Career snakes and ladders.
Discussion
I gradually worked my way up the career ladder in construction starting off as a trainee estimator working my way through the positions of junior surveyor, surveyor, senior surveyor and survey team leader to the heady heights of commercial manager. I assumed that being reasonably good at my job and experience would eventually get me to the heady heights of commercial director at some point in my 50s and from there cruise to retirement. Job done.
Then the credit crunch hit and construction took a hammering guys in other industries would not believe. My last management tasks were to sack all my staff before visiting my line manager to be chopped in turn.
Since then I have suffered periods of unemployment, worked freelance and even did a spell of mucking out stables and dog walking (best jobs I've ever had as far as enjoyment and job satisfaction were concerned) before landing a full time position as just another surveyor in a large construction company specialising in social housing repair and renovation work.
I'm nearly fifty now (very nearly 50
), in a fairly junior position, my CV is a mess, the industry is full of old guys with very similar career paths and recent experience as myself and it's also full of younger guys who were in the right place at the right time to have progressed their careers through the recession with intact career paths and having picked up all the most recent and relevant training in current management and technical practice. What's more I always get the feeling guys like that are very wary of guys like me and keep us on tasks where our long experience and technical knowledge never gets a chance to shine on the off chance that if it did we could present ourselves as competition for future promoted post.
I have the feeling that when playing career snakes and ladders if the player hits a snake, particularly older players, there wont be any more ladders. I suppose I should count myself lucky. Within my circle of friends and ex colleagues there are some very able older people who haven't even managed to gain junior positions within their old professions.
Then the credit crunch hit and construction took a hammering guys in other industries would not believe. My last management tasks were to sack all my staff before visiting my line manager to be chopped in turn.
Since then I have suffered periods of unemployment, worked freelance and even did a spell of mucking out stables and dog walking (best jobs I've ever had as far as enjoyment and job satisfaction were concerned) before landing a full time position as just another surveyor in a large construction company specialising in social housing repair and renovation work.
I'm nearly fifty now (very nearly 50
), in a fairly junior position, my CV is a mess, the industry is full of old guys with very similar career paths and recent experience as myself and it's also full of younger guys who were in the right place at the right time to have progressed their careers through the recession with intact career paths and having picked up all the most recent and relevant training in current management and technical practice. What's more I always get the feeling guys like that are very wary of guys like me and keep us on tasks where our long experience and technical knowledge never gets a chance to shine on the off chance that if it did we could present ourselves as competition for future promoted post.I have the feeling that when playing career snakes and ladders if the player hits a snake, particularly older players, there wont be any more ladders. I suppose I should count myself lucky. Within my circle of friends and ex colleagues there are some very able older people who haven't even managed to gain junior positions within their old professions.
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