To find a job you just have to rely on your own strength, unless you belong to that group that you settle through friends of friends. I have never belonged to this type of group and, therefore, I take the opportunity of giving some suggestions to the young psychologists who write to me and who want to do it with their own strength. Here they are, they are simple, perhaps they may seem trivial but they are actions available to everyone:
- know English: very well
- want to specialize and, above all, to do so (there are better masters in Europe than there are currently in Italy)
- be part of an international social network of young professionals who exchange ideas and opportunities for work and internship: www.enyssp.com
- map the people known, predicting how each of them could be useful to increase opportunities and knowledge in sport
- do internships abroad (summer or not)
- ask to the university professors (or others) to get to know youth experts who have managed to achieve what they wanted and talk to them for information.
- read the most updated manual of sport psychology and then for the articles, find the authors’ email on the internet and write to them, they will send them to you
- don’t listen to those who say there’s nothing to do, work hard to find your way
- establish a fixed time to find work in your city, then you will have to search in a wider geographical area
- In Italy at the moment the opportunities for collaboration in sport, for young graduates, are mainly with football schools, they need the psychologist to be classified at the highest level by FIGC (it may be useful to contact the psychologist of your Region in the youth and school section of the FIGC) and in tennis that provides the role of mental trainer to work in the clubs (information on the website of the Italian Tennis Federation)
