Want to develop your potential and turn your passion for evidence-based insights into impactful action? Join the ANAO grad program!

As an ANAO grad, you’ll shape public sector accountability as you dive into work that empowers you to ask bold questions and drive real change in the public sector.

Audits are like research projects — so if you like to dig into data, uncover evidence, balance the numbers, and analyse information to draw conclusions, then the ANAO is the place for you to kickstart your career.

Grow

GROW your understanding of the scope and shape of the public service. You’ll research and review a wide range of government programs and departments — and in doing so, you’ll gain an in-depth understanding of what good public service governance should look like.

Thrive in a supportive environment where you can GROW both personally and professionally. Your health, safety, and value matter here. That's why, from day one, you'll have access to a wide range of health and wellness initiatives designed to empower you.

Excel

The ANAO is a learning organisation, and our graduate development program will help you EXCEL in your chosen field. Explore new challenges and make the most of personalised development opportunities as you hone your technical and public sector capabilities.

Work with credibility, courage and confidence as you strive to EXCEL in your work. Immerse yourself into meaningful work with real impact and see your contributions to audit reports be published and tabled in the Parliament during your graduate year.

Lead

Help promote meaningful change across the public service as you work at an agency that LEADS in the integrity space. You’ll do meaningful work that matters, while helping shape audit products, conclusions and recommendations.

Collaborate directly with senior leaders and develop your own LEADERSHIP skills. ANAO graduates work closely with our executives — with opportunities to attend meetings with the Auditor-General. Plus, you’ll have the opportunity to participate in — and potentially lead — meetings with leaders from the government agencies you audit.

As a graduate at the ANAO, you’ll help the ANAO fulfil its unique role, keeping government agencies accountable to the Parliament and the public.

ANAO grads are offered:

• generous conditions, including a starting salary of $73,305 per annum plus 15.4% super
• engaging, interesting and varied work that supports accountability and integrity in government
• extensive learning and development opportunities to support career goals
• flexible working arrangements and a positive culture of work-life balance
• opportunity to work closely with and learn from senior leaders
• promotion to a higher classification at the completion of the program.

You’ll work at an office driven by a strong culture of integrity and independence, working to hold all Australian Government agencies to account for their use of taxpayers’ money. In auditing different government agencies, you’ll evaluate against best practice and internalise how to implement best practice — knowledge that you can take with you to any future public service role.

You’ll also work at an office committed to providing a supportive environment that enables all of our staff — graduates included — to feel healthy, safe and valued at work. Our people are our most valuable asset — which means that flexible working arrangements, work-life balance and wellbeing initiatives are key focus areas for us.

What traits do you need to grow, excel and lead as an ANAO graduate?

Auditing is a learned skillset, and no matter what your background or degree, there’s a place for you at the ANAO. All you need to grow, excel and lead as an ANAO grad is:

• curiosity
• a positive attitude and an eagerness to learn
• teamwork and relationship building skills
• strong written and oral communication
• creative and critical thinking
• flexibility and adaptability
• well-developed conceptual and analytical abilities
• a strong sense of purpose and the drive to achieve.

What to expect from an ANAO graduate program

• strengthened core skills like collaboration, communication and influence
• an extensive program of face-to-face workshops and masterclasses
• self-directed online learning
• on-the-job training from peers
• structured rotations into different parts of the office
• generous studies assistance post graduate program, including assistance with CA, CPA and membership for professional bodies and associations.

As a financial auditor grad at the ANAO, you’ll do meaningful and rewarding work across the entire Australian Government sector, as you engage with our unique and diverse audited agency base of 250+ government agencies.

You’ll develop your accounting and auditing know-how as you are guided through the audit process by the ANAO's experienced teams. You’ll build foundational skills that you can carry anywhere in your career — public sector or private. Each new engagement will be unique and present new opportunities to learn and grow as an auditor, accountant and financial sector professional.

Your days might involve:

• researching and meeting with agencies to gain an understanding of their operations
• verifying financial statement line items via strategic sampling and testing
• meeting with your audit team to plan and evaluate audit strategy and discuss contemporary accounting issues
• liaising with agencies to source evidence, and sorting through documentation to find evidence and prepare strong financial analysis
• working with your team to identify areas in which agencies could improve
• assisting with drafting formal reports, including management letters and reports to the Parliament. 

Are you a flexible and adaptative numbers whiz who wants to work in a place where profit isn’t a driver? Do you care about transparent spending of public money? Are you keen to gain a broad experience in public sector auditing? Then the ANAO is the place for you!

Use your IT infrastructure and cyber security expertise to examine the IT systems and governance of some of the public sector’s biggest agencies — or use your problem-solving and programming skills to investigate complex data sets from across the public service.

As an IT auditor, you’ll examine and evaluate the function of the systems, platforms and networks used by Australian Government agencies, checking whether they’re keeping information secure and achieving intended goals and objectives.

Your days might involve:

• collaboratively planning different approaches to assess risks and test systems
• liaising with audited agencies to understand their processes, conduct walkthroughs and gather evidence
• assessing governance structures and IT controls in different IT systems, like separation of duties, password security and permissions
• completing work papers and documentation to capture results from testing.

As a data analyst, you’ll work with highly-skilled data professionals as you use innovative technology for statistical modelling, data mining, database management, cloud technology maintenance, script development, visualisation and automation — all in the name of supporting audit teams and shaping audit conclusions.

Your days might involve:

• working with different data sets from across the public service to determine their quality, completeness and application to an audit
• liaising with different ANAO audit teams to understand their needs
• conducting analysis on and visualising information from different agencies
• operating and improving standardised audit-specific data analysis programs
• documenting the results of your analysis and collating evidence to justify your analysis.

Are you eager to be mentored by highly skilled data and IT professionals? Do you want to work across a wide range of projects, and be exposed to a broad spectrum of systems and data from across the public service? Do you care about supporting accountability and transparency? Then the ANAO is the place for you!

Support public sector transparency and integrity by using your strong generalist skills as you investigate the performance and program implementation of government agencies. Different audit topics call for different specialist knowledge — which means that whatever your degree, you’ll have relevant expertise.

As a graduate in our performance audit team, you’ll use evidence-based analysis to support public sector transparency to look at the program implementation and governance arrangements of agencies from across the entire public sector. Each new audit is like a research project, which comes with the opportunity to learn new things, develop new skills and work with all kinds of people.

Your days might involve:

• creating and implementing a system to fairly and accurately analyse a bundle of evidence
• meeting with different teams at audited agencies to gain a deeper understanding of what actions those teams took when implementing a government program
• using evidence and analysis to write a section of an audit report, explaining how an audit conclusion was reached.

As a graduate in our performance statements audit team, you’ll focus on assessing the quality, usefulness and reliability of the performance information laid out in the annual reports that all government departments and agencies must produce. Performance statements audits are a new and emerging field for the ANAO — which means that you’ll be working with a team of like-minded problem solvers and innovators to set the course for this new field.

Your days might involve:

• engaging with stakeholders at audited agencies to understand what targets they’re working towards and how they’ll assess whether they met those targets
• gathering and analysing evidence to assess performance statement information
• drafting audit strategies, reports and plans
• building and maintaining positive relationships with audited agencies
• providing professional and technical support to your audit colleagues.

Want to make the most of your strong generalist skills by doing work that matters? Are you a curious, detailed-oriented and highly motivated team player? Not sure what you want to do with your degree, but know you want to do something meaningful? Then the ANAO is the place for you!

Use your corporate and professional skills to help the ANAO in achieving its purpose. Support and enable our audit teams by keeping the office running — or by providing expert technical audit advice.

Audit work can only be completed if our IT systems are running, technical and legal advice is shared, finances are managed well, people are recruited and paid, and the lights turn on.

Your days might involve:

• working on finalising audit reports for publishing and tabling, in the communication team
• organising a training session to address a skill gap, in the HR team
• planning a pilot program for new software, in the IT team
• preparing legal advice for the executive, in the legal team
• reviewing audit work for quality and compliance
• managing the methodologies and tools that guide our best practice auditing standards.

Do you have a background in law, communication, human resources, IT support, corporate finance, project management, or audit technical? Keen to dive into a unique operating environment with a diversity of corporate tasks? Are you passionate about public sector transparency and accountability? Then the ANAO is the place for you!

Applications for our 2026 program open on Monday 20 January and close on Sunday 6 April.

Our recruitment process

After an initial assessment period, shortlisted applicants will be invited to participate in a range of assessment activities, including online and in-person assessments.

Eligibility

If you’ve completed any undergraduate-level degree in the last seven years, in any area, then you’re welcome to apply.

To be eligible for our graduate program, you must also be:

• an Australian citizen
• willing to undertake a national security clearance process
• willing to relocate to Canberra.

Position locations

All graduate positions are located in Canberra, ACT.

We can provide relocation assistance if you need to move from interstate.

Reasonable adjustment

The ANAO is committed to providing an inclusive and diverse workplace where all our employees and potential employees are valued.

This commitment extends to our recruitment practice — we will provide reasonable adjustments to our application and assessment process based on need.

Please ensure that you contact our Early Careers Programs team about any adjustments or considerations you may need for assessment processes before completing the relevant assessments. No consideration can be given after assessment submission or without evidence.

Contact us

Email: earlycareerprograms@anao.gov.au
Social Media: Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.

Join our graduate program mailing list