I have experience as a policy adviser in the public service in Australia, so I can give you my impressions from my experiences there.
A postgraduate degree is not required to get a graduate job in the Australian Public Service (APS). It is very common for people to be hired with only bachelor’s degrees. Once hired, your performance on the job is much more important than your level of degree qualifications, so not having a postgraduate qualification isn’t a barrier to progressing. Even departments that might seem to require specialist knowledge usually also value hiring people who bring different skillsets (for example, the Attorney General’s Department offers positions to some graduates without law degrees, the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet hired people with all sorts of backgrounds including engineers, physicists, and philosophy graduates). In general, my impression is that some degrees are overrepresented in policy roles not because they are preferred by the departments, but because more people with that background apply. For example, there are many more law or international relations graduates who are interested in policy careers than there are physicists and engineers. Of course, a substantial proportion of people hired by specialised departments will have relevant specialist skills, but many others will bring different skills.
If you would be interested in a career as a policy adviser in the public service, I would suggest applying to a bunch of graduate programs now and seeing if you get accepted. Once you are in the APS, it is easy to jump around between departments. Even if you don’t get a job exactly where you want to be, just starting work somewhere and building experience might get you there faster. It’s also worth considering state government roles, which can also provide great policy experience. A few years of experience in policy roles will also help you work out which skill gaps you might want to fill with a postgraduate qualification. Most departments will support employees to attain postgraduate qualifications once they’ve been working for a few years, including providing financial assistance for fees and/or leave without pay to complete a full-time postgraduate qualification.
I don’t have as good knowledge of the best way to get a job in politics (e.g. parliamentarian, a staffer for an MP or Senator etc), but again postgraduate qualifications don’t seem key. Instead, a track record working for the relevant party or experience in relevant roles seem more important.
If you are still keen to get a postgraduate qualification before seeking work in policy, prioritise developing skills that will be genuinely useful in a policy career and choosing a course you think you can excel in. Also prioritise a course that is shorter and won’t land you in lots of debt. I don’t think a law degree vs an MPP would make a big difference to your hiring chances, assuming similar grades. Better grades will help (and many graduate programs require a credit average), but strong grades alone are unlikely to be decisive. In the public service, departments are looking for people who can give good policy advice, so try to build relevant skills and demonstrate competence in them. Try to step back and think: if I was hiring someone to advise a government minister on policy decisions, who would I want to hire? Succeeding in a difficult, prestigious course is one way to demonstrate competence, but even better is doing a great job in a relevant work environment, even if it is just for a few months or a year. For what its worth, my impression is that the most sought-after skillset when hiring policy generalists in the public service is economics. But many other skill sets are also useful. I’m not sure how all of these factors would cash out for you, but a 3 year law degree is a big time commitment, so I would only recommend it if you are passionate about the law and want to work directly on legal issues. Otherwise, as others have mentioned, most of the subject matter that you study in a law degree is unlikely to be directly relevant to policy work.
I hope this is useful and good luck with your decision!
This is a really fantastic post Hamish, thank you for writing it.
I certainly am applying for many APS graduate programs, but I do wonder if this round will be especially competitive due to economic circumstances. I’ve never applied for a program like this before, so I am not sure how prepared I am for their style of interviewing. It’s also the case that as a philosophy major, I have less empirical knowledge about politics than many of my peers, so if they ask me content based questions I may struggle (I am of course trying to read and catch up). If for some reason I do not get in, it may be worth starting an MPP or JD.
’I don’t think a law degree vs an MPP would make a big difference to your hiring chances, assuming similar grades’
This point is heartening, because if prior to starting a JD I think that there is a good chance I ought to be a lawyer, but years later it turns out I was wrong, I won’t have made such a devastatingly bad mistake.
‘a 3 year law degree is a big time commitment, so I would only recommend it if you are passionate about the law and want to work directly on legal issues.’
An MPP would be 2 years for me, but I can’t receive Centrelink for it (one can for a JD, which is really significant). So I don’t think a JD represents that much more of a commitment in my case. For some reason I am much more excited about the content that is taught in law degrees, so I think it’s quite possible that I would be passionate about law and want to work directly on legal issues. I just worry about whether I could do less good in law— 80K seem less enthusiastic about legal careers. That said, their advice may be directed at those who are better at maths than me, which leads me to your next point.
‘For what its worth, my impression is that the most sought-after skillset when hiring policy generalists in the public service is economics.’
This is certainly what I am worried about, because if so, my weakness at maths could really hold me back.
I have experience as a policy adviser in the public service in Australia, so I can give you my impressions from my experiences there.
A postgraduate degree is not required to get a graduate job in the Australian Public Service (APS). It is very common for people to be hired with only bachelor’s degrees. Once hired, your performance on the job is much more important than your level of degree qualifications, so not having a postgraduate qualification isn’t a barrier to progressing. Even departments that might seem to require specialist knowledge usually also value hiring people who bring different skillsets (for example, the Attorney General’s Department offers positions to some graduates without law degrees, the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet hired people with all sorts of backgrounds including engineers, physicists, and philosophy graduates). In general, my impression is that some degrees are overrepresented in policy roles not because they are preferred by the departments, but because more people with that background apply. For example, there are many more law or international relations graduates who are interested in policy careers than there are physicists and engineers. Of course, a substantial proportion of people hired by specialised departments will have relevant specialist skills, but many others will bring different skills.
If you would be interested in a career as a policy adviser in the public service, I would suggest applying to a bunch of graduate programs now and seeing if you get accepted. Once you are in the APS, it is easy to jump around between departments. Even if you don’t get a job exactly where you want to be, just starting work somewhere and building experience might get you there faster. It’s also worth considering state government roles, which can also provide great policy experience. A few years of experience in policy roles will also help you work out which skill gaps you might want to fill with a postgraduate qualification. Most departments will support employees to attain postgraduate qualifications once they’ve been working for a few years, including providing financial assistance for fees and/or leave without pay to complete a full-time postgraduate qualification.
I don’t have as good knowledge of the best way to get a job in politics (e.g. parliamentarian, a staffer for an MP or Senator etc), but again postgraduate qualifications don’t seem key. Instead, a track record working for the relevant party or experience in relevant roles seem more important.
If you are still keen to get a postgraduate qualification before seeking work in policy, prioritise developing skills that will be genuinely useful in a policy career and choosing a course you think you can excel in. Also prioritise a course that is shorter and won’t land you in lots of debt. I don’t think a law degree vs an MPP would make a big difference to your hiring chances, assuming similar grades. Better grades will help (and many graduate programs require a credit average), but strong grades alone are unlikely to be decisive. In the public service, departments are looking for people who can give good policy advice, so try to build relevant skills and demonstrate competence in them. Try to step back and think: if I was hiring someone to advise a government minister on policy decisions, who would I want to hire? Succeeding in a difficult, prestigious course is one way to demonstrate competence, but even better is doing a great job in a relevant work environment, even if it is just for a few months or a year. For what its worth, my impression is that the most sought-after skillset when hiring policy generalists in the public service is economics. But many other skill sets are also useful. I’m not sure how all of these factors would cash out for you, but a 3 year law degree is a big time commitment, so I would only recommend it if you are passionate about the law and want to work directly on legal issues. Otherwise, as others have mentioned, most of the subject matter that you study in a law degree is unlikely to be directly relevant to policy work.
I hope this is useful and good luck with your decision!