THE YEARS 1965 TO 1997 - PROFESSIONAL WORK
In January 1965 I commenced the first of two years full time study at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology
(RMIT), in Communications Engineering.
I had been selected as a Trainee Engineer, PMG;'s Dept, having been accepted by rigorous competitive
assessment late in 1964, and had already completed half of of the four year course by part time study in 1963 and 1964.
In those years, RMIT did not have Degree courses, and the course I was undertaking was endorsed by
the Institution of Engineers (Australia)
Positions of Trainee Engineer were only available to PMG staff, and I was one of eight trainees. The
other Trainees were senior to me in terms of their ages, employment hstories and designationss
I graduated with the Associate Diploma in January 1967, and was appointed to the grade of Engineer Class1.
My
first appointment as a base grade Engineer was to the large Telecommunications Workshops in South Melbourne,
This was not my preferred placement, as I had sought a position in the Radio Section,
but there were no vacancies.
My formal qualfiications in Communicatons Engineering and my extensive backgound in the Network
Management and Analysis were of limited value to the operations of the Workshops,
I made the most of this posting, and considered resigning at one stage and moving to another Telco.
One of the most challenging projects I was involved with was at Engineer Class 1 level, where I was giv
emn the rfesppnosbilotyh of setting uip a new work area known as the "Development and Prototype Shop"
One of the assigmenst was leading a team of technical and trade staff on the development and construction of a new
service which the Company was introducing, known as the "PABX Extension and Traffic Route Analyser" ("PETRA").
This was designed to monitor and analyse employee-generated unauthoriized calls made from PABX extensions on high-cost
trunk circuits, and was state-of-the-art at the time.
It involved close liaison with people in Telecom's Research Laboratories, on issues of design, cnsuiction,
planning, testing, operations, and maintenance.
As things turned out, I moved upwards at a very fast pace, gaining promotions to the grades of Engineer
Class 2, 3, and 4, the youngest person ever to have reached those levels in the Company's Victorian State
Administration.
I transferred out of the Workshops on 1978 to a new position in the Company's Professional Engineering
Training area, where I became the State Manager, which also looked after base level Engineer recruitment and undergraduate
employment.
I continued with that work until 1995 when I took up a new position of National Manager, Professional Engineer
Traniing and Development.
I left Telstra on September 17, 1997, after 41 years of service, having accepted a voluntary redundancy
and early retirement package, as did thousands of other employees at the time.
