My Career: ‘If I won the Lotto, I don’t know if I’d give up work’

Name: Eileen O’Shea

Age: 47

Lives: In Cork

Job title: Occupational Therapy Manager with Horizons (formerly Cope Foundation)

Salary bracket: €50,000+

Education background: A well travelled education…Primary school in Dublin, Secondary School in Tipperary, two years in Carlow IT, and four years in Jordanstown in Belfast.

Hobbies: GAA, running, walking the dog, hiking, reading, gigs; a good Netflix series.

Describe your job in five words: Motivating, teamwork, dynamic, problem-solving, rewarding.

Describe yourself in five words: Eager, outgoing, problem-solver, supportive, straight-talking.

Personality needed for this kind of work?

Definitely need to be a people person as you work with a wide range of personalities. Good listening and communication skills. Empathy and compassion are important so you can support the people supported by Horizons. Good observational and decision-making skills. A good problem- solver, solution-focused, and at times be able to think on your feet.

How long are you doing this job?

I have been the Occupational Therapy Manager in Horizons for the last three years.

How did you get this job?

When I was in secondary school I knew I wanted to go into healthcare. I was originally looking at nursing and a career guidance teacher suggested physiotherapy. I studied Applied Physiology and Health Science in Carlow IT as it was also a back door into health care courses in the UK.

I was advised by one of my lecturers to look into Occupational Therapy as a further qualification when I completed my diploma. So I applied for and was successful in securing a place in Belfast for OT.

I completed a four-year honours degree in Belfast and qualified in 2002. During that time, I completed two placements in Cork from college, one in St Finbarr’s/CUH and one in Horizons, formerly Cope Foundation. Before I qualified from Belfast, a staff grade job came up in Horizons and I applied for the job and secured the same.

I moved from being a staff grade to a senior within four years, as a senior role came up, and now here I am as the manager. I have been with Horizons for 24 years and I am still learning new things every day. It is that variety throughout my career that has kept the job enjoyable for me. The manager’s job came at the right time, personally, as I was beginning to feel that I needed more challenges and that I wanted to push myself out of my comfort zone.

I had toyed on and off with working in a manager capacity but had at times not felt ready or confident in taking the leap. My manager here at the time encouraged me to keep considering it and helped me develop some of those competencies that I would need.

Some people may say it is not good to stay in one place for as long as I have, but I felt strongly about it being an area that I enjoyed working in, from both the perspective of working with those who attended Horizons and their natural supports, but also with a wide range of supportive colleagues and plenty of opportunities in the future for developing Occupational Therapy in intellectual disabilities.

Do you need particular qualifications or experience?

Qualifications is a Degree in Occupational Therapy. Experience-wise, I would say, if it is an area you are thinking of working in, try to shadow an OT at some point if you can.

Occupational Therapy works across a wide range of services, e.g. hospitals (acute, geriatric, palliative, mental health), children’s teams, community services, special schools, voluntary providers such as Horizons, city and county councils, to name a few, and in many different areas such as seating, AT, plastics, rehab, hand specialists, pediatrics (0-18), adult intellectual disability, sensory processing, mental health, and community supported living, to name but a few.

Describe a day at work:

Occupation refers to everyday things that we do that make our day meaningful, e.g. for children, play is an occupation for them, for adults it is not only the activities we take part in such as our hobbies but also our ability to cook for ourselves, organise ourselves in the morning to be able to get washed, dressed and get into work, college or get out for a walk.

It’s about all the things (occupations) we do throughout the day that make it meaningful to us. And as Occupational Therapists we look at helping a person achieve that to the best of their abilities.

In Horizons, we work supporting people with their seating and positioning from a wheelchair so you can get out into the community to comfort seating and higher level molded seating; assessing daily living skills to see what supports you may require to live in the community; looking at accessibility of properties; equipment to assist with maintaining your independence in the bathroom and bedroom; assessing people for their sensory preferences; assisting people in learning skills such as cooking, washing, etc, exploring meaningful activities, etc.

My role now as a manager is in offering support and clinical supervision to Occupational Therapists working in both our children’s and adults’ teams; developing the Occupational Therapy adult department so we align our work with the needs of the people we support in keeping with policies and legislation and the values of Horizons; attending meetings and working groups with regard to wider organisational issues in order to provide a clinical view point; being part of a national group of OTs who work in ID looking at improving service delivery; looking at caseloads and waitlists; responding to referrals and many other jobs.

How many hours do you work a week? Monday to Friday from 8.30am to 4.30pm.

Is your industry male or female dominated? We are mostly female-dominated.

Does this affect you in any particular way? I wouldn’t say it affects me but I definitely think both sexes have their strengths and weaknesses and I think ideally meetings where there is a mixture of male and female have better outcomes and are often more balanced.

Is your job stressful? How? Rate it on a scale of 1-10: In the first six months of the manager post I would have said an 8, but that is because it was so different and I had so much to learn. There are days it feels like a 7 - 8 but generally I would say around a 4 or 5 - enough to keep you on your toes but not enough to burn you out.

Do you work with others or on your own? I have an office on my own but I would say 40% of my time is in my office doing my own bits and pieces and the other 60% is linking in with others through different meetings and group work.

When do you plan to retire or give up working? If I won the lotto I don’t know if I would give up work completely. I would have to keep my toe in the door in some shape or form! Otherwise I am not going anywhere until retirement comes knocking at the door.

Best bits: The people we support, the colleagues I work with, and the fact that no day is the same.

Worst bits: Learning new things especially new fancy technology or ways to do things on the laptop, and feeling like you could do more as a service but funding is a blockade.

Advice to those who want your job? I think for those who want to go into a manager’s role, complete some type of training outside of your clinical work on managing people, managing conflict, and how to develop your team. Communication and flexibility is important. And try to make time to attend those tea breaks as informal socialising is just as important.

Any other comments?

If you had asked me six years ago if I could ever see myself as a manager, I would have said not a hope! But you never know what pathways will open up before you in your life. My advice would be to explore all pathways, don’t discount one due to your own fear of change or lack of confidence because it might just be the challenge you were after.