Final Reflections on the Stage 2 Training Process

It seems such a long time ago that I began this journey.  It has taken me 6 years and 10 months in total.  I remember after finishing my masters I felt that I had accomplished something, and that I had an experience that, whilst difficult and stressful, had been very rewarding. Finishing my Stage 2 did not feel like that, at least not at first.  I had a sense of relief that the work was finally over: no more practice diaries, no more placements, no more submission or re-submissions.  I just felt plain relieved.  Even when I received my BPS certificate and my HCPC certificate, I felt little joy or elation at my achievement.

Fast forward 6 months and I agree to attend the DFP Conference to accept my certificate in a more formal setting.  My partner and I decided to treat it as a small family holiday with our 6 month old and we drove to the conference.  My supervisor was there to greet me with hugs and congratulations and her old supervisor was also there and did the same.  I lined up with my peers who had also qualified and we sat in the front row of the conference hall waiting to be called on stage to collect our certificates.

As we waited, we whispered to one another our relief and confessed the length of time it had taken to complete, 6 years 10 months for me, some others shorter and some others longer but all of us united in the sense of gladness that it was finally over.  We collected our certificates and smiled for the obligatory group photo and then we all dispersed, back into the crowd and off back to our roles wherever we are, no one so much as looking over their shoulders.  But when I do look back at the event, I remember one thing very clearly. My little boy was the centre of attention and one lady, a senior psychologist, commented that despite the chartership, children are the greatest achievement.  And this really did place everything in perspective.

Before this, all I saw were the times of failure and the re-submissions. I had still held on to the feeling of being under constant stress and strain trying to complete the work and felt resentful of that.  I have since been able to let go of that burden, and that alone is an achievement.  To hear my peers express similar experiences and relief helped me recognise the enormity of the task we set ourselves and we came through it, slowly but surely.  More a case of the tortoise and hare than any prodigal speed to win a race but complete the race we did.  And also, if that lady was right and my little boy is my greatest achievement, then completing that chartership was an achievement along the way and I should acknowledge it as such.

I think what I am reflecting on now is that this was one of the toughest journeys I embarked upon and I know that peers on the BPS route and the doctorate are experiencing the same stresses and strains.  It is natural to feel relieved and want to push away all thought of the emotional challenges and feel bitter, but actually getting through is an achievement and each one of us should feel proud (although you won't see me applying to do any further studying for a while now, if ever!).

And also, this is one achievement, in a whole list of many that we will experience, some of which are not career related.  This profession and training can be all consuming, but it has helped me to remember that it is one part of what defines me and putting my achievements in context and in perspective has helped me take true enjoyment out of what I have done so far.

So to all of you still training, stick with it, you will get there, be brave and work through the failures - we all have had them.

To those of you starting out, don't just think about finishing fast. Think about the training route that will help you qualify, that is cost effective and that fits with the life that you want to live outside of your career. If that means choosing a slower route so that you can afford holidays and to travel and have children, then do just that; the training routes aren't going to disappear if you don't get it finished straight away, and neither is the profession.

And from me, this is my last post here as I move on to the next stage of my life.  Thank you to all those who have read, glanced over or accidentally clicked on the blog.  You have been a source of catharsis for me over these years.

Farewell.

My experience of Core Role 4

Looking back at Core Role 4, I feel this was actually the Core Role that I enjoyed the most.  This was because it took me past my nervousness at public speaking and gave me the confidence to present myself well in all aspects of my life.  It also taught me about my learning style and also my teaching style, which, I have to say, is probably a little informal.

There were aspects of this Core Role that had particular challenges in terms of the assessors.  Sometimes developing a rationale for training can be as problematic as developing a rationale for research.  Although it is understood that as a trainee you need to provide exemplars, there is no room for developing training "for the sake of it".  Assessors will pick up on this and will question whether the training was really needed by your organisation, and this in turn will suggest to them that you might not entirely understand how to identify learning and training needs in the context of working within your organisation.

On the other hand, sometimes you identify a need and there is little appetite for meeting it within the organisation.  I found that exploring literature around change and growth in organisations can help in this situation.  It can help you understand any resistance you meet and can help you develop strategies to get past this.  What you must do is provide evidence for the assessors to prove that you understand how to identify learning and training needs and that you can bring the organisation on board.

Another hurdle that you might need to overcome might be in the case of your organisation directing you to deliver training and the training is mandatory.  In these cases it is harder to demonstrate why you have identified the training needs and how you select appropriate participants for your training.  Instead, you might have to reflect on what you could do under different circumstances or perhaps you could do some additional work to check the need within your population.

With mandatory training it is vital that you consider the motivations to attend and what this might mean for people's willingness to engage and learn. It is important to consider what will affect a person's motivation to learn and how you will account for this and address this in your training.

Finally, a focus for the assessors is how you evaluate training.  They will want to see that you have used literature and research to develop evidence-based methods of determining if people have learnt from your training session.  Usually this is a form of questionnaire but you will have to have clearly demonstrated through your evidence why you have chosen this method and your reflections on your chosen method.  A final part to this will be evaluating your evaluation method through reflection.  Did your evaluation really test what you wanted it to?  What could you have changed?  What would you do next time?  They will also want to see how you have learnt and how you have applied these changes to your next training programme or seminar.

I should note that whilst a reflection on learning styles and how you have catered for them in your training is often wanted by the assessors, there is a huge amount of literature available recently which rejects the theory of learning styles.  You may want include and consider this when you are developing your training.

Money Matters for training success

Sinking money into your training - photo "Pound Sinking in Sea" by Stuart Miles courtesy of www.FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Since starting to blog on my experiences as a Forensic Phsychologist in Training Stage 2, I have had numerous comments and interactions from readers who are either at various stages of the training or are considering embarking on the training, and are concerned about funding.  Of course, how you organise the financing of this professional training is crucial not just to attaining Chartership, but also to avoid an additional stress when in the depths of carrying out the work necessary, arranging supervision and so on.  So I decided to summarise what I had to do to pay for the training.

I have to admit I have not fully kept tabs on all the costs.  Perhaps if I had, the enormity of it would have had me abandon ship.  But, with an eye firmly on the final goal, which I am certain will amply recompense for the work, effort and budgeting of the last few years, I embarked on making sure that I could make ends meet.

Photo by stockimages courtesy of www.FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Firstly there is an annual cost of enrollment of £1500.  This covers all your submissions and any resubmissions of that year and of course, is the first cost you must be sure to be able to meet.  You might want to think about how much time it will take for you to complete the training.  5 - 6 years seems to be a standard sort of time frame for this and worth keeping in mind, because this is not a short term commitment.

Next there is the cost of supervision.  This is typically around £80 per hour for face to face contact and around £40 per hour for non-contact time, such as reading through and assessing your work.  The training requires you to ensure that you demonstrate a minimum of 4 hours per month of supervision spread out between your designated supervisor and your co-ordinating supervisor.  If you are in a position at your work to be able to complete any expemplars, it is possible for your manager in your work place to also be your designated supervisor, and this would certainly reduce the cost.  If you are in a particularly advantageous position, you may find that your work place will also be able to supply you with a co-ordinating supervisor and in this way you will have no supervision costs..  I was fortunate enough to have one out of the two and so my supervision costs were not as great as they might have been.  The costs will vary from month to month - some months you will need more face to face time, some months less, and the same for non-contact time.

Photo by Serge Bertasius courtesy of www.FreeDigitalPhotography.net

So how to meet those costs.  Work is the obvious answer, but not just because it will supply you with a regular income.  Where you work may be crucial to keeping costs down.  Not only could your work place provide you with some if not all supervision opportunnities, but there may be numerous projects or work products that could provide material for exemplars, and your work place may want your developing skills enough to susidise the cost.  Another obvious usefulness of the work place will be whether you are able to work overtime at least on some occasions to add to the income that you can dedicate to meet those costs.

Photo by Serge Bertasius Photography courtesy of www.FreeDigitalPhotos.net

It is possible to borrow money - perhaps through a personal loan, or possibly a professional development loan, both of these from banks and the usual lending institutions.  It may also be possible to obtain funding from bursaries or research or charitable institutions that want to invest in chartering psychologists, although in general I found that these believed that  having reached Masters level, the career had been achieved.

Photo by stockimages courtesy of www.FreeDigitalPhotos.net

One of the ways I found it possible to boost my income enough to meet my commitment to pay for my training was by tutoring students during after work hours.  Having attained masters degree level you can tutor students who are on undergraduate courses.  However, I find that the greatest demand for private tutoring is from A level students - or rather, their parents.  Tutoring is not reliable regular income, and most interest comes in the period January to June (from the time of the mocks to the actual A level!), but it certainly helps tremendously.  This is a tough option, because not only are you working and preparing your submissions, but you are  having to include time for tutoring as well as your own life, relationships, families etc.  This option calls for strong time management and I would strongly recommend builidng in a series of breaks to avoid burn out.

Financing the training is as much of a challenge as meeting the requirements of the course.  It involves reasearch, analysis and good time management skills, not to mention skills of persuasion and the sharpness of wit to spot an opportunity for funding or for saving on costs when it comes your way.  

Photo "Piggy Bank" by suphakit73 courtesy of www.FreeDigitalPhoto.net

Carry on Networking

In my last post, I talked about making the most of networking opportunities, and I've found myself reflecting more on this of late.  If you happen to be working in a field directly associated with forensic psychology in practise, then you will have a plethora of opportunities not just for networking, but through your working practices, opportunities to address most of the competencies required in the BPS Stage 2 Chartership qualification.  That is rarely the case, and most of us have to be pretty imaginative at times to find or create those opportunities.  It is that creative thinking that helps to define us as professional forensic psychologists which keep us pushing the boundaries of this developing field.

Networking is a broad concept so it is best, I find, to think about it in a broad context.  In my place of work, a research institution, while I am well-placed on some of the core competencies (mostly Core Roles 3 and 4 surprisingly), I have had to work hard to set up opportunities to work elsewhere, usually through voluntary work, to meet some of the other requirements.  Your supervisor will have talked you through most of this, but I wanted to share some of what I have learnt with you.  Through membership of the BPS I was able to access many opportunities to attend conferences, seminars and training courses.  There were also others that I was able to access through work, such as workshops on transforming rehabilitation.

Of course, attending courses and seminars is useful purely for the basic reason of increasing skills or knowledge in a particular area of expertise, but it is useful to use those opportunities to meet other professionals, and to introduce yourself, your organisation, your particular field of expertise and to develop those relationships further for example, at one seminar I was paired for a task with a gentleman you manages a charity in prisons. This opened up an opportunity for me to visit his charity in a prison and provided me with the scope to write an article for the Division of Forensic Psychology. 

 Once you've broken the ice and have met a number of people, you will be able to exchange email addresses, find each other on Twitter, Facebook etc. and communicate.  If you work these relationships you may well find that you are asked to give presentations on your field of research.  Or better still, you will start to make connections between different fields and create those opportunities to present your work to others for example, speaking at a seminar on rehabilitating young offenders with drug issues can give you a chance to offer your research or experience in making a presentation to other professionals.

Sometimes, though, it is worth thinking outside the box a little.  Take a situation where you or your organisation is dealing directly with certain clients.  It may be the case that the local social services department calls a case conference.  You will often know about it because even though you may not have been directly invited, your client might have told you.  At this point, it may be worthwhile using your network of local contacts to see if you might be able to obtain an invitation to this.  Or, if it is pertinent, you may be able to write in to the relevant case leader and offer your expertise on the client and on the issues associated.  It is part of your applied work as a psychologist in practise and a further opportunity to develop inter-agency and inter-professional networks.  This links directly to Core Role 1, Competency 1.3 - establishing, developing and maintaining working relationships, as well as to Core Role 3.

So far so good on physical, personal networking, and in my experience, this basic legwork - attending events, talking to people at the coffee breaks, exchanging contact details and quickly making those contacts and following them up - is the best way of networking. But what about social media networking?  Social media is relatively new, and technology has not yet taken the place of gathering together a disparate set of professionals from a rangeof fields in one room.  But it can certainly support your drive to broaden your spectrum of contacts and support the spread of the expertise that you, personally or through your workplace, are developing.  So maybe you will have a Twitter account and follow and tweet with other forensic psychologists, the great thing about Twitter being its global reach.  What are the issues for forensic psychology as a theoretical specialism in Capetown, Ottawa and Canberra, for example?  If you publish articles, you can blog about them and invite your followers to engage in on-line discussion.  You might have a web-site and hold a regular forum for debate for other forensic psychologists.  You can use Facebook to keep in touch with people you meet at conferences, seminars etc.  You can use Google Hangouts to hold discussions on particular areas that you are working on and you know others have an interest.  Again, the beauty of this is that it is international, you set a hangout for a specific time and a specific subject and you invite people to turn up - all in the comfort of your own home.  No displacement, no catching trains on rainy nights, and the exchange of information with professionals can take place.  Like I said earlier, it is all about creative thinking.

Once you have been able to establish links, however tenuous, with local agencies, which can include the local NHS as well as social services, universities and training institutions, charities etc. you have a foot in the door.  You will be able to use those personal links when you meet people you know at various local seminars etc. to be able to promote your work, your knowledge and expand on what you know.  Successful networking leads to more than just meeting of the standards you need to achieve in the Stage 2 training.  It leads to a personal and professional enrichment, especially when you get to the stage where you are sought after to deliver in-house training, or write a contribution for a specialist journal, or when you are called upon to contribute to a  think tank in the redesign of a service that will directly benefit clients and society as a whole and drive forward the quest for knowledge and the dissemination of knowledge in our field.

So, if you're not totally sold on networking yet, and need more ideas, comment on this article, leave contact details, and I'll be right back in touch: networking is a two-way dialogue all the time!