Deloitte & Touche LLP to audit our Consolidated Financial Statements,
on which they have issued an unqualied opinion.
Our commitment to providing timely, accurate and understandable
information to investors encompasses:
Communicating expectations to employees. Every employee —
from senior management on down
— is trained on the Company’s
Worldwide Business Conduct Manual, which sets forth the
Company’s commitment to conduct its business affairs with high
ethical standards. Every employee is held personally accountable for
compliance and is provided several means of reporting any concerns
about violations of the Worldwide Business Conduct Manual,
which is available on our website at www.pg.com.
Maintaining a strong internal control environment. Our system of
internal controls includes written policies and procedures, segregation
of duties and the careful selection and development of employees.
The system is designed to provide reasonable assurance that transactions
are executed as authorized and appropriately recorded, that assets
are safeguarded and that accounting records are sufciently reliable
to permit the preparation of nancial statements conforming in all
material respects with accounting principles generally accepted in the
United States of America. We monitor these internal controls through
control self-assessments conducted by business unit management.
In addition to performing nancial and compliance audits around
the world, including unannounced audits, our Global Internal Audit
organization provides training and continuously improves internal
control processes. Appropriate actions are taken by management to
correct any identied control deciencies.
Executing nancial stewardship. We maintain specic programs
and activities to ensure that employees understand their duciary
responsibilities to shareholders. This ongoing effort encompasses
nancial discipline in strategic and daily business decisions and brings
particular focus to maintaining accurate nancial reporting and effective
controls through process improvement, skill development and oversight.
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Chairman of the Board Vice Chairman and
and Chief Executive Ofcer Chief Financial Ofcer
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