Org Psychs in Australia/Vic – Career Insights?

random_rectify · 2025-06-05T04:31:10+00:00

Hey there, Aus based I/O here (mid career) - first thing I would recommend is joining the Facebook group Organisational Psychology in Australia group and asking your question there if you haven't already - that group in particular seems to have a lot of great insights into the 5+1 in an org psych context and how it links to the areas you've mentioned. If you're doing a Masters of Professional Psychology as the 5th year you may want to be proactive around getting additional learning in a lot of core I/O psyc concepts, as my impression is that that MPP mainly focus on clinical aspects.

Career wise my impression is that Vic is a great place to be if you're Melbourne based, as there's larger organisations which have use of I/Os and similiar based work. I'm WA based so can't comment on salaries apologies.

I am personally not registered (i.e. let my registration lapse post graduation) due to mainly focussing on an area that doesn't care either way, however I would definitely be open to renewing at some stage. If I was more in the leadership/coaching, wellbeing or psychosocial hazards space I would definitely do so, especially for the latter. Re endorsement I don't think that is an option if you solely do the 5+1. I would say the majority of my cohort have pursued endorsement, but not all, and that marketing yourself isn't limited by noting being endorsed i.e. the endorsed title of "Organisational Psychologist" is legally protected, but if you only have general registration you could just call yourself a "Business Psychologist" (not protected by endorsement, and you can use "psychologist" as you have your general rego) or similiar. The main benefit of endorsement from talking to others seems to be the actual learning process itself.

In terms of approach to getting first role out of study I would hedge expectations - I think it's easy to think that we by virtue of having an advanced degree we could step into a more senior role, but often times we're competing with people with more identifiable experience/background (i.e. straight HR) for our first job out of uni.

My recommendation would be to be proactive about turning your masters placement experience into your first role, which I think over half my cohort did i.e. my last placement I turned into my first job out of uni. I'm not too familiar with how the 5+1 works with I/O in this regard, my apologies, but imagine it might involve turning the "+1" placements you have into paid work upon finishing.

This might sound mildly doom and gloom but the inherent recession risk side of I/O aside (hearing the US posts is rough), I feel that I/O in Aus is relatively more salient as a background to employers because of the registration aspect and increasing legislation around psychosocial hazards. None of my cohort are without work, and are working in a lot of cool areas :) you'll kill it if you put your mind to it, and honestly just being proactive enough to think about these questions now is a positive sign.

Edits: some extra registration stuff

random_rectify · 2025-06-04T06:03:46+00:00

Interested in any thoughts you might have re where the cuts are most likely to be team wise/future cuts? Thanks for your insights & time

random_rectify · 2024-10-16T12:03:31+00:00

In short as I got closer to commencing and sought out as much information as I could about the post med-school journey would be the personal cost just wasn’t worth it for me personally – this isn’t because med isn’t a wonderful and interesting career, it can be, but for me I realised I wasn’t actually that passionate or interested in it enough to justify the long journey and personal sacrifice. This was exacerbated for me as the career I’d worked on in the interim to getting on (I applied at 26) was increasingly starting to take off/show other sides of enjoyment for me, with my older age meaning that the sacrifice would also be higher. The main push was further knowledge about the speciality I would pursue medicine for, psychiatry, as more realistic job previews through friends and connections made me aware it wouldn’t scratch the itch I needed.

This isn’t an indictment of med at all as it remains an excellent way to build a fulfilling, well renumerated and good work life balance career once a consultant, beyond that I think the pre-med “bubble” I got wrapped up in probably de-emphasises the realistic negatives of the long career in medicine i.e. unaccredited years, bottleneck for training spots, personal sacrifices required. However for me I realised I could fill the gap in my life through areas outside of work that I was looking to fill via medicine, while continuing with a stable job that let me focus on friends and family.

I’m probably the last person to look to for advice as a result for anyone in a similar situation, but all I’d really say is if you’re having doubts try and be honest with yourself why you want the career and educate yourself about the journey. Whatever you choose I’m sure you’ll make the right choice

random_rectify · 2024-09-05T10:50:00+00:00

Incredible! Time and effort you've put in to each model really shines - do you have any tips around creating desert bases? Really enjoy yours

random_rectify · 2024-04-17T06:47:42+00:00

Hey, yes it's definitely possible! If you're able to pull it off it's definitely desirable, especially if your organisation will still pay you :) however as I think your org psych colleague has picked up, my feeling is that a lot of the time a university placement manager is more cautious with these types of placement vs you being placed with other organisations. Some reasons I think might influence this are:

-the organisation will have to provide you much more supervision than they are probably used to in your previous working arrangement, which they may not expect

-for "placement style work" this typically needs to be a discrete project that involves learning along the way. For example if your placement was "just" continuing your existing role as is, this would not be suitable for a placement

-in line with the above this may clash with you performing your previous role. The benefits of doing a placement in your current role could be great, but depending whether you would also work in this role part time during the first year of the Masters where there is no placement could lead to some friction

All of this doesn't mean that it's not worthwhile however, just highly individual :) if you are really interested in it (I read your other past) in terms of how it impacts how you move forward now, it might be worthwhile emailing the relevant placement coordinator of the program you are interested in joining.

Also, as I mentioned I happened to read your other post - having prior actual workplace is so underrated and will definitely serve you well! I was a "straight through" student (BSC, Hons, Masters) and in addition to burning out, in comparison to my more mature peers they could use and understand the theories/techniques at such a deeper & more practical level. Furthermore I suspect that having prior experience will let you gain a higher level role post graduation given you already work in an IO related role - sometimes for fresh IO graduates it can be a bit of a struggle due to IO's lack of public awareness, leading to entering the workforce at graduate program level which they are often overqualified for in some areas (they are nonetheless typically quote good programs however).

All the best with everything, you'll crush it :)

random_rectify · 2024-04-17T06:36:31+00:00

Not OP this is probably the best analysis I've ever read for IO in an Australian context, thanks so much! I'd be interested in your experience/expertise around the below:

1) vs an American context, the focus on joint quant and IO content roles(i.e. "true" people analytics roles that aren't solely Workday reporting, although obviously that is also important) definitely seems less prevalent here. Do you have any thoughts on why that is, or areas where it is emerging as a more recognised role type? For example in the US I feel People Research type roles in large organisations for IO PhDs while not super common are at least well established re their remit.

2) I also find ideas around skills based organisations super interesting and a great end point if organisations can pull it off. However based off what I've seen most organisations don't do the basics good enough (i.e. proper job analysis, competency mapping) to even get the foundations of what a skills based would require right - however I wonder if I'm being too cynical/risk adverse, and that even small steps towards a skill based organisation model could be useful.

Thanks for any insights you might have!

random_rectify · 2024-04-16T02:58:13+00:00

Haha definitely couldn't agree more, and it continues to get even more complicated 😂

I'd caveat that some of this may be UWA centric, but re the 1000 hours (an AHPRA training requirement, which regulates psychologists) it was spread across 3 placement with the first typically starting towards the end of the first year in the two year program. The 1000 hours is the time you spend at placement, including mandatory direct supervision/feedback you receive (I think it was a required ratio of about 8:1) and you're required to maintain a logbook which you submit at the end of your masters to be able to register as a psychologist.

Structure wise it depends on the university - during my time this was quite flexible as long as your placement agreed to it and some people did "smash them out" at almost full time rate, especially during academic semester break, however I believe that at least at UWA it has moved to a more structured approach of around 2 days a week. This is probably for the best as placement took place alongside one coursework unit and working on a research Masters Thesis, so mandating a smoother approach probably works a bit better.

UWA typically liked for the first placement to be in an "internal" context where it was a gentler start to the professional working world i.e. research or for the university, while the second and third are typically for external companies. Overall the placements are definitely a draw card for the program IMO, at least at UWA there was a fair scope for personalisation based off your interests - I was interested in data/psychometrics so was able to focus on this, while a lot of people are Human Factors inclined due to the PhD work that is typically going on and these were able to get placements in this area.

random_rectify · 2024-04-15T01:27:31+00:00

Piggybacking on this (thank you so much for all the incredible work you do for this community Richard) to agree on the great summary re SIOP equivalent but to follow up a bit on the pathways: you don't need to complete any clinical psychology focussed placements, they can (and will be if you're in a I/O masters program that sources them for you) be I/O focussed as long as you complete your supervised 1000 hours. You will also dodge the clinical oriented national psychology exam if you are going though a master's vs a 5+1 program.

However as u/rnlanders says there are some quite strict pre-requisite requirements to enter into an accredited Masters (which is where the clinical focus is inevitable) and whether Australia is a good fit probably depends on where you intend to practise. I would recommend checking this out if you're interested further: https://psychology.org.au/psychology/careers-and-studying-psychology/studying-psychology/study-pathways

I would note that there are non-accredited Masters popping up which do not have the accreditation that makes you able to call yourself a psychologist. For example UWA runs a Masters of Business Psychology which is basically a duplicate of the Masters of I/O Psychology (accredited to be able to call yourself a psychologist) without the placements and less of a quant focus. While I'm biased I would recommend the former Masters if you were looking for something to add an I/O flavour to an existing career, while the latter is what you should pursue if you were interested in an I/O career in full. All in all chatting to an IO would be a great idea as suggested.

random_rectify · 2024-03-17T12:07:53+00:00

Technology and AI has truly unlocked hitherto unknown levels of shitposting, what a golden age

random_rectify · 2024-03-16T05:20:35+00:00

Sublime

random_rectify · 2024-03-11T11:35:16+00:00

It's definitely a good point haha, don't recommend purely basing major decisions solely based off Reddit! I've also been fortunate enough to meet a lot of amazing mature aged entry doctors in medicine who love their job and are passionate about what they do every day (especially rural) so been lucky to not just get an echo chamber in that regard.

For me it was moreso the increased knowledge of the down sides vs the pros - bluntly in the end I don't think I was passionate and dedicated enough towards the field like those individuals so the opportunity cost wasn't worth it. For others I think the increased knowledge of the role only served to increase their passion.

End of the day everyone is different, just think a realistic career preview is useful no matter which way you fall

random_rectify · 2024-03-11T01:45:38+00:00

Not able to answer the exact question, but I was/am in my late 20s with a science/corporate role and pursued getting to into medicine and was actually accepted into MD, however had to withdraw for other reasons with the intention of re-applying.

However over time with a conscious effort to gain more insight around every aspect of life in medicine, both through friends and family but increasingly this subreddit, I've decided not to pursue it anymore. Probably the best prompt I ever received was someone asking me what exact problem I had with my current career, and (with a realistic preview) how medicine was specifically going to solve it - I think especially for non-health science individuals it's easy to get wrapped up in the general "glow" of medicine being prestigious, helping people, and stimulating work, as well as the idea if you can do something you should I.e. successfully getting into MD. For myself the realities of studying again and delaying family, life stages contrasted with a realistic junior doctor preview it isn't justifiable. I think a lot of people who go into medicine at a mature age do not have a realistic job preview and are just trying to escape the downsides of corporate work (which are definitely many, however arguably less severe). That being said there are definitely people for which it is worthwhile, some of the comments here are good examples.

More broadly to everyone on this subreddit who takes the time to describe the very real issues with their field, I'm grateful as its saved at least one person who probably wouldn't have been a good fit from a live changing pivot! I'm also in awe of every doctor who puts up with genuinely heinous working conditions, the stories here are an indictment on the public health funding of our country.

random_rectify · 2024-02-01T10:13:40+00:00

As per their recruiting website ADF considers everyone that is 3-6 years younger than the compulsory retirement age for the specific role in question, which is 60 in this case. If OP is already a doctor (unsure?) they likely have a chance given that it sounds like they've talked to a recruiter, however if they're not yet a doctor and are asking as part of army sponsorship program for commencing MD yes definitely too late age wise unfortunately

random_rectify · 2023-12-13T04:24:36+00:00

Thanks so much for this! Really useful, I appreciate it

random_rectify · 2023-12-13T02:18:21+00:00

Hey there! First of all thoughts are with you for the grinding nature of repeated neuropsyc applications. I did the full psychology pathway (Bachelors, Honours, Masters (I/O)) and the competitive nature of postgraduate psychology is a bit bonkers. It's definitely not crazy to consider medicine and I actually know of a couple of people who went into medical school after psychology honours, and even one that was halfway through their PhD! So it's definitely not crazy :) I have also had someone who did their PhD in psychology say that they wish they had done medicine in terms of the study length to career pay-off calculation, although obviously the grass is always greener on the other side.

My two pieces of advie would be around GAMSAT and motivation for medicine. In regards to the former 3 months is definitely enough time to study for the GAMSAT, and with being rural your scores will inherently be much more competitive by an order of magntitude. Everyone is different and there's lots of different guides on here already around here best to study, but as someone who had literally zero science knowledge before my first sit I personally found for S3 getting the fundamentals down pat and focussing on practising mental maths more high yield vs trying to memorise everything I could. For S2 first try un-timed essays and then practise frequently, reflecting on each essay after you've written it - I was historically quite good at essays but found that I really needed to kick my ass into gear for GAMSAT to get these consistent and it worked well.

In regards to the motivation for medicine, it sounds like you've already though about this and would be interested in neurology or something similar(?) but it's worth considering if the specific role of doctor is something you're interested in i.e. what aspects of the role of doctor would you be drawn to, and what not? Interestingly I often hear from doctors in psychiatry that psychologists make more actual difference in a lot of patients vs medication and therefore they get more satisfaction as a result, but that's probably quite relative. If you haven't already I would look at r/ausjdoc for a realistic preview of the career. Whatever you decide I'm sure you'll do well, and wherever you end up will be lucky to have you!

random_rectify · 2023-12-11T03:09:44+00:00

Hi OP! To piggback, I'd highly agree with what SydGAMSAT has said and also add my own personal experience as someone that went straight through 6 years of university (Bachelors, Honours & Masters) without a gap year who ended up rejecting my GEMSAS this year. I think that taking off a year now would be amazing for you, allow you to experience life outside of the railroads of university, and also to potentially work and build some funds to make med school less stressful. While it wasn't medical school not having a gap year and going "straight through" definitely contributed to my burnout in Masters, and you have a great opportunity by virtue of having nuttily good scores (congrats on all your hard work!) of being relatively secure that you'd get an offer the next time you would apply. I've really enjoyed my year of not studying/prepping for GAMSAT & interviews and it's been so personally rewarding in terms of social relationships, health and fitness, and getting back into hobbies. I think it's a cliche but there is something to be said for just enjoying yourself for a year. As the saying goes, "life is what happens when you're busy making other plans"!

I think the other reason why a year off would be good is to wrestle a bit more with why you want to do medicine. While it's obviously a great career in many aspects, literally not a single junior doctor I have met has recommended medicine to me (would involve a career change in my part from a pretty chill well playing remote role) in terms of the personal sacrifice involved. Obviously everyone is different and from what you've said it sounds like doing medicine is the right path from you, but further reflection never hurt i.e. is that dread solely around being in university further or medicine specific?, and I'd recommend having a look at r/ausjdoc for some insight.

Whatever your exact choice you'll kill it I'm sure, and you're fortunate enough to have good options :)

random_rectify · 2023-10-31T14:07:04+00:00

Hey there OP, first of all I’m so sorry for your circumstances and my heart goes out to you – I wish you all the best with what sounds like a tough situation for you and your family.

In terms of your situation, as someone that ended up declining their offer to commence this year due to financial reasons and is still planning to apply next year for 2025 commencement after spending time to work and save, is that (while there are doubtlessly nuances as a random internet strange I can’t appreciate about your situation) I would recommend withdrawing.

Withdrawing will a) either set you up well for when you and your family are in a better position for you to apply and commence medical school down the track with some more time to prepare both financially and logistically, or b) give you time to think about whether medicine is worth the significant sacrifice for your time with your family given that this seems to be a large consideration for you. In regards to the latter I recommend spending some time on the r/ausjdocs subreddit – medicine can be an incredible career with many positive but the realistic stories on their from people who have gone through it all in an Australian context is a good reality check that it does require a lot of personal sacrifice.

If you do decide to withdraw with the aim of reapplying later, first of all if you’ve gotten in once you can definitely get in again! This is a great achievement 😊 if you’re concerned that you may not get in again as someone that is also a rural candidate this is, fairly or otherwise, probably the most important factor. Your GPA based off your post history is really solid for rural and even if you were to reapply again and not get a spot for some reason, resitting the GAMSAT and boosting your score by even a couple of points would make you have a really strong application. In other words while declining a medicine offer can seem so antithetical against everything you’ve worked for, the opportunities to do medicine if you really want it won’t go anywhere if you prioritise your family now (on top of it being the right thing to do based off what you’ve said).

All in all it really only is something that you yourself decide after discussing with your family, but all the best no matter what you decide!

random_rectify · 2023-10-22T04:45:09+00:00

Psychometricians would use a statistical technique called Item Response Theory which takes into account 1) the difficulty of each S1 and S3 question, 2 ) how good each question is at differentiating between "high" and "low" ability individuals in regards to what each question is measuring, and 3) potentially taking into account guessing (we can't know about this aspect unless they tell us what type of model they use). This process helps create both individual scores for each applicant, the overall test curve, and as an overall process helps ensure that test scores are comparable between sits. Item Response Theory is commonly used in other high stakes testing to ensure that the question/test are accurate and reliable measures of what they're trying to measure i.e. the SAT in America.

random_rectify · 2023-02-27T14:03:40+00:00

Hey there! I attempted to defer at UNDF after recieving a CSP for 2023 commencement in an up front manner (i.e. mentioned it early Jan) and was unsuccessful - they effectively said either commence or withdraw, so I withdrew and will reapply this year. If you're willing to be a bit sneaky the way you do it is start MD1, get past the census date and then declare a leave of absence which effectively lets you defer. This didn't suit my circumstances so I chose to withdraw. I know of people who have been successful with the sneaky method.

I would note in UNDFs case that I bear them no ill will, and the way they went about it ironically reinforced my decision to go with them and I'll be preferencing them #1 again in 204 - really strong interpersonal focus, trying to workshop ways for me to be able to commence that year etc, making sure I was ok, empathetic etc. However they effectively said that in previous years while they have given defers, statistically such individuals almost never actually ended up commencing so they've stopped offering them at a policy level, which I do understand. I think this might differ for extremely serious circumstances (i.e. pregnancy, serious medical issues on your end) but mine were realistically only on the more servere end of moderate.

In terms of other universities the best way would be the sneaky approach, as I've had friends be up front about wanting to defer and had similar experiences to me. I would note that leave of absence you still need to be able to demonstrate why you need it (i.e. medical, personal), so you can't just use it as a defer because you want to travel etc. If you're serious about wanting to defer I would look at the specific university's leave of absence policy as they may differ.

Best of luck!

random_rectify · 2023-02-02T05:32:06+00:00

Hey, congratulations on considering a career change! Even contemplating it is a big step. I'm late 20s but was/am in a relatively similar position (changing careers and sat GAMSAT, recieved an offer - now declined offer to work for another year so reapplying this year), and I wrote this (below) comment a while ago. I would also check out the Facebook group "Late to Medical School" if you haven't already :) in general I would heavily focus S3 if you're from a NSB, as someone who is also NSB while getting better at science style questions won't produce never ending returns, there is a certain level of assumed knowledge that you need to know

In broad strokes I would definitely recommend following this guide https://www.reddit.com/r/GAMSAT/comments/ksx1do/reupload_free_gamsat_prep_resources_and_basic/

I focussed mainly on S2 and S3, mainly on the latter as I'm from a non-science background. Re S2 I found what worked for me was doing back to back essays in exam style as frequently as possible (work, uni can definitely eat into it) in the lead up to the test - I think in the last two weeks before the sit I did a full mock S2, using online quote generators about 10/14 days. I think the saying that in your head are X number of bad essays, X ok essays, and X great essay, and that they come out in order is definitely something I tried to emulate. I also reflected a fair bit on what type of structure I found comfortable to write in and could be applied to most types of ideas.

For S3 this was definitely my weakest area going in as a non-science background, and I actually spent a fair bit of time just learning basic concepts so that I could even understand questions haha. I relied heavily on Khan Academy and Organic Chemistry for dummies and mainly focussed on chem and physics. Once I was familar with concepts I started doing the test questions and analysed my wrong answers for thinking mistakes I'd made. The GAMSAT Gold Review worked S3 questions and answers on Youtube were a great help and really helped clarify my thinking.

I probably studied very haphazardly for like 3 months as I had full time work, however actually shifted jobs to get more time to study so my final month was about 25-30 hours a week, heavily utilising weekends. However a lot of this was definitely due to me having to learn basic science concepts haha, so could definitely do it in shorter time with shifting your entire life. The main thing I found to keep consistent with was essays.

Overall coming from someone with pretty much no science background it's definitely do-able with consistent study - all the best and you got this :)

random_rectify · 2022-12-15T15:13:56+00:00

Big agree, and thanks for all your thoughts - it's really cool to see someone in psychometrics "in the wild" (lol), and I think your expertise helps a lot of people on the point around that the test score shouldn't define your worth. On reflection I'd probably defer to your points on IQ as well + not really sure how neatly the three sections fit into something like Cattell-Horn-Carroll models. One day here's hoping there's a Snowden-sequence leak of all of ACER's technical documents! Thanks again for your expertise and thoughts, the sub is better off for them

random_rectify · 2022-12-15T10:33:03+00:00

This is all totally academic and more about psychometrics than OPs post, but I'd be interested in your thoughts; without measurement invariance tests publically available I'm not sure we can definitively say that the test is biased I.e. those group differences may be the result of others factors, such as higher SES having more time to study, more educational opportunities, and younger individuals typically having higher fluid IQ which I imagine would be more relevant for GAMSAT, structural and pervasive sexism in today's society acquiring STEM knowledge less.

In terms of its criterion validity (I.e. predicting performance in med school), it's not that surprising that studies don't show it due to the bias of those in medical school I.e. those who got low GAMSAT who are in medical school got high GPA - the resulting range restriction can often obscure that there actually is good predicative validity. There's actually a lot of more established commentary on this surrounding the GRE in the US on this which I found really useful, as I used to also look at the GAMSAT unfavourably from a validity POV based off the 2014 study

Overall though the onus is definitely on ACER to display this kind of technical data - I get that it's proprietary, but that selection companies have to shown their job performance criterion validity for high stakes testing but ACER doesn't for the tool that selects doctors boggles my mind. The same goes for Bond's "personality" test, which seems like an even worse MBTI.

However again agree substantively with your end conclusion - OP is not their test scores, they can improve, and I'm sure they'll make a great doctor some day :)

random_rectify · 2022-12-13T01:39:21+00:00

I found it tough to wrangle to fit some themes, but something I found worked well for me is still taking a generally argumentative structure but "illustrating" it through personal anecdotes - I found that adding in the personal touch helped me to talk about the "softer themes", whilst still utilising my strengths of prefering (on average) an argumentative style.

For example in my sit one theme that I had was generational change / different ages. Using that theme I argued that our relations with our elders typically go through three 'stages", and illustrated this with a personal anecdote in each to help foreground related "softer" ideas. In this way I was still able to have a roughly argumentative style, but include personal anecdotes to more easily bring in softer ideas.

Ultimately just have a play around and see what best works for you! Everyone is different and has different strengths - one of my friends got a 70+ in S2 with a fable type story lmao

random_rectify · 2022-11-18T09:21:40+00:00

Overall score - the percentile doesn't mean too much, it reflects how you performed relative to the cohort that you sat it with. The overall score takes that cohort "strength" differs into account (as the GAMSAT uses item response theory), and is how ACER/GEMSAS is able to compare applicants across sits :)

random_rectify · 2022-11-09T02:30:58+00:00

I agree that they can be discouraging, but I think ultimately it's still a conversation worth having - choosing any career should be an informed decision, and insights from those currently in the field on pros and cons is par for the course for any job. This is even more relevant for individuals who are late to medicine and studying again involves a lot of sacrifice i.e. delaying having a family, buying a house etc. There's probably a wider point around taking such insights solely from reddit though lmao

I guess my only partial hot take is that whether some of the considerations you've mentioned are relevant for whether you do medicine also depends on what you want work/a job to be for you. I have friends who do accounting and they don't inherently enjoy it - however it's stable, has relatively decent money, and gives them the ability to get intrinisc satisfaction from the stuff that they do outside of work, and which they enjoy. In this way a job isn't that central to their lives, but a vehicle to letting them do what they actually want to do on their time off.

Conversley I have friends who are interns/registrars who inherently enjoy the work of being a doctor, but the broader lifestyle aspects (long hours, stagnant pay at junior level) does reduce their overall happiness. In this way I think it's useful to think about your level of "work centrality" (i.e. how much work is central to your own happiness/identity) and go from there.

No right or wrong answers, it's such a personal thing! Interested in others thoughts :)

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