Psychological Professions Week, 16th to 20th November 2020

What a week! Fortunately, every session was recorded and is available for 6 months here. You can also read about some of the highlights here...

Adrian Whittington, PPN SE Chair, Alice Plummer, PPN SE Clinical Programme Manager, Helen Leigh-Phippard, PPN SE Board Member and Expert by Experience consultant delivered the first presentation of Psychological Professions Week: “A Vision of the Psychological Professions”. Alice took us through the national campaign ‘Psychological Professionals into Action’, and how this led to the first ever Vision for the psychological professions. To read more from Alice, click here. To view the infographic of our vision, click here.

Following the unveiling of the Vision, Helen brought us back down from space with “So What? What difference is the vision going to make to those on ground?”. If you want to get a sense of what Helen said, continue reading here.  

On Day Two, three PPN SE Experts by Experience (two current, one former), delivered a presentation on “What people want from the NHS in the next ten years”. As an aspiring psychological professional, I found the talk heartening and inspiring. You can read more from the Experts by Experience here.

The South East Showcase

The South East showcase took place on the afternoon of Day Two of Psychological Professions Week, which featured workshops on ‘Finding a career in the psychological professions’ and ‘Maximising the impact of the psychological professions in physical healthcare’. Both sessions featured guests and colleagues from around the South East, and if you want to watch the recorded sessions, you can do so here.

Finding a Career in the Psychological Professions

Alice Plummer and Helen Leigh-Phippard opened the first session of our showcase with a live demonstration of the Career map for the Psychological Professions, a free online resource which illustrates entry routes and career pathways to joining the workforce. If you want to see the career map, you can find it here. If you would like to be part of the Career map videos, then you can sign up here and find out more below.

Following this, the APP subnetwork Co-chairs, Amy Pound and Rachel Nethercott gave a presentation to provide aspiring psychological professionals information on how to join the workforce, as well as informing delegates upon the benefits of joining their subnetwork. You can hear more from them here. They also invited Brad Powell, PPN SE Senior Assistant Psychologist, to give his three top tips that have been useful in his experience.

If you’re wanting to join the workforce, remember, there is no special formula and everyone takes their own path!

The workshop closed with a panel discussion of professionals representing the six Psychological Professional roles funded (course fees paid, and you receive a salary) by Health Education England, who all provided an inspiring 60 second pitch! The Psychological Wellbeing Practitioner role was pitched by Faye Small from Exeter University, the Children’s Wellbeing Practitioner and Educational Mental Health Practitioner roles by Professor Catherine Gallop, also from Exeter University. Dr Daniel Salter from Canterbury Christ Church University provided the pitch for the Cognitive Behavioural Therapist role, Kate Robertson, Vice Chair of the Association of Child Psychotherapists for the Child and Adolescent Psychotherapist role, and Mary John from Surrey University for the Clinical Psychologist role. Adrian Whittington directed questions from the audience to each of the representatives. 

“We’ve had ballet dancers, train drivers and journalists join our cohort. It’s essential you can illustrate how your experience makes you suitable for clinical training” Mary John

“We are looking for people who have experience with and are comfortable when working will people with mental health conditions. If you’re wanting to become a CBT Therapist, we’d encourage you to seek this experience.” Daniel Salter

Across the professions, we are actively diversifying the programs, to ensure our clinicians are representative of the communities we serve. You can more about our projects here.

Maximising the Impact of the Psychological Professions within Physical Healthcare

 This session was a chance to hear from the author of our recent discussion paper (see here), Dr Clare Daniel, Consultant Clinical Psychologist Consultant Clinical Psychologist and Lead of the Psychology Service in Buckinghamshire Healthcare Trust, and explore the barriers and recommendations to incorporating psychological practice in physical healthcare. There was an interactive slide session with Alice Plummer, Clinical Programme Manager PPN SE, and together with Helen Leigh-Phippard, Expert by Experience Consultant PPN SE an interesting panel discussion unfolded. 

If you’re interested in maximising psychological practice in physical healthcare, or are working in the physical healthcare sector, you’ll want to read our discussion paper and watch the recorded session.

Brad Powell

Senior Assistant Psychologist

PPN South East