How we’re upskilling our people for the future of audit

Our Next generation audit (NGA) program reimagines the audit from end to end, integrating intelligent AI throughout every stage of the process. At its core is the world’s first AI-native audit ERP system — a groundbreaking advancement designed and developed by PwC with support from Microsoft. But our innovation goes beyond technology. This global transformation initiative includes the upskilling of all 1,600 auditors across PwC Australia to confidently and effectively harness this new capability. To lead the way, we’ve also established a Global Leadership Training Program, developing an elite cohort of ‘NGA Champions’ — trusted professionals who are equipped to drive adoption and inspire change in their respective territories. 

Assurance partner Anthony Goldsworthy is one of our NGA champions in Australia. Together with his global cohort, Anthony is becoming an expert in using and coaching others in the use of the NGA technologies. Our NGA champions, including Anthony, are also providing feedback as the program evolves, ensuring we meet – and surpass – your needs as a PwC audit client.

As part of Anthony’s immersive 100-day AI leadership training journey, he met with fellow NGA champions in Ireland earlier this year, where they heard from the Silicon Valley engineers who are developing the platform. “Our next generation audit is built to allow for continuous innovation,” says Anthony. “Each component can be separately upgraded and enhanced, without disrupting the platform, which means we can adopt emerging technologies without interruption.”

Every auditor in our Australian team has completed mandatory AI training to use the platform, and as our technology evolves, so does our training. And as we develop new AI tools – such as ChatAssurance – they get added to this world-class auditor training. “AI isn’t going to replace our auditors, it’s going to enhance our audit by arming our teams with the skills to critically analyse the AI tools and systems they’ll be using and allowing them to focus on the issues that matter most to our clients” says Anthony.

By upskilling our people to use the new platform, they’ll be able to spend less time on routine administrative tasks, and more time with working with clients to solve problems and add value. There are numerous ways we’re upskilling our people to use next generation audit:

• Digital Academies: Every new hire in our Assurance team participates in a compulsory Digital learning Academy, which includes modules about generative AI and how to use our AI tools most effectively.

• Digital Accelerators: This is our Australian network of over 50 PwC AI champions who champion the use of our AI tools and help our teams transform client engagements by embedding AI-thinking into every audit.

• Training to direct AI agents: We train our auditors to direct AI agents, not the other way around. We call this human-led approach “the human in the loop”. So we’ll continue to teach our auditors vital skills such as professional scepticism, critical thinking, and keeping client engagement front and centre.

Find out more about next generation audit here.