Training & Personal Development at CSIRO

Training and development is available to all staff both formal and informal and on the job training. The great thing is being able to enrol and choose courses that you would like to do and most of them are free of charge. There is a good selection to choose from. They have the learning academy and other platforms like MCI Solutions and O'Reilly where you can go to for developing your digital proficiencies and your professional and personal skill development.

Some of the training is great, others not so much. This is mainly due to staff availability. When staff are busy with their other duties they do not have time to train new staff on theirs. Usually the staff who are most busy (managers) are the ones you need approval and sign off for key parts of training.

There is always ongoing mandatory training done online through the CSIRO training portal, as well as extra training in many different work-related skills (e.g. coding) available.

CSIRO provides an exceptional training platform in all areas needed to excel in your career. This includes all compulsory IT training, WHS training and training on company policies and procedures. They also offer the opportunity to complete additional training in the specific area of your field. They allocate a certain number of days per year for personal development.

none available to me that I know of.

safety training is good. many opportunity's to be trained by a peer on needed equipment.

Throughout my workweeks there have been plenty of seminars/success programs that teach helpful out-of-work lessons. With these programs I have not only improved my understanding of various industries and practices, but have improved personal skills such as researching, IP Understanding and contract negotiations.

Each team and each graduate has a different experience. I had no formal training. I have had some informal on the job training but understaffing in my team meant this was sporadic and not extensive. There was a lot of self learning.

Mostly the Fusion workshops. They are more general and not as customised to working at CSIRO as they could be. One of the sessions was on developing your personal brand. There are training modules online that all staff can do - they have every topic under the sun.

team shadowing and workflow process based training is the core of my development journey.

I will preface this by saying that graduates in different teams have had different experiences based on the capacity and budgets of their teams. My team has a very limited budget and capacity. I completed a lot of free online courses from government organisations. When my team was reduced in numbers, I was able to gain skills in reporting, the operational side of my team's work and internal compliance mechanisms.

CSIRO has invested so much in my training and development everyone in the graduate program is given a budget which can go towards formal training sessions, workshops or conferences that are relevant to their goals or role within CSIRO.

We have been involved in a formal training program administered by an external agency which began prior to starting our roles in February - this was a good opportunity to meet other grads, continued in GO-week, a learning and orientation week held in person in Melbourne for all grads and on-going workshops throughout the grad program. These workshops are mostly helpful and cover a range of important skills but occasionally feel a bit stretched out or not super worthwhile usually because it seems as though they are target at too low of a level. The informal training and development has been excellent, my team has taught me a lot in terms of how to do day-to-day tasks but I have also been able to attend workshops and complete online training relevant to my work as arranged by my manager and mentor.

There are many training options available - both mandatory and voluntary. The graduate program has central mandatory trainings.

I have enjoyed CSIRO's on the job training, as getting back into the chemical laboratory is fun, challenging and engaging. In order to get to this level of on the job training I have also done a lot of online safety training and other learning modules. Outside of these basics, there are provisions for 20 days of paid learning days for all employees, as well as development programs offered by the graduate program I am part of.

The HDR workshop was great. Would love to see more of this with specific themes: HDR Writing workshop, Indigenous Research Methodologies.

good