Transcript of interview

1. Can you give me your name, position and tell me how long have you been at the NAO?

My name is Akhil Patel, I’m an audit manager on the third sector value for money team, and I’ve been at the NAO for four and a half years.

2. What attracted you to the NAO and what made you decide to join?

While I was doing a masters at the London School of Economics, one of the seminars was run by the Comptroller and Auditor General who is the head of the NAO, and he ran a very interesting seminar on policy evaluation which was largely based on past value for money reports and I found this seminar fascinating and when the advertisement came up for a position at the NAO I jumped at the opportunity and thankfully was awarded a position of a researcher at the national audit office.

3. Do you feel your work has an influence?

My work certainly does have an influence, in how many other jobs can you get the opportunity to call a senior government official to account through the work that you do? For example, we publish value for money reports, and these are used by the public accounts committee as evidence, the senior official is called there and has to account for the public money that has been spent and also the effectiveness and efficiency with which he has spent the public money. At the end of the day the public accounts committee publishes a report and makes recommendations which the government has got to respond to, and often they are accepted and the recommendations are therefore implemented and, hopefully, the public services are improved as a result.

4. Describe the culture and work environment. Is there a good team ethic? Are there social activities?

The culture and work environment at the NAO is very good. On value for money studies, we work as quite a close-knit team members of four to five staff and we work on the projects for about a year at a go, and in that time we get to know each other quite well and there’s a lot of opportunity for socialising after work, drinks parties and so on. More widely the office runs a number of social events including a golf day, pop quizzes and even a wine tasting competition, and also there’s quite a good work life balance you know that sort of you’ve got to put in the hours to get the work done but that’s not the be all and end all - it’s about having a proper social and leisure time as well.

5. What have been the most beneficial aspects of the training and development you have received?

The NAO offers a wide variety of training and development, it runs bespoke training programmes under the banner ‘unlocking our potential’ through which staff access quite a wide variety of personal development courses and they cover topics such as emotional intelligence, persuasion and influence as well as practical case studies, which are always good fun but also quite challenging. A couple of years ago I was selected for the future leaders development programme and through that I have accessed a wide variety of training opportunities, courses on leadership, courses which involve strategic issues such as making the organisation more client focused. But the important thing about training and development is applying what you learn on these courses in the work environment. The office has, for all staff up to the level of audit principal a dedicated development manager who can discuss with you your development needs and try and make your work programme suit those.

6. How has the NAO met your expectations career wise?

The NAO has met my expectations career wise in that I wanted a job with a lot of variety and the studies that I have worked on so far have involved such issues as the British Library and design of school buildings under the public private partnerships programme. I also wanted a job in which I’d have the opportunity to progress up the organisation and I’ve had the opportunity to do so. Also importantly there is a very good work life balance, and that’s important to me.

7. What do you enjoy most about your role? What challenges have you faced?

What I enjoy most about my role is the fact that you have access to senior government officials and to documents. Ultimately your work is going to be used to hold public officials to account for the public money that they’ve spent, but in speaking to these senior public officials you can sometimes see the passion and commitment they have to the public good and that to me is very inspiring. But sometimes officials can be quite defensive about the work they are doing because they perceive that the NAO is just here to criticise which, of course, is not the case and that defensiveness can mean that you’ve got to show quite a lot of resilience in making sure that you ask the right questions and get the answers that you need to conduct your audit work.

8. What is the most interesting and/or most recent project you have worked on?

I’m currently working on a study which is looking at the regeneration of the Greenwich Peninsular. This is a project which has recently come to the public attention with the opening of the Millennium Dome which is now known as the O2. It’s an interesting study because it combines a range of public policy issues such as property development, transport and design - it's really interesting stuff.