Our Story

myWAY Employability Plus (myWAY) is an interactive, strengths-based website that supports autistic Career Explorers and their Supporters – including employment specialists – to explore and develop personalised career, education, and training pathways.

myWAY Employability Plus builds on myWAY Employability, a platform co-designed with autistic individuals, using a human-centred design that was launched in August 2020. myWAY Employability was created to address the startling unemployment rate for autistic people of working age. At 18.2% this rate was more than double that for people with disability (7.5%) and almost six times the rate of people without disability (3.1%), in 2022. 

myWAY Employability was founded on six years of research and evaluation, stemming from the Better Outcomes and Successful Transitions for Autism (BOOST-A) program, a digital tool helping autistic young people plan post-school activities. Students using BOOST-A reported heightened self-determination in study, training, and employment goals compared to those using generic school-based transition planning processes. 

More than 220 stakeholders, including young people, parents, health professionals, and educators, participated in the website’s discovery phase, while a further 90 autistic young people contributed to its co-design and development. Since its launch, myWAY Employability has helped thousands of Career Explorers in their employment journey. 

myWAY Employability Plus, launched in August 2025, takes inclusive employment to the next level… Like its predecessor, myWAY Employability Plus is strengths-based and supports Career Explorers in creating individual profiles that include personalised career, education, and training information, and helps them set achievable goals. 

In addition, the myWAY Employability Plus offers exclusive access to advanced support features designed specifically for employment specialists and organisations, including enhanced Career Explorer profiles, an innovative Job Explorer tool, new Supporter invite features, and progress reporting to explore meaningful pathways and take practical steps towards employment success. 

Acknowledgments 

myWAY Employability was developed in consultation with autistic young people, and their supporters, parents, allied health professionals, researchers, disability service providers, and educators from around Australia, and was proudly supported by Telstra Foundation under the Tech4Good Challenge initiative 2019-2023. The website continues to receive support from the Australian Government. 

The website was co-designed with autistic young people. The Autism CRC established a Neurodiverse Youth Advisory Group (NYAG) to guide the development of the website's engagement elements, content, and user expectations. 

The development of myWAY Employability was led by Associate Professor Marina Ciccarelli (Curtin University), Cheryl Mangan (Autism CRC), Brendan James (Autism CRC), Adie Wilmot (Curtin University), and Alex Creece (Autism CRC Future Leader alumni). We’d particularly like to acknowledge the support of Neurodiverse Youth Advisory Group members. 

The Better Outcomes and Successful Transitions for Autism (BOOST-A) program is a digital tool helping autistic young people plan post-school activities. We'd like to thank Dr. Megan Hatfield (Curtin University) and her supervisors, including Associate Professor Marina Ciccarelli, the late Emeritus Professor Sylvia Rodger AM, Dr. Marita Falkmer, and Professor Torbjorn Falkmer. 

Finally, our sincere thanks to the many hundreds of autistic individuals, parents, professionals, and organisations who have been part of the myWAY Employability journey.

Clockwise from top: Ellen (14), Trinity (14), Zoe (19), Harry (28), Brendan, Cameron (19), Cheryl, Kat (just behind!) and Hamish (14).