Division of Business
Honours
Honours
2004 Currently enrolled in the PhD in Business and Management
After completing my Bachelor of Business in Administrative Management I took a year of leave from my position with the Government to complete my Honours degree. It was well worth it. I graduated with a First Class Honours in Management and this has led to both career promotion in the Government sector and the skills and confidence to undertake my PhD having also been awarded a full scholarship.
The Honours program was incredibly worthwhile and highly enjoyable. It was quite different to my undergraduate in that it required a deeper level of thinking and more independent study. This is something which I found is much sought after in the workplace. There were also tighter deadlines and it is up to you to plan your time and work with your supervisor to meet each milestone. The support and recognition that you get though is much better, my supervisor was fantastic and acted more as a mentor guiding me in academia and introducing me to other staff and students, most of whom have helped me in some way. I found the Honours students were highly regarded by academic staff and they were eager to help me and also offered opportunities for tutoring to help build my academic career.
The program was more practical than theoretical and one of the most valuable aspects was the networking and being able to network. I had to develop my interpersonal skills and confidence to effectively approach and manage my relationship with the organisation where I was conducting my research. This has been great for my professional and personal development and even better for my career and current research which has involved use of the contacts I made then. We have a good relationship and I have found it incredibly beneficial for my current research and reputation in the field.
My career in Government and academia have both benefited from my Honours degree.
In Government, honours is well recognised (particularly by senior staff) and synonymous with being dedicated, organised and an overall high achiever adding credibility to my qualification. My achievement in honours demonstrated skills in project management, analysis and report writing that led to the offer of a higher level position. I also feel more confident in my ability to actively seek challenging projects and opportunities.
In 2003 I commenced my PhD with the University of South Australia. My Honours result enabled me to receive a University of South Australia Postgraduate Research Award scholarship to support my research. What I learnt from Honours has been incredibly valuable to my work in the PhD and ability to identify and plan a large research project that will contribute original knowledge. The Honours thesis process made me better equipped to plan my PhD as it follows the same process of writing a literature review, designing a methodology, preparing a proposal, Ethics approval, collecting data, analysing results and writing a thesis - only with tighter deadlines. I was also better equipped psychologically with the confidence and maturity to approach the PhD as I had a good awareness of what to expect.
I am working full-time on my PhD entitled The effect of high and low employee morale on the intent to withdraw labour. Working with my supervisor, Prof Robert Heath, I am expecting to complete this in 2007.
My experience with the Honours program was very positive. I learnt good academic practice and developed skills in research methods which have been invaluable in getting me to where I am now. I would recommend anyone aiming to build a successful professional or academic career make the commitment to succeed in the Honours program.
