Elevate Auditing with Global Expertise and People-First Approach

The human side of technological transformation  

My origins go back to Macedonia (where I lived until age 14), but it was in Canada that my career kicked off. That was in Toronto back in 2004. Why did I decide to join PwC after my degree? One of the main reasons was the fantastic experience I had at my interview. I could really feel the energy and the fit with the firm. To be honest, though, I didn’t really intend to stay with PwC. The idea was to get my CPA and leave after three or four years to travel. 

That’s not quite how things turned out! I certainly got to travel. But I managed to do so within the firm. Almost 20 years later I’m still with PwC as an Assurance partner and Audit Transformation and Strategic Talent Leader, but I’m halfway across the planet here in Switzerland. PwC has been a great way to see the world. I’ve lived on different continents in the course of my career. I’ve been inspired by the people and country of Japan and later Ireland on a short secondment to Dublin. My work has also taken me to Manila, Singapore, Frankfurt, Tokyo, Luxembourg and the US. But the travel has been less strategic and more down to the need to explore. A very human urge.

People in assurance 

The human side of the assurance business has emerged as a big part of my career with PwC. It’s all in my job title: Audit Transformation and Strategic Talent Leader. Audit transformation naturally has a very technical and technological aspect: it’s about digits and digitalization, after all. I’m completely at home in that world, having specialised in financial services in my degree, worked on many audits, and moved into audit digitalisation. But the human side is equally important. That’s because audit transformation is about change, and change always has to do with people. 

Let me give you an example. One of the most interesting success stories of my career so far has been a major audit transformation a few years ago. And one of the biggest challenges within this project was to change the mindset of the team to start looking at and planning the audit as a multi-year journey rather than an annual event. If this sounds easy, consider the fact that making it work required a joint project with both PwC’s and the client’s leadership heavily involved.

Projects like this require assurance people who aren’t just at home with numbers and digital technology, but who also have deep people skills, including the ability to work in a team (without which nothing is possible), and a genuine interest in the client, their business and the broader society in which we all operate. That’s why I encourage younger people within the firm to meet and talk to as many people as they can, both in Switzerland and abroad, to widen their perspectives beyond their day-to-day silo. I also encourage them to focus on what’s important, to them and their clients, rather than what’s merely urgent. In other words, I advise them to step back and think beyond the confines of where they are. 

One of the things that has kept me at PwC this long ‒ apart from the opportunity to repeatedly work with interesting clients ‒ is relationships with people. Since early in my career, I’ve had great coaches and mentors who have helped me achieve my ambitions in this large global organisation. Naturally it can be difficult to stay close to your people when things get super busy, especially if you’re in a leadership role. It’s particularly important to maintain your authenticity and proximity. One of my favourite tools is “walk with me” chats, where members of my team get 30 or 40 minutes get to ask me anything they want and I respond as genuinely as I can. Doing it virtually allows us to get outside and up our daily steps too! Things like this don’t just keep the people side of business running smoothly; they also keep the information flowing, including know-how on best practices and technology ‒ something that’s crucial if expertise gained working with companies at the leading edge of change is to be propagated around the organisation so that it benefits the entire clientele.

#That’sAssurance for me?

Assurance is many things. Now more than ever, at a time of such fascinating change in our profession, it’s a great place to work for talented and motivated people with a genuine interest in making an impact on business and society. For me, assurance is about harnessing the latest technology and methodologies with the power of people to build trust in the economy and society.