Applying for a Registrar Post

Is Psychiatry the Career for You?

Is psychiatry the right choice for you, and what are we looking for in a psychiatric registrar? Obviously, you need to be interested in people, in psychology and how the brain works. You need good communication and interpersonal skills and to speak and write English fluently. You need to be motivated and both clinically and academically competent, as RANZCP training is quite a demanding postgraduate course and the examinations are not easy. You need to be able to tolerate uncertainty and to be curious - psychiatry is fascinating and we don't fully understand the brain and the mind yet, so although there's a solid and growing evidence-base of research, there are plenty of unknowns. On a practical note, you need to be able to type reasonably well as all our services now have electronic records. For on-call work you need to be able to drive and to have a car - or to get one shortly after arriving here, if you're from overseas. And finally, although the College allows entry into training after PGY-1 year, the RDA mandates two houseofficer years before RMOs become registrars, so in practice two years as a houseofficer are needed before starting as a registrar in New Zealand.

Whangarei and Auckland

Although Whangarei and Auckland are both part of one regional programme, Whangarei is about 2.5 hours drive north so it functions as a separate satellite, with registrars driving down for teaching days. This means that there are different employment processes for Whangarei and for Auckland. There are pros and cons to living and working in a smaller provincial city or a large metropolis like Auckland - it's your choice as both parts of the programme are likely to be keen to recruit new registrars. Posts are not time-limited but continue indefinitely until you complete training, although the usual performance-management processes apply.

Posts in Auckland

The employment process for psychiatric registrar posts in Auckland is centralised through the Director of Training and ARRMOS. The Director of Training organises the process, with assistance from ARRMOS who manage the practicalities and help with recruitment. If you make initial contact with ARRMOS your query will be sent through to the Director of Training who will liaise with you about what is required. Our Administrator Rosalynn also plays an important role, liaising with applicants and collecting application paperwork, and arranging interviews.

The main annual intake process occurs mid-year, planning ahead for posts starting in early December. There's a selection process with either a face-to-face or teleconferenced interview, in July. The Selection Panel consists of the Director of Training, one or two members of the Regional Training Committee - generally Training Facilitators, a trainee representative and an ARRMOS staff member. Our selection process covers both selection into RANZCP training, and also employment by the Auckland DHBs, via ARRMOS. Unlike some other programmes, it's all handled together, not as separate processes.

We're a large programme so we almost always do have some vacancies and we're keen to recruit all the year round. Don't worry if you miss the main selection process application deadline as we schedule one-off interviews at other times, as needed. Most registrars start their posts in December, but some start mid-year, in early June. If we have vacancies you can often start at another time if you're coming from overseas, as soon as you arrive in New Zealand. Obviously it's somewhat difficult for a clinical team and supervisor if you need to have a late start while completing a post overseas before arriving here, but we can generally locate a post that can cope with this. You'd have less choice as to your initial placement, however. 

The stages in joining the Auckland part of the programme are:

1. Email or phone the Director of Training, or our Administrator Rosalynn, or ARRMOS, and email us your CV. We're happy to answer any initial questions you may have, by email or phone, or if you're living locally the Director of Training can meet with you informally if you want.
   
2. We will tell you what other paperwork we need and if you haven't downloaded them here, we'll email you the forms. You need to fax them back to Rosalynn, or attach scanned files to email. You can use airmail of course, but be aware that from overseas this can take quite a while to reach us so we prefer electronic means. The things we need are:
   
• RANZCP Application including a ~300 word statement about why you're applying
  
• ARRMOS application (follow the link for recruitment details and contact Annika Benthin at this address)
  
• Three references (note that the reference format differs depending on where you're from, as below*)
  
• Copy of your medical degree and any other relevant qualifications (e.g. MRCPsych, Dip Psych, etc.)
• Copy of your IELTS scores if you don't yet have registration in NZ and have English as a second language and passed IELTS within 2 years (if it's older than 2 years you can't use it and there will be special rules about the three references, which ARRMOS will explain to you).
• You'll also have to get a Certificate of Good Standing from your local Medical Council, for the Medical Council of NZ
  
3. Once we have the paperwork as above, Rosalynn our Administrator organises a selection interview with you.
4. The Selection Interview is held to determine if you're suitable to be selected into psychiatric training, to sort out any practical details, and to give you information and answer your questions.
5. The Director of Training contacts you by email (within a few days) with the results of the selection process.
   
• If you've been selected into registrar training you'll be emailed a job offer by ARRMOS and (if you're overseas) ARRMOS will help you with medical registration and immigration details. The Director of Training will liaise with you about the allocations process for a specific post, and provide general orientation information
• If you haven't been selected into a post the Director of Training will email you and explain why
  

(*About the Reference format: If you already have Medical Registration in NZ please ask your referees to use the College reference format. If you are overseas so don't yet have registration in NZ, please give your referees the Medical Council reference format.)

Posts in Whangarei

You should start off the process by emailing or phoning the Northland Mental Health Services Clinical Director Dr Holdaway (+64-9-430-4100), who will involve their HR staff to assist with the practicalities. The Clinical Director will inform the programme's overall Director of Training who is based in Auckland, who will also make contact with you and arrange the necessary paperwork as above. Then there's a selection interview for RANZCP training, as above, organised by Rosalynn. Note that this is more of a two-stage process so if you definitely want a training post rather than a service post, you need to make sure that the selection process is also underway. The process for Whangarei is thus:

1. Once you contact the programme's Director of Training we will tell you what other paperwork we need and if you haven't downloaded them here, we'll email you the forms. You need to fax them back to Rosalynn, or attach scanned files to email. You can use airmail of course, but be aware that from overseas this can take quite a while to reach us so we prefer electronic means. The things we need are:
• RANZCP Application including a ~300 word statement about why you're applying
  
• Three references (note that the reference format differs depending on where you're from, as above*). 
  
• Copy of your medical degree and any other relevant qualifications (e.g. MRCPsych, Dip Psych, etc.)
• Copy of your IELTS scores if you don't yet have registration in NZ and have English as a second language and passed IELTS within 2 years (if it's older than 2 years you can't use it and there will be special rules about the three references, which the HR staff will explain to you).
• You'll also have to get a Certificate of Good Standing from your local Medical Council, for the Medical Council of NZ
• NB: with all of these, if you've already provided them to the Northland HR staff we'll get copies from there.
2. Once we have the paperwork as above, Rosalynn our Administrator organises a selection interview with you, usually by teleconference.
3. The Selection Interview is held to determine if you're suitable to be selected into psychiatric training, to sort out any practical details, and to give you information and answer your questions. If possible, especially if you're overseas and we're doing it by teleconference, we will combine the selection interview with the job interview for the actual post, but sometimes it's a two-stage process. 
4. The Director of Training contacts you by email (within a few days) with the results of the selection process.
• If successful, you separately finalise the job offer for the actual post, and any relocation logistics, with the Northland Clinical Director and HR staff. 
• If you haven't been selected into RANZCP training, the Director of Training will email you and explain why.

Should You Use an Agency?

We'd rather that you didn't, as agency fees are very costly to our DHBs. The Auckland ARRMOS or Northland HR staff can help you with all the practical details about Registration and Immigration just as well as any agency. If we have vacancies we do however take applicants from agencies, but if there were competition for a post, a suitable non-agency candidate would have the edge over a similar person referred via an agency. 

Is there any assistance when travelling from overseas to take up a post in the programme?

Whangarei do sometimes offer relocation assistance when recruiting from overseas. You'd need to talk to the HR staff involved with your recruitment, to check the details. The Northland DHB careers website has a lot of useful immigration and relocation information, and details about life in Northland.

The Auckland DHBs provide practical help from ARRMOS with your Registration and Immigration processes but they don't pay for airfares or other moving costs. They do provide advice and support though, about relocation to Auckland. This is a WDHB relocation support website. And here's an ADHB relocation support website. These websites have many helpful links about getting started in New Zealand, no matter which which DHB your post is going to be in. 

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