Early career occupational therapists

Resources and information to support you as an early career occupational therapist or as an employer of early career occupational therapists.

Explore resources

In this section you’ll find information to support you as an early career occupational therapist or as an employer of early career occupational therapists.

To connect, learn and collaborate with members who are also early career occupational therapists join your region’s network and other networks where you can connect with members.

Head to RCOT communities

Finding your first post as an occupational therapist

Join the ‘Transitioning to practice’ event

Become a member: Professional newly registered category

International healthcare recruitment: NHS and social care

Guidance on returning to practice

Professional Advisory Service

Principles and standards for early career occupational therapists

Our Principles and standards for early career occupational therapist were launched in March 2026.

They demonstrate our commitment to supporting early career occupational therapist and their employers in creating an environment where they thrive.

Read our Principles and standards for early career occupational therapists

Our five principles are designed to support early career occupational therapists as they navigate the often challenging transition into professional practice.

Each principle recognises and builds on the skills, experience and learning gained through pre‑registration education.

Early career support should celebrate diversity, recognise each occupational therapist’s unique attributes and lived experience, and foster a sense of belonging, progression and professional identity.

Employers have a duty of care to support early career occupational therapists as they consolidate their learning, develop their autonomy safely and grow as confident professionals. This includes using the HCPC’s Principles for Preceptorship (2023) alongside relevant national policy and early career guidance to shape high‑quality support.

Principles

Principle 1, sense of belonging & value

Early career occupational therapists experience a sense of belonging, connection and feel valued as they begin or return to their professional journey.

Feeling connected - to a team, to other early career OTs and to the wider occupational therapy profession - is central to thriving

We know that our members find networking especially valuable when they’re at a transition point in their career. It helps to share and learn from others and seek support from peers with similar interests.

In our inclusive communities you’ll find a place to share, learn and network based on your region, area of practice and professional interests. You can connect and network with others across career levels and with diverse experiences and access learning and development opportunities.

Connect with your community

Principle 2, supervision

Early career occupational therapists have access to regular, structured supervision that supports their individual transition into autonomous, safe and confident practice.

Gaps in supervision intensifies pressure and self-doubt

Supervision, put simply, is a professional relationship and activity which ensures good standards of practice and encourages development. It gives you a way of professional learning and development that helps you to reflect on and develop your knowledge, skills and competence through agreed and regular support with another professional.

Our supervision guide helps practitioners and managers establish healthy and effective supervision practices that will meet the quality standards and strategy documents across the UK.

We’ve used HCPC’s 10 key characteristics of effective supervision in our Supervision readiness toolkit to help you evaluate your experience as a supervisee. You can use the checklist to reflect, plan and guide your professional conversations to help you get the most out of your supervision.

Access our supervision guidance

Principle 3, professional development

Early career occupational therapists are supported to engage in professional development, establish individual career trajectories and contribute to the development of the profession.

I felt valued and encouraged to pursue training that was not only role specific, but meaningful for my long-term development

Read our Career Development Framework

Use our CPD portfolio to record and keep track of your CPD in one place

Manage your CPD

Principle 4, wellbeing

Employers proactively promote the wellbeing of early career occupational therapists through supportive working practices that enable sustainable, reflective and self-directed engagement in the profession.

The importance of workplace vulture, gatekeeping and realistic caseload management in enabling sustainable practice is key for thriving

Principle 5, professional identity

Early career occupational therapists develop a strong professional identity and engage with the wider profession.

Early encouragement especially during university studies, plays a vital role in helping early career OTs see themselves as members of a wider professional community.

Log into your CPD portfolio to watch our Complexity of occupation lectures

Access your CPD portfolio

Case studies

Thriving as an early career occupational therapist.

Read Michaela's blog reflecting on conversations with early career OTs. PDF (166KB)

Our Career conversations series focuses on hearing and sharing the career narratives of our diverse workforce and highlight a whole range of possibilities in OT.

Our career conversations vodcast (video podcasts) series is a great resource. Watching these will help you find out about other people’s experiences − see possibilities and pathways and hear what’s worked for others.

Capturing career conversations

We used the Kawa model of occupational therapy, and the analogy career journey as a river, as a lens for these career conversations.

The prompts used to guide the career conversations vodcasts have been repurposed into a Kawa-based reflection tool that prompts thinking around career development and progression within and beyond the four pillars of practice.

The Kawa approach also highlights the individual in their career journey; that river course/career development and progression journey is something that’s consistently changing and evolving with a unique course for each individual and not necessarily linear or hierarchical. This aligns with the broader ‘Growing Your AHP Career’ (AHP Careers project and narrative). 

Preceptorship

Early career preceptorship can help you develop confidence, skills and knowledge. It’s a programme of structured support that’s helpful if you’re newly qualified, been internationally recruited, are returning to practice or are moving between different settings or areas of practice.

HCPC has five broad principles of preceptorship[CH1] that:

serve as a guide
ensure programmes meet HCPC registrants’ needs
support improvements in the quality of the services allied health professionals provide.

You’ll find out more about these principles and information to help you access preceptorship when and where you need it on the HCPC website.

The AHP Preceptorship Standards and Framework[CH2]  set out what AHP preceptorship means and expands on the HCPC Principles for Preceptorship, to provide standards and a best practice implementation framework to support AHPs in England.

Understand the principles and how they affect you

To help you get to grips with how you can use these resources, you can watch a recording of a webinar we hosted with HCPC and NHSE.

Watch the webinar here