
Meet our people – Maia Grange
Find out more about our staff, their roles, and what their day to day looks like!
What was your path into evaluation/ARTD?
I initially chose to study psychology because I wanted a career helping people. However, I quickly realised that being a psychologist wasn’t the right fit for me. It was during my honours year that I discovered evaluation.
After graduation, I worked as a casual academic at the Australian College of Applied Professions, teaching first-year psychology students. I also worked as a case manager where I gained experience working with a variety of stakeholders. When a friend told me about ARTD, I knew right away that it was my dream job. I applied for a role as an analyst, and I couldn’t be happier with where I am now.
Can you sum up your role as an Analyst in one sentence?
As an analyst, I support projects by completing document reviews, data collection, and analysis.
What was the best opportunity/ your proudest work moment since starting at ARTD?
One of my proudest moments at ARTD was learning to use a new software for quantitative analysis. Although I had a background in statistics and experience with point-and-click software, I had never written code for data analysis. Early in my time at ARTD, I participated in an internal training course to learn R, which was both challenging and rewarding. A few months later, I needed to use R for a project and realised just how valuable the training had been. With support from a colleague, I successfully ran the quantitative analysis in R and even completed some analyses independently. Seeing the results contribute to the report alongside the qualitative data was very cool!
What is your favourite thing about working at ARTD?
My favourite thing about working at ARTD is that everyone wants to be here and genuinely cares about the work they are doing. This creates a working environment that is supportive and collaborative. It also means you feel comfortable to be yourself.
What does a ‘day in the life’ look like for you?
My day usually starts with coffee—whether it’s me having another attempt at latte art with the office coffee machine or joining the team on a coffee run to the café next door. Then, my day could involve a range of varied activities—from writing literature reviews to scheduling or conducting interviews with key stakeholders. I might spend some time deep in data analysis or collaborating with colleagues during meetings to discuss project progress and next steps. Each day is a mix of independent focus and teamwork, which keeps things interesting.
What’s something your clients may not know about you?
In my free time I’m an artist, and I actually gained a lot of my facilitation experience and skills working at a paint and sip studio, where I would lead groups of people through a painting step-by-step.