Before I officially became part of Internal Audit, there were already experiences in my life that slowly trained me to become observant, analytical, and detail oriented without me fully realizing it at the time.

One of those experiences started when I worked under the Construction Department of a geothermal power plant project in Mt. Apo. My role at that time involved monitoring materials and equipment being claimed and used by contractors for ongoing construction activities.

Looking back now, I realize that was one of the first environments that trained my mind to notice inconsistencies, question unusual transactions, and pay attention to details that many people would normally overlook.

Part of my work involved checking whether the materials being requested or charged were reasonable based on actual project requirements. I remember reviewing items like rebars, construction materials, manpower usage, and other operational costs. There were moments when we would physically measure remaining materials and even monitor scrap because some requests seemed excessive compared to the actual project needs.

I remember asking myself simple questions:

Why purchase fifteen meters when less than ten meters were actually needed?

Why were there too many leftover materials?

Why did some manpower signatures look similar?

At that time, I did not even realize that those small observations were already helping shape my auditing mindset.

I was slowly learning that behind numbers, requests, and documents, there should always be accountability, reasonableness, and proper support.

One thing I appreciated from that experience was that it taught me how important it is to verify things properly instead of simply accepting documents at face value. It trained me to become more observant and objective while still remaining professional when raising concerns or clarifications.

Eventually, some of the concerns we noticed were also elevated properly to the appropriate offices for review and verification. Looking back now, I appreciate how those experiences taught me that speaking up professionally and responsibly is also part of protecting the integrity of operations.

That experience became one of the foundations of how I developed my attention to detail and analytical thinking.

Years later, when I eventually entered government service and became involved in audit work, many of those lessons still stayed with me.

Sometimes, people think auditing only starts when you officially become an auditor.

But for me, I realized that my auditing mindset started long before that — through real experiences, actual operations, and learning how to observe things carefully while understanding how systems work behind the scenes. ✨