The NAO has a plethora of sports and social teams, so there are plenty of opportunities to get involved in something other than audit.
I am a keen member of the NAO’s netball team, despite not having played since being at school. Initially I was hesitant to offer my services, being all too keenly aware of my lack of netballing skills and fearful of being more a hindrance than an aide. I have now been playing with the team for over a year. That doesn’t mean to say that I have improved at all; I just go along because I enjoy it and the team are more than happy for me to cause chaos across the court. Thankfully there are far better members of the team who can redeem my amateur performance.
Two weeks ago I played my first match in many months. We travelled over to the sports facilities at Oval after work to face up to our rival – we play in the civil service league against teams from government departments and other organisations. It was a blazing hot evening, almost too hot for netball. Unfortunately, the score wasn’t exactly what we had hoped for (I won’t write it up!), but as they say, it’s the taking part that counts, and that was very much the motto for the match.
We’re hoping to take up our training sessions again as they proved helpful (and hopefully should save us from similar results!). A few months ago we had a few training sessions at work, which was really great, and an opportunity to have a run around even if you couldn’t make it to a match.
There are often football matches, both with teams within the NAO, and also against other firms. There is also a table tennis room, as well as a darts group to name but a few of the sporting activities at the NAO. The NAO also has its own on-site gym and range of classes so you really don’t have to go far to get involved.