By Henry Briscoe, NTU graduate
WARNING: this is not a career blueprint, and nor should it be, the reflections I share with you here are not a manual. They are based purely on my own experience, hence why there are a lot of ‘I’s in this piece. I hope you find them helpful!
Lesson 1: it’s okay to take diversions
Let me take you back. It’s my final semester at NTU and I want to be solicitor. I’ve decided after watching far too many episodes of Suits on Netflix that I want to be a lawyer. After making this decision, I ended up working in a law firm for 3 months and quickly realised it wasn’t for me. So, I reconnected with the idea of becoming a clinical psychologist, an idea that I had since I was 18 and so I worked out a career pathway – a rough plan. I worked as a health care worker in a psychiatric hospital, an honorary assistant psychologist (unpaid), an honorary research assistant, an assistant psychologist, and then finally accepted an offer to train as a clinical psychologist. All this took about 2.5 years. And this is the first lesson I learned. Don’t be afraid to try something different. After working towards a career in psychology for 3 years, I graduated and thought about doing something different. I took some small steps into the journey of becoming a solicitor but turned back, recouped, and started a different journey. I am very grateful for this experience because it cemented what career path I wanted to take. Another thing I learned along this journey is don’t compare yourself to others. Everyone’s journey is unique, some journeys take longer and some journey’s take shorter – but neither are better or worse than the other, embrace it.
Lesson number 2: You are more than your career
The journey to qualifying as a clinical psychologist is long. I was wary about becoming consumed by this journey. I looked at the ratios of those who apply, and the places offered. I looked into how long the course would be funded for by Health Education England. I spoke to qualified clinical psychologists about how many times they applied before being given a place. My conclusion was, it’s hard. So, it might take a while to get to training and there is likely to be setbacks. For me, when I realised the journey could be hard with lots of setbacks, I made a conscious decision to apply when I ‘felt’ ready. What I mean by this is that I was only going to apply for training when I felt I was in a position to field the disappointment of being unsuccessful. How would I know when I reached this juncture? Well, in my own view, a pathway to a desired to career shouldn’t consume all the space in your life. Therefore, I made room for other experiences. I made sure I continued to connect with friends, go on holidays, develop new hobbies, and pursue different goals. All these things helped me to realise the aspects of life I really valued. So, when times got tough, I had a buffer that would help get me through. I’m at a loss what to call this lesson, but I guess it’s all about recognising what’s important to you (outside of your career) and maintaining those things throughout your journey.
Lesson number 3: Experience
Experience of working within clinical settings. It’s a classic line, the wording varies but you read it across many job specifications. When applying for assistant psychologist roles there is now an expectation of a candidate having worked in clinical settings. But the question is, what counts as clinical settings? In my experience working within in clinical settings was working as a healthcare worker (also referred to a healthcare assistant) in a local psychiatric hospital. These jobs are invaluable. Being a healthcare worker will mean, in most cases, you will be working directly with service users on the ‘frontline’. Having this opportunity will allow you to provide care for service users whilst developing a wide range of therapeutic and communication skills. Such skills are the ‘bread and butter’ of a clinical psychologist. Working as a healthcare worker will also give you the opportunity to work as part of a clinical team also referred to as a Multi-Disciplinary Team (MDT). Again, this opportunity is invaluable. When applying for roles within psychology having experiences of working with an MDT, understanding, reflecting, and recognising’s times it is effective and more challenging is crucial when gaining relevant clinical experience.
A healthcare worker role is not the only role though. If you were to look for another role keep the above themes in mind, working directly with service users, and experience of working within an MDT – that should stand you in good stead.
Lesson 4: Awareness
Increasingly psychologists are taking an active role in addressing the inequalities we face in our society. The world is changing and developing an awareness of these issues is imperative for anybody, especially those working within healthcare. Issues of inequality and discrimination effect everybody, whether it be, service users, colleagues, friends, or family, and therefore, if we are to understand someone’s lived experience, an awareness of their social context is essential. Perhaps whilst reading this blog you have been affected by inequality. Being aware of such issues is the first step to taking action to address them. Within the wider context of society, there is an emerging expectation that we help empower people to address these issues, whether it be ourselves, people we work with, or people that receive our service. If I could have created a time machine where my future self goes back and gives my former self advice, I think developing a fuller awareness of the issues of inequality, reflecting on them, and taking action to address them is number one. So, perhaps you could use this as your time machine?
About the author:
Henry is currently training to be a clinical psychologist, and as part of this, is conducting research on anxiety and perspective-taking.
You can read more of our career-related articles, below…
Psychology at Nottingham Trent University 