by Garth Sheriff, Sheriff Consulting
Most fraud stories don’t begin with villains.
One of my favourite films, No Country for Old Men, opens with a simple decision faced by a straight-laced ranch worker: Do I take this money, or do I walk away?
The audience knows the answer.
He should walk away.
But the character finds a reason not to. A justification forms. And the devastating consequences that follow can be traced back to that single moment of rationalization.
In many ways, that moment captures how ethical lines begin to blur in the real world. Not with dramatic criminal intent, but with a small decision—one that seems manageable at the time.
For decades, the accounting profession has used the fraud triangle to explain how this happens: incentive, opportunity, and rationalization. When these forces align, even principled professionals can find themselves justifying decisions they once believed they would never make.
Pressure might come from financial targets, investor expectations, or the fear of missing the numbers. Opportunity emerges when oversight weakens or controls fail. But rationalization—the most dangerous element—allows someone to tell themselves a comforting story: This is temporary. No one will get hurt. I’ll fix it later.
In times of rapid change—when new tools, new expectations, and new pressures are reshaping how organizations operate—the importance of professional judgment only grows.
Tools will evolve.
Professional judgment must endure.
Consider the now-infamous Toronto airport gold heist, one of the largest thefts in Canadian history—and the case I’ll explore in my upcoming presentation at the upcoming Elevate Your Mind live, virtual, half-day conference. Without giving too much away, what is already clear is that the theft did not begin with a Hollywood-style mastermind. It began with a system where processes, access, and trust intersected in ways that created opportunity.
And like many major failures, the real story isn’t the theft itself—it’s the small assumptions that went unchallenged long before it happened.
This is where professional skepticism becomes essential.
Skepticism is not cynicism. It is the discipline of maintaining a questioning mindset—even when working with people we trust. CPAs often build long-standing professional relationships with colleagues, clients, and leadership teams. Trust is essential in those relationships. But ethical responsibility requires that trust never replace verification.
That responsibility matters because public confidence in the profession cannot be taken for granted. As one recent analysis of data from Gallup observed, “Accountants still rank among the trusted professions—but the ice may be getting thinner.”
Trust is the foundation of what CPAs do. But trust alone is never a control.
Professional skepticism exists precisely for those moments when everything appears fine on the surface. It reminds us that our responsibility is not only to the organization in front of us, but also to the integrity of financial information and the public interest.
Most professionals will never commit fraud. But every CPA will face moments where pressure, relationships, and judgment collide.
In those moments, skepticism isn’t a sign of distrust. It’s a sign of professionalism.
Because when incentive, opportunity, and rationalization align, the ice gets thin—very quickly.
Garth Sheriff will be presenting at the Elevate Your Mind: Ethics Conference on May 26th. For more information and to register, click here. Registrants can earn up to four ethics CPD hours at this conference.
