Career Change - What Qualifications?
Discussion
Hello,
I'm looking at changing my career from sales/recruitment to something else, the trouble is I'm not really sure what. Hoping the PH crowd can throw some ideas at me. So I'll start with the absolute dream sheet and work back from there.
Background: I'm 36, decent BSc Finance degree, 10 years' sales experience, mostly in white collar professional recruitment. My absolute ideal would be something that allows me to do a 6 or 12 month contract on decent money and then clear off for a couple of months. I wouldn't rule out rotation work just about anywhere. I know these jobs often require some experience as well as qualifications and am happy to work towards this goal over a longer time period if necessary.
I'd like to be doing something where I can feel that I've actually achieved something or made something.
Although I don't have any formal qualifications or professional experience to show it I have a sound mechanical aptitude and don't mind getting my hands dirty.
I can invest a bit of money in training - a Master's degree would be a stretch but I wouldn't completely rule it out. I don't expect to walk in on a huge salary - could get by on £25K to start with.
The options I've considered so far are:
1) Quantity Surveying. Seems to be relatively easy to get into, decent money and lots of contract work available. The work doesn't especially appeal to me but I suppose it depends what sort of area you specialise in
2) Get my BOSIET certificate and attempt to get offshore as a roustabout. Work my way up towards a drilling sort of role. Kind of wish I'd done this 10 years ago, but I didn't.
3) Procurement. I guess my sales experience would come in sort of useful, but not really sure how to get started on this.
I also like the idea of being a blast technician or something in a quarry or mine, but I wasn't in the army and I don't think my motivation of "I want to blow stuff up" would go down very well with any sensible person who hires blast technicians.
I know the standard answer here is "what do you really want to do?" Well I'm too old and too fat to drive F1 cars and we don't have a space programme (and I'd probably be too old and fat for that if we did!) so it's more a case of what would I be able to make decent money at and enjoy enough to keep doing for the next 30 years.
Open to any and all other suggestions, and thanks in advance.
I'm looking at changing my career from sales/recruitment to something else, the trouble is I'm not really sure what. Hoping the PH crowd can throw some ideas at me. So I'll start with the absolute dream sheet and work back from there.
Background: I'm 36, decent BSc Finance degree, 10 years' sales experience, mostly in white collar professional recruitment. My absolute ideal would be something that allows me to do a 6 or 12 month contract on decent money and then clear off for a couple of months. I wouldn't rule out rotation work just about anywhere. I know these jobs often require some experience as well as qualifications and am happy to work towards this goal over a longer time period if necessary.
I'd like to be doing something where I can feel that I've actually achieved something or made something.
Although I don't have any formal qualifications or professional experience to show it I have a sound mechanical aptitude and don't mind getting my hands dirty.
I can invest a bit of money in training - a Master's degree would be a stretch but I wouldn't completely rule it out. I don't expect to walk in on a huge salary - could get by on £25K to start with.
The options I've considered so far are:
1) Quantity Surveying. Seems to be relatively easy to get into, decent money and lots of contract work available. The work doesn't especially appeal to me but I suppose it depends what sort of area you specialise in
2) Get my BOSIET certificate and attempt to get offshore as a roustabout. Work my way up towards a drilling sort of role. Kind of wish I'd done this 10 years ago, but I didn't.
3) Procurement. I guess my sales experience would come in sort of useful, but not really sure how to get started on this.
I also like the idea of being a blast technician or something in a quarry or mine, but I wasn't in the army and I don't think my motivation of "I want to blow stuff up" would go down very well with any sensible person who hires blast technicians.
I know the standard answer here is "what do you really want to do?" Well I'm too old and too fat to drive F1 cars and we don't have a space programme (and I'd probably be too old and fat for that if we did!) so it's more a case of what would I be able to make decent money at and enjoy enough to keep doing for the next 30 years.
Open to any and all other suggestions, and thanks in advance.
Interesting post and place to be career wise. Out of interest what are the things that are making you want to change career?
Having pondered a similar scenario in the past (currently work in construction specification sales) I've come to the personal conclusion that many of the other roles like some of the ones you listed unfortunately just don't pay as well or have the same benefits in the short or long term.
Out of the ones you've listed I've personally looked into procurement the most as a career change and seems to be the one that offers good scope for earnings and career progression. Senior procurement positions paying £65k+ which is not too bad. It also seems possible to move industries as a procurement professional. I always thought HNC/HND in a construction discipline like civil engineering plus similar level qualification in procurement might be a good start?
Having pondered a similar scenario in the past (currently work in construction specification sales) I've come to the personal conclusion that many of the other roles like some of the ones you listed unfortunately just don't pay as well or have the same benefits in the short or long term.
Out of the ones you've listed I've personally looked into procurement the most as a career change and seems to be the one that offers good scope for earnings and career progression. Senior procurement positions paying £65k+ which is not too bad. It also seems possible to move industries as a procurement professional. I always thought HNC/HND in a construction discipline like civil engineering plus similar level qualification in procurement might be a good start?
A few things have conspired to bring this about at the moment.
A shift in priorities that comes with age - when I was 25 sales seemed the way to go - my boss drove a Ferrari, my team leader had a Rolex, the company finished work at 3pm on Friday and people piled into the pub over the road. I was living in London and earning decent money in good months and paying my rent in bad ones. Now I'm less motivated by Ferraris and Rolex watches, nice as they are, so the possibility of earning big money isn't so much of a draw.
Along side that I'm a bit more circumspect, if not jaded, as I realise that for everyone who does make big money in sales roles, probably 20 people quit and a further 20 spend their lives doing "ok" money wise, working long hours and getting fed up with it.
If I could work my way up to £65k over a few years I'd be pretty happy with that.
A far bigger driver would be time - as I mentioned I would love to do a 6 or 12 month contract and then be able to take a month off. This is just totally impractical with most sales roles. Even taking a couple of weeks off means coming back to a black hole, and changing jobs every 12 months means you never get anywhere or build up any sort of momentum in your career.
As it is, evenings are about having dinner, going through emails and watching TV for a couple of hours. Weekends are laundry, shopping and recovery. I'm living to work, not working to live. I'm not afraid of hard work, but I think I'm better suited to bursts of it with an end goal in mind rather than year after year of it.
The offshore thing is appealing in this sense, if you have a decent rotation you've got a solid 3 or 4 weeks to travel, spend time with friends and family, or do something I actually enjoy, and only commuting once a month or so would allow me to live somewhere I actually want to live rather than being tied to being fairly close to a big city.
The fed up part is a bit less tangible - I don't feel like I am learning anything or achieving anything. I really envy people who can look at something and say "I built/designed/fixed that." Even on a fairly modest scale, I get more enjoyment and satisfaction from changing a head gasket or cutting a nice pile of firewood than I do from closing a deal.
And it's not that I don't see the value in sales or that I think it's all bulls
t and snake oil. It just doesn't excite me anymore int he slightest.
Procurement is looking like the most likely option, but also the least appealing as I suspect the same boredom/frustration will surface at some point. Perhaps it will with anything. Anyone actually made a sales-procurement switch? It's probably worth a thread of it's own. I guess at this stage I'm looking for inspiration as well in case there's omething I've missed completely!
A shift in priorities that comes with age - when I was 25 sales seemed the way to go - my boss drove a Ferrari, my team leader had a Rolex, the company finished work at 3pm on Friday and people piled into the pub over the road. I was living in London and earning decent money in good months and paying my rent in bad ones. Now I'm less motivated by Ferraris and Rolex watches, nice as they are, so the possibility of earning big money isn't so much of a draw.
Along side that I'm a bit more circumspect, if not jaded, as I realise that for everyone who does make big money in sales roles, probably 20 people quit and a further 20 spend their lives doing "ok" money wise, working long hours and getting fed up with it.
If I could work my way up to £65k over a few years I'd be pretty happy with that.
A far bigger driver would be time - as I mentioned I would love to do a 6 or 12 month contract and then be able to take a month off. This is just totally impractical with most sales roles. Even taking a couple of weeks off means coming back to a black hole, and changing jobs every 12 months means you never get anywhere or build up any sort of momentum in your career.
As it is, evenings are about having dinner, going through emails and watching TV for a couple of hours. Weekends are laundry, shopping and recovery. I'm living to work, not working to live. I'm not afraid of hard work, but I think I'm better suited to bursts of it with an end goal in mind rather than year after year of it.
The offshore thing is appealing in this sense, if you have a decent rotation you've got a solid 3 or 4 weeks to travel, spend time with friends and family, or do something I actually enjoy, and only commuting once a month or so would allow me to live somewhere I actually want to live rather than being tied to being fairly close to a big city.
The fed up part is a bit less tangible - I don't feel like I am learning anything or achieving anything. I really envy people who can look at something and say "I built/designed/fixed that." Even on a fairly modest scale, I get more enjoyment and satisfaction from changing a head gasket or cutting a nice pile of firewood than I do from closing a deal.
And it's not that I don't see the value in sales or that I think it's all bulls
t and snake oil. It just doesn't excite me anymore int he slightest.Procurement is looking like the most likely option, but also the least appealing as I suspect the same boredom/frustration will surface at some point. Perhaps it will with anything. Anyone actually made a sales-procurement switch? It's probably worth a thread of it's own. I guess at this stage I'm looking for inspiration as well in case there's omething I've missed completely!
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