What’s the most important piece of advice you give to students who want to work at ANAO?

Be curious. Be perpetually curious. The is probably the number one piece of advice and attribute our SES officers talk about when they're speaking to graduates. This is a job that relies on curiosity and skepticism. Do your research as well and demonstrate how or connect your background with the work that the office does. Also just challenge everything. Even as a student now as you're completing your studies, challenge everything that they've given you and that way you can easily transfer that sort of thinking in the office.

The best thing to do as a grad is to come in with the mindset that you're going to learn everything you possible can in that first year to set you up for your future career in the ANAO. The ANAO is incredible with the amount of learning and development that it offers especially in your grad year so keeping that mindset of, "I'm here to learn and I'm here to develop my skill set," is really important. Instead of thinking micro and thinking that it will only help you in your grad program, the training and development that you'll receive will actually help you immensely later on as you go into you team leader and more senior roles. Another important thing to keep in mind is that it's not a race. Take and allow yourself the flexibility to make mistakes. Take in as much information as you can, but also give yourself the time to process it.

In terms of the application process, don't rush the expression of interest. Take the time over a couple of weeks to put together something thoughtful. The people who'll be looking at your applications are from the particular service groups and they'll be looking for the people who are a good fit for that particular service group. We can see the people who put the time and effort into putting together something thoughtful. The expressions of interest are the first impression you make on the office which is pretty important. The ANAO website is a really good resource for you to make a very good first impression so if you can learn as much as you can about the office before you apply and if you can incorporate some of the language and terms that we use into your expression of interest, that will serve you very well.

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