Who You Are Before What You Do: Rethinking the Internal Audit Career Path
In internal audit—and in many professional fields—it’s easy to get swept up in goal-setting and checklist-building. You map out certifications, positions to climb toward, industries to explore, and even specific companies you dream of joining. The plans seem solid. They make sense on paper. But then a quiet question creeps in: Why doesn’t this feel fulfilling?
Let’s pause and start from somewhere deeper: not with what you have to do, but who you are.
The Trap of the Checklist
I once worked with an auditor—let’s call her Linda—who had her five-year plan meticulously laid out. CIA certification? Check. Move into a multinational firm by year three? Check. Specialize in IT audit by year five? In progress.
Linda was a high performer. She landed the roles she wanted, hit the targets she set. But a few years in, she found herself exhausted, disengaged, and questioning whether she had made a mistake.
It wasn’t that her goals were flawed. It was that they didn’t belong to her. They were based on what success looked like from the outside. She had joined her company for its reputation, pursued IT audit because it was in demand, and pushed for leadership roles because that’s what “progress” looked like. But none of it aligned with what gave her energy, what matched her values, or how she liked to work.
Who You Are Must Guide What You Do
When you start from who you are—your strengths, your values, your vision of a meaningful career—you’re more likely to set goals that are sustainable and fulfilling. You might realize you thrive in smaller teams where your work has a visible impact. Or that you care about mentoring, and a leadership role in a huge corporate hierarchy might not give you that space. Maybe you’re energized by uncovering systemic weaknesses and communicating risks clearly, rather than building technical models in the background.
In internal audit, the illusion is that our job is about checklists: of controls, of risks, of audit plans. But we aren’t checklists. We’re whole people. And when we choose a company or role based solely on what it is, rather than how it fits with who we are, we often end up making sacrifices—of time, energy, even integrity—that don’t seem to pay off.
Aligning Your Career with Your Core
Linda eventually left her big firm to join a regional nonprofit as an internal controls advisor. On paper, it looked like a step back. But in reality, she had never felt more in step with her work. She was using her skills, yes—but more importantly, she was operating from her values. And that made all the difference.
So the next time you’re setting career goals, stop and ask yourself:
What kind of problems do I enjoy solving?
What values am I not willing to compromise on?
What type of environment brings out the best in me?
The answers may not point you toward the loudest opportunities—but they’ll guide you to the right ones.
