Where to next with work?

[Phillay]

Fair play mate. I hear you as we're having the same problems here in Cambs. Our population has upped massively, but it's not only the construction jobs that are being taken up. I spent some time working in IT systems for a well known retailer's distribution centre when it opened. Pretty much everyone working alongside me had moved from Eastern Europe, well, recruited from Eastern Europe and paid to re-locate here... 'Every little helps' I suppose.

Very hard workers, for less money, but when you see the queues outside our job centre, it's just crazy.

My wife's worked for the same insurance company for 15 years, she started out at about £11k, and is now on around £19k... not a massive increase, but a decent wage all the same... she's pretty much stuck now as she's sitting at the top of her salary band. I faced a few redunancies which really sets you back.

But, if you're unhappy with the way work's going, you can only go and try something else... good on you for doing that. That's all I was trying to do by making a career change towards construction, not really money driven. One particular office job I encountered made me very ill and set in a lot of grey hairs.

Going back to what you were thinking though, if you can get in somewhere and start at the bottom, a lot of my mates have done that and managed to work their way up, it's a bit of 'right place, right time' and 'not what you know, who you know'... but definately give it a go.

 

[Heat Kent]

I think employers in any field are looking for experience over qualifications, but if you’re looking to change to an office based role you might find that there are skills you can gain which are far more valuable to employers than generic degrees (unless you’re looking to be a doctor or something that requires a degree). Often having a degree doesn’t make you qualified to do a job, but rather shows the employer you have potential to learn and apply new skills specific to the role. It’s not necessarily right, or fair, but you’ll find that your CV with a degree and employment history in construction amongst 500 others won’t even make it to the HR department if everyone else has got years of relevant experience behind them, just like most plumbing firms wouldn’t look at my CV.

My wife left school with just a handful of GCSEs and went to work in an investment bank as a low paid admin girl. She was always the first in and last out of the office, she did her IAQs (Investment AdministrationQualifications) in her own time, went on loads of spreadsheet and database courses, learned Mandarin and goes on all sorts of other management courses. She now manages a team and is the only person in her department who doesn’t have a degree, but it’s the relevant qualifications that make her invaluable to the bank. She earns a good wage, but it comes at a price… High pressure, constant redundancies, office politics and not stop deadlines. Our alarm goes off at 4:30 every morning so she can get the 5:30 train and she doesn’t get home until gone 10pm (provided no one on her team messes up). She wants to take redundancy in a few years and just do fun stuff like balloon twisting, DJing, wedding services and promo work.

At the end of the day, anyone retraining at our age will come across hurdles, but if you’re not happy doing what you do then it’s time to make a change. Maybe look to find the job you want and figure out what qualifications you need to do it rather than getting the qualification and looking for jobs to fit around that? The problem with office jobs is that most people fall into them by accident, it’s not like you can try a role out before you apply.

We should hook up, I’ll teach you everything I know about underwriting and loss adjusting, you can teach me everything you know about plumbing. Just do a job swap….:clap: