13 Mar 2022
Overview
  • Let me give you a few hints: it’s Australia’s fastest growing sector, it covers some of the most meaningful and fulfilling roles out there, and it’s all about making a positive impact in peoples’ lives.
  • That’s right - the human services sector has all that and more up its sleeve. But let’s go into a little more detail.

Basically, the human service sector is all about assisting people to achieve more independence, work their way through some difficult times or to make sure they’re getting the freedoms and opportunities they deserve. From providing mental health support to early childhood education, most of the guidance, education and care you or a loved one experience in your lives come directly from the human services sector.

Without even realising it, we have access to heaps of services that really benefit us pretty much any time we need them. There are loads of people out there looking for assistance in hundreds, if not thousands of unique ways, which means that no two jobs in the sector are the same.

More broadly, you can group these roles into areas such as:

  • Early childhood education and care: these people work with children from 0-5, helping them feel ready and able to get stuck into primary school.
  • Mental health workers: Just like a doctor or physiotherapist may help with physical ailments, mental health workers help their clients achieve their goals and manage their expectations when it comes to living with mental ill-health.
  • Allied health assistants: Allied health assistants provide physical, mental and social support across a huge range of services. Roles could involve working with a physiotherapist, speech pathologist or an arts therapist.
  • Community health workers: community health workers work with, well, communities - taking a zoomed out perspective to health to create and implement care and support workers:
  • Care and support workers work with veterans, people with disability, young people and older people to help them live safely, with dignity and independently. They’re there to provide really essential forms of support, as well as assisting with everyday tasks.

Even then, that doesn’t cover the full gamut of unique jobs out there. The great thing about having so much diversity in this sector is that you can find a job that suits your background, your interests, your experiences - you name it!

If you’re curious about what’s involved in working in the human services sector, what career opportunities are out there and how to get started, make sure you check out our brand-new Academy Positive Humanity. It’s a short course giving you the run-down on all of the above, plus loads more. Plus, finish any module from the Academy and you can enter the draw for a $5k cash prize! Check it out over here.