"I want to identify suitable candidates for the job as accurately as possible."

After studying psychology at Graz University, Barbara Weißenbacher started her career in the "Talentecheck" project, which supports young people in choosing a career. 'During my studies, I realised that I was particularly interested in personnel selection and personnel development. I was particularly interested in the question: How can I identify and also foster the right people?'

It was therefore only natural that she transferred her expertise in career counselling to another context, namely the field of teaching. Today, she focuses on the teaching entry procedure and the lateral entry into the teaching profession: she develops and evaluates psychological tests to predict the academic and professional success of teachers. 

Dropout in teacher training and teaching is also at the centre of her new research project, 'Should I stay or should I go?'. In this project, she is investigating who drops out of the study or profession and for what reasons. In this context, she is particularly interested in finding out whether it is the more suitable people who drop out of the course or leave the profession, or the less suitable ones. In her analysis, she focuses on individual factors such as personality traits and intrinsic motivation, as well as situational factors such as integration into the university and identification with the subject, and structural factors such as the often difficult framework conditions of the teaching profession.

She gave up her original "classic" career ambition of becoming a clinical psychologist when she discovered her interest in personnel selection and personnel development during her studies. "I want to find ways to identify suitable people that are as accurate, fair and inclusive as possible," she emphasises. She wants to apply the results directly in practice, for example through workshops or by optimising the admissions process for teacher training. "I find it exciting to see that what I do is also used and utilised directly – and not just in an article that is more or less read," she says.

What she particularly appreciates about research is the independent work and developing new research questions. "It's very important to me that I find what I do exciting and that I can make as many decisions as possible about what and how I work."