Occupational therapy

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>>Participant 1: I think the key attraction to me, for Queensland Health is opportunities. Do something different each day, work with a different person a different community each day.

>>Participant 2: You can work with adults, you can work with children. You can work in mental health, you can work in a hospital. You can work in the community. And really, you can travel anywhere with it. You can work in, you know, the big cities or go more regional or remote. So I think that's the great flexibility of being an OT in Queensland Health, isn't it? That you can really go anywhere and do anything.

>>Participant 3: In terms of career options, diversity in terms of consumers, diagnosis, you know, you can be a clinician, you can be a team leader, you can be a whole range of things within Queensland Health which is really nice.

>>Participant 4: So for me it was really that ability to work in sometimes chaotic but always vibrant and enjoyable sort of teams that brought me back to Queensland Health.

>>Participant 5: It's one of the best things about Queensland Health, I think. There's so many, so much variety, you never quite know what you're going to walk into.

>>Participant 6: You're always thinking and you're always on your feet and you're always learning, which I also really love about this job and this role as well.

>>Participant 4: It's not just about the clinical work and occupational therapy, but it's also opened, a whole host of doors, in terms of senior leadership roles that, you know, that allows you to work in these organisations.

>>Participant 7: You’re really supported to, to be the best leader you can be there. There’s, there’s training opportunities. there’s amazing mentors there. There's just people around who can really guide you through that process of becoming a leader. So for me it's been a really rewarding experience to become a leader and, and work really closely with my team.

>>Participant 2: Also throughout my career, I had the one-on-one supervision with a team leader, and and now I'm obviously on the other end of that offering that to other staff. How about you?

>>Participant 8: I always look forward to our weekly supervision, so that's part of being a new grad, is you have booked in protected time.

>>Participant 5: It's both formal and informal, isn't it? It's the casual chats around, what would you do in this situation? But it's also the sit down and actually working through some things, which is amazing and so valued.

>>Participant 7: I'm a team leader, I'm an occupational therapist, I still see patients. But I'm also able to go home and leave work behind. And then live that life with the family that, that I really want to do.

>>Participant 9: I've definitely benefited from having flexible options with work. Trying to juggle, you know, progressing your career and still looking after a family. And having opportunities such as working part time, really helps, you know, look after your own well being as well.

>>Participant 4: Actually this afternoon after work I have to go down and train for the World Surf Lifesaving Championships. So, it certainly keeps you busy. And good work life balance.

[Text on screen] Queensland Government

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>>Participant 1: Queensland Health is an organisation that is really looking to provide excellence in all that we do. So be it through advanced roles within the clinical practice areas, opportunities for research and innovation. There's such a driving culture around success and excellence, so people with experience would be attracted to come to Queensland Health to really take some of those opportunities and run with them.

>>Participant 2: Also within this role, it's sort of the intermediary between clinicians and executive. So we get to do a lot of service development opportunities. Um, and we look at different types of service improvements as well, which is really exciting. So taking direct clinician feedback and trying to put that into really meaningful change, not only for our OTs, but improving the outcomes for our consumers as well.

>>Participant 3: The opportunities to really extend myself beyond the clinical realm and into leadership roles has been amazing, and the training provided in that in that area has been really quite amazing.

>>Participant 4: Throughout the year that there's a range of different leadership courses that are offered by the organization. Um, that will really sort of that have assisted me in learning and growing about leadership and management, um, and the skills that are needed within that.

>>Participant 3: The training that they provide, the mentoring support, um, the colleagues that I get to work with and the modeling behavior that I'm able to observe is, is just, is just phenomenal.

As a team leader, I get opportunities to work both clinically and in leadership position, mentoring my colleagues and mentoring the staff who report to me. And I think that combination of clinical work and of leading my team, it's a really good opportunity for me to come to work every day and really feel fulfilled and rewarded.

>>Participant 1: When you're working at Queensland Health, you have access to working in a wide range of interdisciplinary teams, and actually working with your peers in the clinical areas allows you to shine as an OT and also gives the best result for our clients. So, we really do work better as a team and relying on the strengths of your team, both in diversity of clinical area, but just diversity of personalities and ways that you learn really helps teams to thrive and provide good quality care.

>>Participant 4: Within the organization, you never work in isolation. So, um, as a, as a senior leader within, um, the space that I am, I'm not on my own. So I have colleagues in, um, a medical director within the child and youth mental health space, but also the senior executive of the mental health services and the, the um, hospital and health service as well, that are there to draw on and support um, when difficult and tricky decisions need to be made. So you never feel like you're working alone, um, and you never feel like you're sort of isolated, um, in those difficult decisions that need to be made.

>>Participant 2: Coming back because I'd been outside of OT profession and been outside of Queensland Health for a while. Um, it gave me an opportunity to, um, really have a think about where I wanted to work. So I came in as a HP four, um, and then decided that I really wanted to move into leadership. So I took on, like, the professional lead role as a HP five. Um, and now there's opportunities to step up to HP six through Secondments and bits and pieces like that.

>>Participant 1: I think we know. As for occupational therapists, the importance of balance in our lives is so is so significant. So I've been fortunate to have, um, maternity leave and paid parental leave throughout my fifteen years here at Queensland Health. And having that security and stability when you are trying to raise a family has been so important. And then having that space to return to work and have that flexibility where your career can still progress, but you can also have that protected family time, um, is just a very enriching and fulfilling thing to have.

[Text on screen] Delivering for Queensland

Queensland Government

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Video Transcript Occupational therapist Amber

>> Amber: I think for me, the most rewarding part of working as an occupational therapist within Queensland Health is just the impact that we have on other people's lives. So as a clinician, that's really with the patients that we work with on a day to day basis and helping them to achieve their goals, to return to their, their lives and their occupational roles that they were fulfilling before their injury or illness.

And then now as a non-clinical later within Queensland Health. For me, it's the impact that I can see on the teams that I lead and also in developing innovative models of care to really improve the health care that we provide on a day to day basis.

For me, I think some of the greatest opportunities of working for Queensland Health is the diverse areas that you can work within, but geographically, you can work in metropolitan areas or regional and remote areas, and also the different clinical practice domains. So you can work within paediatrics, you can work within adult physical, you can work within mental health and then also different areas geographically and the types of settings. So you can work within the community. You can work within a hospital setting. So there's lots and lots of different opportunities that you can pursue with your career in Queensland Health.

As well as that, I think it's that the fantastic opportunities that are offered as far as the career development and support. So occupational therapists working within Queensland Health have access to lots of different supervision modalities, both your peer supervision groups as well as your supervision with a more experienced clinician or manager. And then also the professional development opportunities that are offered. So within Queensland Health, you have access to both a professional development allowance and a professional development leave time. And there's a myriad of both free and paid professional development opportunities that are offered to you.

And then I think it would come down to as well, things like the graduate pathways. So the fact that as a new graduate, you have access to lots of different rotations, so you can try lots of different clinical areas. As a newly graduated occupation therapist. And then there's also leadership pathways. So if you're interested in pursuing, a leadership career, there's opportunities to get some development in that and go down that career path as well.

As far as research goes, Queensland Health certainly leading the way with lots of leading edge research. And so if that's something that interests you, you can participate in either creating your own new evidence or also in consuming that research through things like journal clubs and other research opportunities.

Clinical education is a really big part of being an occupational therapist in Queensland Health, so a lot of our occupational therapists would begin their journey as undergraduate students on clinical placement within Queensland health facilities and Services. And then once here, a graduated occupational therapists, you'd have the opportunity to supervisors undergraduate occupational therapists.

One of the great opportunities with working for Queensland Health is that there's funding available to support clinical research, so you can be continuing your clinical work whilst also having some funded offline time to pursue some research.

So as far as wellness in Queensland health, there's lots of different opportunities. Things such as the fitness passport where you can access lots of different gyms and fitness facilities, and then there's other wellness programs such as access to psychology services if you need those supports, and lots of other opportunities to get whatever support you may need as an employee within Queensland Health.

There's also lots of opportunities to access flexible working arrangements, so if you need some more flexible hours or shifts, that's something that you can apply for and be supported for within Queensland Health, and also things like paid parental leave, paid spousal leave and other such leave arrangements that are a great opportunities when you work with Queensland Health.

I think for me, at different stages in my career, particularly as a team leader and now as a director, what I've really loved about working as an occupational therapist within Queensland Health has been watching other people's careers develop, and that's something that I really enjoy doing to mentor and support others and help them to achieve their goals, to become the occupational therapist that they'd like to be.