Show Notes for The Aspiring Psychologist Podcast Episode 158: What is a Psychological Wellbeing Practitioner Insights from a Qualified PWP

Episode Description:

In this episode of the Aspiring Psychologist Podcast, Dr. Marianne Trent sits down with Ben Olofson, a qualified Psychological Wellbeing Practitioner (PWP), to explore the PWP role, training, and career opportunities. They discuss the journey to becoming a PWP, the challenges and rewards of the profession, and how it fits into the broader landscape of mental health careers. Whether you're considering the PWP pathway or are just curious about this impactful role, this episode is packed with valuable information and inspiration.

Guest:

Ben Olofson – Qualified Psychological Wellbeing Practitioner, sharing his experiences, training journey, and insights into the PWP profession.

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Key Takeaways:

• PWP Overview: Psychological Wellbeing Practitioners primarily work with low mood, anxiety, and other mental health challenges using low-intensity CBT approaches. They offer both individual and group interventions.

• Training Pathway: PWPs undergo a year of training, blending academic study with supervised practice, and are supported by supervisors and tutors throughout.

• Role Benefits: Offers a structured pathway into mental health work with opportunities for progression to senior roles or alternative careers in psychology.

• Caseload Realities: The role involves managing a high volume of clients with robust support systems, including supervision, to prevent burnout.

• Career Advice: Reflect on transferable skills, focus on client engagement, and prepare for a varied and rewarding role in mental health.

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Highlights:

• (00:00) – Episode introduction: Exploring the role of a Psychological Wellbeing Practitioner.
• (02:08) – Welcome to guest Ben Olofson, a qualified PWP.
• (03:35) – What drew Ben to the PWP role and its unique training structure.
• (05:28) – The balance of academic work and clinical practice in training.
• (06:34) – Addressing imposter syndrome and the support available for trainees.
• (08:56) – Practical considerations when applying for PWP roles.
• (11:04) – Transitioning from training to qualified work and the variety of clinical presentations handled by PWPs.
• (17:28) – The importance of supervision and personal well-being in the role.
• (20:54) – Managing high caseloads and the significance of job planning.
• (23:37) – Long-term career progression within the PWP profession.
• (25:21) – Pay bands for trainees, qualified, and senior PWPs.
• (28:48) – Entry requirements and advice for aspiring PWPs.
• (31:51) – Reflecting on transferable skills and personal experiences for mental health roles.
• (32:46) – Final thoughts from Ben on the rewards and challenges of being a PWP.

Links:

📲 Connect with Ben here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benolofson/

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📚 To check out The Clinical Psychologist Collective Book: https://amzn.to/3jOplx0

📖 To check out The Aspiring Psychologist Collective Book: https://amzn.to/3CP2N97

💡 To check out or join the aspiring psychologist membership for just £30 per month head to: https://www.goodthinkingpsychology.co.uk/membership-interested

🖥️ Check out my brand new short courses for aspiring psychologists and mental health professionals here: https://www.goodthinkingpsychology.co.uk/short-courses

✍️ Get your Supervision Shaping Tool now: https://www.goodthinkingpsychology.co.uk/supervision

📱Connect socially with Marianne and check out ways to work with her, including the Aspiring Psychologist Book, Clinical Psychologist book and The Aspiring Psychologist Membership on her Link tree: https://linktr.ee/drmariannetrent

💬 To join my free Facebook group and discuss your thoughts on this episode and more: https://www.facebook.com/groups/aspiringpsychologistcommunity

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Have you ever wondered what a psychological wellbeing practitioner actually does? Perhaps you're curious about how to train as one and whether it's a paid role. Perhaps you're wondering about the career progression for PWPs. Well, today I'm sitting down with Ben, a qualified PWP as we discuss the ins and outs of this really important mental health profession. From training paths to daily responsibilities, we are breaking down everything you need to know about becoming a PWP. Hi, welcome along to the Aspiring Psychologist podcast, which is now an award winning podcast. We won the best science and technology category at the Independent Podcast Awards 2024. It means a great deal to me, and thank you so much to you, my listeners and my watchers because this, I adore this podcast and knowing that you guys love it too and that you find it to be a really helpful support in your career or in learning about mental health, it means a great deal.

So that's going to live on the desk behind me when I'm recording podcast episode. So there will be two ways of telling the age of this podcast. One, whether or not I have my mole, what stages of mole removal I'm at, and whether I've got my award-winning trophy in the background. Anyway, today's episode, as we said in the hook, is all about the very important role of psychological wellbeing practitioner. If you find it helpful, please do like, share, comment, subscribe, tell your friends about it. If you're listening on Spotify, please do rate. If you're a listener on Apple Podcast, please do rate and review and please, wherever you are listening or watching, please subscribe or follow the show. It really is the kindest thing you can do for any podcast that you like. Let's dive in and chat with Ben and I will be along on the other side of this podcast and I hope you find it really useful. Hi, just want to welcome along our guest today, Ben Oliver. Hi, Ben. Welcome along to the podcast.

Hi, Marianne. Thank you. Thanks for having me. Pleasure to be here.

Oh, thanks for reaching out. I think you originally reached out to praise my work, which always goes down well, and we got chatting and we realised that it had been my intention to cover what A PWP is, but I've never actually never actually done it. So I'm delighted that we met at the time that we did, and hopefully we can help our audience to be illuminated on what A PWP is and whether they would want to be one.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I think there's a lot of talk about other roles. A lot of what I've come across has been about assistant psychologists, which obviously is a fantastic role and a very common route into psychology training. But yeah, I don't think a lot has been said or as much has been said about the P two BP route. So yeah, happy to have that conversation and share that my experiences today.

Perfect. So rightly said, there's no right or wrong way to become a qualified HCPC psychologist, but a common way is to think about doing an assistant psychologist route or maybe even to work in education. But obviously over the more recent time period, other routes have become available, which do actually involve professional qualifications. Can you tell us what drew you to the PWP roles?

Yeah, absolutely. So I think what drew me is the fact that you start with the training gear where you complete a university qualification with a lot of support, guidance, use that training gear to really develop those key therapeutic skills that are so, so important for our clinical practise with a lot of assistant psychologists. So I was looking at, I applied for a couple, fortunately didn't get onto those, but then I looked into other routes and some of across the PDP routes and yeah, I was really attracted to that training experience that you get. And then, yeah, after that, once you complete that, a qualified role and yeah, I'll see the training in low intensity, cognitive, be therapy, CBT. So yeah, that was really what drew me to that.

Perfect. So it's a year of training and in that year you seeing clients as well, you're learning on the job.

So there is a little bit of learning on the job. So in terms of how it's structured, so you start with a few months of university training where you're not seeing any clients. So that first period, this three month period is you do a university module in assessments and engagements. So looking at how you do an assessment. So you might be doing a lot of shadowing of qualified PVPs or whether that's other professions in the therapy service. So yeah, so you are working toward your assignments. Okay. So the OSCE (An Objective Structured Clinical Examination) is a big thing at the beginning of the training. So that's where you are being observed to see whether you are okay to being given the green light to do assessments in the real world with real clients. Yeah. So yeah, there's a lot of learning on the job. And then the next module is all about interventions.

So learning low intensity CBT interventions like behavioural activation, cognitive restructuring, these sorts of things. And yeah, that's a little bit less practise you get for that. So you might do a week or so of teaching, and then you are more less thrown straight into the deep end, so to speak. So yeah, there is a lot of learning on the job, but I think that's quite exciting and it's nothing to be scared of really having gone through it because all of the clients you'd be working with have been very carefully screened and deemed suitable for a trainee PWP to be working with. So yeah, I think it's a really, really good experience

That's so reassuring. And I think when we're a trainee in anything, there's that kind of imposter syndrome thinking, oh, I'm going to make this client worse. Someone else would be way better to see them than me. But it's actually trying to hold on to that, which is a really important point that they've been deemed as being appropriate to be seen by somebody at your level of training, and I think that's really important.

Yeah, absolutely. I think imposter syndrome is something I've learned even being a qualified PDP and potentially looking to explore a clinical psychology training at some point in the future. And speaking of lots of other people who are current trainees in clinical psychology, that may never leave you unfortunately, that imposter syndrome. But yeah, no, you're right. You get lots of support through the training period. Certainly my experience is fantastic from the service, you've got your one-to-one supervisor, you've got in-service buddies, they set you up with, you've got your academic tutor. There's lots and lots of supports any time if you're going through personal difficulties perhaps, or just struggling with the nature of the course. Because to be fair, it is really, really rewarding and I think overall positive experience, but there are periods where it can be challenging quite. It's a balance that academic, there's academic roles doing assignments, preparing for exams, OSCEs, whatnot, and alongside clinical work, it can be demanding. So it's important to reach out, recognise if you are experiencing any sort of signs of burnout or just generally struggling to reach out for that support.

Absolutely. And we might just think, oh, it's only a year of my life. I can get that done, but it is a calendar year and you do matter. And sometimes there can be a tendency to think, oh, I can commute for two and a half hours a day for a year, that's fine, but actually that's not practical in the grand scheme of things, and you've got to fit your own life around it. So yeah, I think being considerate about where you apply and where you're going to work and how well that's going to fit in your life and whether you might be really lonely as well if you do up sticks and move. So you've almost got to come up with a plan to help yourself to thrive rather than just thinking. So even when I started my doctorate in clinical psychology, I was lucky that I did make friends, but I'd imagined I would be coming along and it would be a bit like undergrad that we all started with 15 of us in those days, we all started, we'd all be single, we'd all be exact same stage of life, we'd be the best of buddies and we'll be out to go out at weekends and in the evenings and help me to settle this local area.

But actually people were spread across a patch, probably an hour's drive from the university. Some of them were married, some of them were in long-term relationships only. I think two of us were single when we first joined the course and different age spreads as well. And so you can't always rely upon your cohort being the ones who are going to become your friends and support systems. I think we do need to go into this with thinking what's going to best set me up to thrive.

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you highlight a really good point there that wherever you go, you just don't know who you're going to be training with. But I think at the same time that diversity of experiences, people coming from different backgrounds, different ages, I think it's a really nice thing. For example, me, I was the only male out of seven of us I think in our service when we trained, and a lot of people were slightly older, but that's quite nice. I think about the trainee PWP position and the ones qualified as well. You get a lot of mixture of people with different backgrounds, different work experiences, so you can learn a lot from different people. Just pick little bits up, especially if you're working in an office environment, you can just pick little bits up and it can be really helpful to help you to improve your own practise really. So yeah, I think it's really nice. There's lots of things to consider, but I think that is a nice aspect of at least my experience of the course.

Absolutely. There is so much to draw upon from your cohort that some people might have had experience in one client area and you can look to them as the expert and others you might feel like, I've never worked with this particular clinical presentation or population before, and you can come together and support one another. So is it like the CAP roles where individual trusts are recognising they would like to have this many qualified, so they kind of almost fund a set amount of training roles to then work in a particular service?

Yeah, I believe so. I think it is similar to that role as much as I'm aware of. So yeah, these courses are NHS funded and in most cases, I mean I can only speak on my experience, but that seven of us were there and I think everyone who trained and wished to stay on and a substantive role qualified POP, there was an interview process still, which was, but yeah, no, that was fine. I got through that and ended up with the qualified position in the same trust, different service though. So I started working just what you call in the core service, but then since qualified moved into the long-term conditions service, so working more with psychology if you like, working with people with diabetes or IBS or chronic pain or fatigue conditions, et cetera. So that's been a really interesting transition and a really new and exciting challenge to develop different skills once qualified. So yeah,

Absolutely. So I think I'm right in saying that actually CAP roles you train and then work as a qualified worker in the same service. It's almost a little bit like a preceptorship role. But yeah, if someone's listened to that episode more recently than I've done it, please do correct me if I'm wrong, but this actually is just we are going to train this many and we hope there'll be a job for a qualified PWP once you're qualify, but it's not a guarantee.

Yeah, not necessarily. But yeah, in my experience, it was still the same. So it was just the different departments for the long-term conditions department. But yes, you are right. Yeah.

Okay. And I think I'm right in saying that if you are doing your PWP route in England, that you attract what's called health education England funding, HEE, which then means that for a fixed period of time after you graduate I think it is, or after you qualify, you then can't apply for any additional HEE funding, which would mean that you have to plan this into your career route. If you are wanting to then go on to the doctorate in clinical psychology, for example, could you tell us a little bit more about that then?

Yeah, absolutely. So that is something certainly to consider if you wish to, especially a thing if you are wanting to think about the doctors of clinical psychology and clinical psychology training. Yes, you have to. So it's once you qualify it's date in which the exam boards have, you've received that qualification from those exam examples, that's all been okayed. And then it's a two year period until then, you are able to start and receive embark on any future funded training. So for me, yeah, this 2023, which I qualified, and so yeah, until 2025, I can't do any further training.

Perfect. Thank you. And I think, again, I'm right in saying that you could apply for it, but you couldn't start and receive and start that training until those two years had passed. So because the application process is quite long, for example, for insight, the deadlines are in November, but it doesn't start until the following September. So if you knew that your two years was going to tick over before the courses start in September, then you should be fine for that.

Yeah, I think there's a bit of confusion online, a bit of confusion, but yeah, that I did look into it and yeah, that is definitely right. So people may have thought it's when you can apply for it, but it's not, you can apply and then it's when you start the next training.

Great, thank you. So what sort of clinical presentations might a trainee and or qualified PWP be working with?

Yeah, predominantly it's low mood, depression and anxiety or generalised anxiety. There's the main mental health presentations that you'd be working with. Could also be people with panic disorder, could be people with difficulties with sleep. I know not in my service that I work for, but in some services, maybe at step two they as A PWP, they may work with people with OCD, but I don't know. That's not every service. It differs from service to service. But yeah, it's predominantly low mood and anxiety. But for me, working in a long-term conditions service now, a lot of what we do is about acceptance work or adjustment adjusting to living with a long-term condition. So you may do one-to-one work in the form of guide self-help, which is typically around about six or so sessions, varies in maybe 30 minutes to 45 minutes perhaps where you're working through supporting people with low mood and generalised anxiety, or you may be doing group work as well.

So for me, in my service, we run a workshop called Building Emotional Resilience, living with a long-term condition, and that can be really lovely. People can connect and share their thoughts and work together almost and learn from each other as service users to support each other with living with long-term conditions. Obviously compose its own challenges. And also he may also do online work as well, so see CBT computerised or low intensity CBT, which, yeah, so doing the same sort of things you'd be doing with guided self-help maybe over the phone or face-to-face, but just sit that online. So guiding clients through online computer modules to support them managing low mood and anxiety, maybe sleep difficulties as well. So yeah, it's quite a varied mixture of things, which I really like that variety of one-to-one work, working in groups, working different methods of delivery as well. So there's a lot of telephone work that you can do video. So yeah, that's really nice. It's quite a varied role, I think, which is really good to develop a lot of those therapeutic skills.

Yeah, absolutely. Am I right in thinking you're supervised by a qualified senior PWP, or might you be supervised by a clin psych or another HCP psychologist? Talk to us about the supervision then.

Yeah, I think most people, at least in my experience with supervised by a qualified senior PWP, who has undergone specific supervision training are approved supervision training. Maybe there are some people out there in services where they're supervised by other practitioners, maybe CBT therapist perhaps, but no, for me it always been a senior PWP supervises me, so yeah, supervision. So yeah, you'll have at least, so minimum of one hour per week of case management caseload supervision, where you'll be going through reviewing the patients you're working with, any questions is quite, it can be reflective space as well where you can reflect on what's working well and maybe what some challenges you might be experiencing with maybe personal challenges or challenges with patients who might working with. And then there's also, I believe it's a minimum of one hour per fortnight of clinical skills supervision where this is more in a group setting.

So you'd be talking with your team, your fellow PWPs, senior PWPs as well. Maybe it's again, a reflective space where you can reflect on particular cases and work as a group to help you all to develop your practise and your skills. So yeah, that's in the training year. I believe there was more of that clinical skills or was on a different sort of schedule just because it's nicer to when you're training, to have that more time to develop those skills, but you still get a lot of that once qualified as well. So yeah, supervision, I think it's really been massively important to me, I think important to all of us regardless of maybe of what stage we're at in our journey, what role. Yeah, I just think having that safe space to share and your experiences in this job, in this profession, working in mental health, it can be difficult if you had lived experiences yourself or something a patient might have said has stayed with you and has been difficult.

It's really important to have a good relationship with your supervisor, have that safe space to share how you are doing. We don't want, we need to look after ourselves. And that's why I'm so lucky because every supervisor I've ever had as we've always had a 10 minute slot or so, just to reflect on my own personal wellbeing and self-care to, I guess really reduce or prevent burnouts really, because it's like that oxygen mask analogy. We got to look after ourselves before we're able to really, truly look after other people. So yeah, I think supervision is really important in the training year. And also once qualified,

Absolutely. Supervision rocks, doesn't it? And it's not something to be scared about. I know when I first having a supervisory relationship with, when I was an aspiring psychologist, it felt almost like I was being grilled and told off, but that's really not, that's what it's supposed to feel like or what it's supposed to be like, but we have to allow ourselves to grow into that. Now I know from my experiences of working alongside PWPs and senior PWPs, you guys work really hard. You have high caseloads and a lot of face-to-face sessions per day. Could you kind of give us, obviously not talking about clients specifically, but how many you hold in your caseload and how many face-to-face hours or sessions you're doing across a day, Ben,

Of course. Yeah, it is definitely a lot. You do work with a high caseload, so they say low intensity, high volume, I believe. Yeah, so I think for me, I have around about five to six assessments, which is normally done over the phone. So they're hour long assessments. And then I think I'll have around about 14 one-to-one clients. And each of those sessions for me in my service, again, I work in long-term conditions. It's slightly longer. It's 45 minutes sessions. So yeah, it's quite a lot. And some of those will be made up of people you are delivering guided self-help. Some will be online low intensity, CBT, so through something called Silver Cloud. Yeah, if you are working with group, maybe that would be slightly less. But yeah, it can be quite a lot. So I think for most PTPs, it's around about 20 or so hours of clinical contact or just a little bit more than that may be.

But yeah, it doesn't leave a lot of wiggle room for other meetings and maybe other training or CPD admin as well because obviously you've got to write up clinical notes and letters and referrals, et cetera. See, it can feel quite a lot at times. So I think that's why it's really important, at least for me to block out those times, putting in my diary times for breaks, times for admin times to take a break from the screen and put things down. So yeah, it is quite a high caseload, but don't want to put that to put people off. It can be done just with the right support and being kind to yourself as well. Of course.

Yeah, absolutely. Job planning is so important. I would not survive even in qualified practise without a job plan. Really important. And I too stop for lunch just on socials yesterday, I'd put that I, no matter how busy I get, I'm always stopping for lunch and I've got my eye on the clock now I've got a 1:00 PM meeting and it's currently 1158. So we need to make sure that we both got time for our lunch. Actually, it really matters. And doing something that is non-work related, I find really, really helps me to decompress and helps me bring my best to the afternoon. And then beyond it my life when I have to parent and do everything I've got to do, Fridays an awful day, Fridays swimming day, this is the worst day of the week. We've got to make sure that we are resourced and that we are putting good stuff in rather than just expecting ourselves to run on empty all the time. Because like you said, it's a year to train, but then you've got to really want to be a qualified PWP. And some people don't think about this as a springboard to another profession. Some people will do this until the retirement, they will be a qualified PWP, so you've got to be able to make this work.

Yeah, absolutely. It's important, like you said, to have things outside of your working hours that you look forward to and have that to, as you say, decompress, that's taking your children to swimming classes or not. I dunno. But for me, maybe not having my dog is a big part of my life, so doing things with him, spend time with family, friends, sports, being physically active as much as I can be at certain important. Also another point you raised, some people will stay in this sort of profession and there's lots of potential for progression within the PP world as well. So you can be a senior PDP, as we said, you can go into more leadership roles as well as a lead of the PDP in the service. So yeah, some people may stay in this and that's okay. Everyone's different on there. They've all got their different aspirations, don't they? But yeah, it's important I think to have that time outside of work as well and not just make your whole life about psychology and mental health.

It really is. And even this evening after swimming, and it's not as me, it's tomorrow, tomorrow going to a sausage cider evening at one of my family members' house. I don't tend to drink at the moment, so I'm going to take some posh apple juice, but it's just about trying to plan bits into your week that help the Groundhog Day to feel a bit less Groundhog Day, I think. Absolutely important. Your dog sounds like a great source of support as well, non-judgmental, always having to do. Can I ask you a little bit about the pay scales? So when you're training, what band are you, when you're qualified, what band are you, do you go up when you are a senior? Do you go up if you do any teaching on any courses? Talk to us a bit about money, Ben.

Of course. So as a trainee, PDP, you'll be paid a band for NHS salary and then once you're qualified and move up to Band five and a senior PDP will be a band six. And then I think if you're lead PDP, I believe Band seven. So yeah, you give up the bands as you progress.

Amazing. What a brilliant answer as well. So you basically got a span from Band four to Band seven, which is really similar really to assistant psychologist or often Band four. I never made it to a band five, I dunno. They do exist. I think it's very service dependent, whether you can get a Band five one, but then I went on to training at Band six. Then when you qualify, you become Band seven, so you might struggle to get to eight A unless you went into kind service stuff or higher up in your trusts. But there's very, if you wanted to just stay in the PWP arena, there is scope for progression, which sounds really promising.

Yeah, absolutely.

Just before we finish, Ben, was there anything that felt surprising about your training or working as a PWP?

Yeah, so what was surprising to me was the incredible amount of support that you do get through the training gear, and also once, I don't think I'd ever worked in so supportive and mindful of your own mental health and personal needs as a practitioner really. So yeah, that was definitely one thing was that support and meeting other people from all different backgrounds with their own personal experiences. As we said earlier, bringing different skills, different experiences to the table and drawing from each others was really, really nice. And just, yeah, it's so easy. At least in my experience, I was lucky that it's so easy to just get along with everybody and have that support and that there's a lot within the PDP role, there's a lot of skills that you develop and if you are interested in progressing further, I think it is definitely a good choice.

I know obviously as we said about the health Education England funding and the now new two year rule, and that may put people off, but I do think it's a fantastic experience for future training. So that was definitely something as well. And yes, the variety you get as well is really, that's what appealed to me, working with different client groups, different ages, different backgrounds, different experiences, different presentations. So yeah, I would really recommend it for any aspiring psychologist out there, maybe if they're graduating in a university or thinking about what to do. Yeah, I definitely think it's a good alternative if you are interested to assistant psychologist route. So yeah,

Absolutely. I think I would've found this really an interesting route if I hadn't hadn't done the assistant route and it had been available when it was my turn. One question I realise I haven't asked you is the prerequisites who can apply. So I'm guessing you need to have done an undergrad psychology degree probably that confers you the GBC with BPS. Is there anything else? Do you need clinical experience? Could you go straight from graduating? Do you need to have known anything about CBT? Do you need to have clinically relevant experience? Could you talk a little bit to that?

Yeah, good question. So I believe actually you don't necessarily need the psychology degree. You may just need a degree, and there are different routes. In my training, there's the sort of postgraduates route and there's also the undergraduate route. So perhaps some people bits older, maybe as a lot of time out of education, so maybe they prefer to do the undergraduate routes. But in terms of prerequisites, I think just having those common factor skills, interpersonal skills are really, really important. They do. I think I was looking the other day, my personal spec, job description for my training role, and it said that, yeah, essential criteria was some experience working with supporting people maybe with mental health difficulties, whether it's learning disabilities. So for me, I started after universities, I did my master's, and then I worked as a support worker for a year with older adults with learning disabilities and autism.

So that's what I reflected on my experiences. Also did some volunteering with mind as well. And so yeah, I used that in the interview to reflect on and demonstrate that I have had that type of experience before going onto the trainee PDP role. So I do think that's important. So maybe people, if they are fresh out of university looking things, some people may, if they're lucky, get onto a trainee PDP position, but maybe they would like to do some support working experience or maybe as healthcare assistant or some other similar roles where they are supporting other people with mental health, maybe physical needs as well. Yeah,

Yeah. So important, isn't it, the engagement and the soft skills that you mentioned. One of my favourite jobs that I've ever done was a home carer, and I learned so much about dignity and respect and coronation streets from doing that because it's not just about the practical elements, it's about honouring that relationship. Whatever your role is in care or mental health is knowing that you can't just be expected to be accepted because you've got the badge or the name, the job title. You've kind of got to earn that therapeutic relationship, that working relationship with your client. And I think for me, certainly my advancing age has helped with that as well and my life experiences, even having travelled independently around the world and now being a mother and having a husband and an extended family, and having worked in non-relevant roles. I worked in Argos head office for a while working on the wedding lifts gift department and working in store support and doing temping roles in organisations across Milton Keynes. I learned so much that is useful to my roles now from just my life really. So I think that's a really good point.

Yeah, absolutely. I think it's not necessarily, and this is what I've learned looking into applying for the Declan, is it's not necessarily what you've done is of course how you reflect on that and what you've learned from that. And yeah, doing whatever role, even if it's not necessarily psychology, mental health related, those really important transferable skills like you mentioned, yeah, really can help inform your practise as A-P-D-P-A psychologist or whatever. So yeah, that's really important too.

It really is. Thank you so much for your time, and so thanks so much for kind of pitching this episode to me as well because it is so important and we want people to be well informed about what this involves. We want people to thrive in the roles that they're doing, that they can help others to thrive by doing their work. So thank you so much for your time then.

Thank you for having me, Marianne. It's been a pleasure.

You and I are going to get together again at some point to talk about the fact that you've got diabetes type one diagnosis and to think about that and striving for a career in mental health whilst managing those kind of physical health complexities. So if people have enjoyed our chat and would like some more of Ben, then do look out for that in the future as well too.

Thank you so much. Thank you.

What a wonderful chat with Ben. That was. I feel like I've learned loads about the PWP role and the training and the career prospects too. How about you? Has this done what you needed it to do? Has it done everything that was advertised on the tin? Please do let me know. Please do drop me a comment. Please do like, please do, share, subscribe, do all those brilliant things. You can also come along and discuss this episode with me on my socials where I'm Dr. Marianne Trent everywhere, and please do come and join the Aspiring Psychologist Community Group too. In this episode, Ben and I discussed imposter syndrome, and you might well find it helpful to have a listen to episode 1 55, which you can grab wherever you listen to your podcast or on YouTube where I'm taking a deep dive, a solo deep dive this time into imposter syndrome.

You may also find it helpful to listen or watch the episodes on clinical associate psychologists. They are episodes 39 and episodes 1, 2 4. You may also find episode 1 1 5. What is a mental health and wellbeing practitioner helpful if you are trying to work out what your options are for your career? Of course, there's a very special four part series looking at assistant psychologists, which spans episode 1 4 8 2 1 5 1. On YouTube. There is a specialist playlist for assistant psychologist episodes two where you can catch them all. Thank you so much for being part of my world. If you enjoy being here and you are grateful, please do consider grabbing me a cup of herbal tea to say thank you. The costs to run this podcast are all met by me and I don't have any advertising or funding available. Please do check out the Aspiring Psychologist Collective book and the Clinical Psychologist Collective book and the brand new book, the Autistic Anthology, which is all about real life mental health professionals with autism diagnoses and their experiences of getting diagnosed and providing a service to people in mental health. If it's your time and you're ready for the next step, please do check out the Aspiring Psychologist membership, which you can join from just 30 pounds a month. We cover CBT. We cover research skills, we cover reflection. We cover personal growth and development, and most importantly, we cover believing in yourself and getting you the dream jobs in psychology that you strive for. If you a psychologist,

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