To specialise or generalise: why not do both?

Many entering the allied health field might not realise how beneficial it can be to widen their job search to more niche health issues. The right workplace won’t pigeonhole you.?

Jemma Stubbs admits she was worried taking up a job in a niche area of speech pathology might pigeonhole her career.?

Would she be as hirable as her peers? Would they see her specialisation as a benefit or more work to train???

She says her gamble paid off.??

While Vision Australia deals with people with vision loss, Jemma found her clientele was incredibly diverse which allowed her to test her skills.?

“I still see children with comorbidities and various conditions outside of vision loss, so I’m not missing exposure and learning about those as well.”?

Many entering the allied health field might not realise how beneficial it can be to widen their search to smaller niche areas.?

Vision Australia, for instance, also offers a transdisciplinary approach to its service provision.?

Transdisciplinary approach to client wellbeing?

Jemma is part of a national clinical team that includes occupational therapists, orientation and mobility experts, paediatric therapists, physios, psychologists and orthoptists.??

Because Vision Australia has a holistic approach to client wellbeing, it means staff are able to work alongside a whole range of allied health professionals.?

They aren’t just there to bounce ideas, they are actively involved in the client’s caseload, so you are learning from many disciplines.??

Occupational therapist Bish Elyas says a major part in creating that collaborative approach is also down to the onboarding process.??

From the get-go, allied health professionals are part of a company wide induction, which includes learning to guide people with vision loss, and speaking to all departments and those with lived experience.??

With 15 per cent of employees at Vision Australia having a disability or lived experience with vision loss, it’s easy to test or ask for feedback on suggested activities.??

“Vision Australia didn’t make me jump into the deep end, the more that I worked with people with low vision and blindness the more I understood and then it just flowed naturally,” Bish said.??

As the leading national supplier of blindness and low vision services there are many reasons for an allied health professional like yourself to consider a career at Vision Australia. Visit our career page to find out more https://www.visionaustralia.org/about-us/careers/allied-health-professionals