Main Responsibilities Of An Auditor At State Auditor

I'm going to answer this from both my auditor and founder roles. As an auditor, my main responsibilities were to dig in as an individual contributor and understand everything relevant to the audit objectives about the program under audit.

Auditing is a structured process with a formula, especially in the public sector. My work was governed by federal standards called the Yellow Book Audit Standards. These standards require a specific level of evidence to assert things and draw conclusions.

This ranges from needing concrete evidence to situations requiring auditor judgment, which is when an auditor has to make a determination without sufficient evidence. Given these strict standards and requirements, the job is an interesting combination of structured thinking and creativity.

While we have standards and objectives, auditors often have no prior familiarity with the program they're auditing. Audit staff, like I was with a team lead, are sent in to learn everything about the program. By the end of a six to nine-month audit, the staff often know more about what's actually happening than the managers at that organization.

There are many stories of auditors correcting managers who make assertions about operations. Auditors can point to evidence showing things are not going as expected.

Getting down to specific skill needs and duties, I describe myself as an analyst and a writer. I'm an analyst in the qualitative sense, as you must draw conclusions from incomplete sets of evidence. You often have to interpret interpersonal dynamics to uncover hidden information, which requires high EQ and patience.

On the quantitative side, you'll analyze sets of data reports, comparing them to other sources. You might use industry standards. For example, in a city audit, you would look at other cities with similar demographics and populations as a potential control.

This is where the creativity comes in. You may decide that comparison is your evaluation criteria if nothing better is available.

The main deliverable for an auditor is a written report on the state of the program. A significant portion of the work involves drafting these written conclusions. For those familiar with government writing, it's highly technical, structured, and standardized. Auditors quickly learn to write clearly and concisely, which is a valuable life skill.

I would say those are the main areas where an auditor improves professionally and builds transferable skills. The biggest responsibility a staff auditor has is, for lack of a better term, ethos and integrity.

In many situations, an auditor is alone or with another staff member, conducting interviews and collecting evidence without a manager present. The auditor must be exhaustive, understanding that taking shortcuts will never serve them. This is where integrity is crucial, as it can be tempting to avoid a path that will create extensive audit work.

Audit work can be a grind, but you simply cannot take those shortcuts. There's no way around it. Fundamentally, the mission of an organization like the State Auditor is to improve California government for the taxpayers and people of California. I took that very seriously, as did most of my auditor colleagues. When working at a mission-oriented organization, carrying out that mission is an essential responsibility for everyone there.