Ever felt trapped in a good job?
Discussion
An odd one I know, lots of people are out of work, etc...
I seem to have spent 10 years painting myself into a corner career-wise. Now I'm basically a very good sales engineer, problem is, I prefer the engineer to the sales and I've not been an actual engineer as per my degree for 10 years. I can't afford to go back to a graduate salary, but I think my only way to progress in my current job is more of the sales, which means a couple of weeks at a time away from home, which is too long (currently do about a week max).
The not having savings and needing to pay the mortgage aside, I don't feel like I can work for myself as my main skill is selling other people's stuff and learning and understanding someone else's product. It's not like I'm a 3D CAD modeller who can now buy their own setup and freelance.
My job is fine, the people are very nice, but I don't see where I can go with it. I'm pretty much department manager in deeds if not title and salary. To be honest, a bit of recognition of that fact would be a good start.
I seem to have spent 10 years painting myself into a corner career-wise. Now I'm basically a very good sales engineer, problem is, I prefer the engineer to the sales and I've not been an actual engineer as per my degree for 10 years. I can't afford to go back to a graduate salary, but I think my only way to progress in my current job is more of the sales, which means a couple of weeks at a time away from home, which is too long (currently do about a week max).
The not having savings and needing to pay the mortgage aside, I don't feel like I can work for myself as my main skill is selling other people's stuff and learning and understanding someone else's product. It's not like I'm a 3D CAD modeller who can now buy their own setup and freelance.
My job is fine, the people are very nice, but I don't see where I can go with it. I'm pretty much department manager in deeds if not title and salary. To be honest, a bit of recognition of that fact would be a good start.
Vaud said:
Can you split the sales bit?
In our world we would be sold to by:
I'd say my current job is like the second one. After sales and maintenance worldwide. To "progress" careers wise I'd have to be a regional sales manager like the first one. Whereas what I actually want is to be recognized (title and financially) that I actually run that whole side of the business.In our world we would be sold to by:
- An account manager/sales person who leads the relationship, sales chasing, stakeholders, right through to the invoice and delivery. And then they vanish.
- A presales technical lead, who carries the technical conversation, integration issues, spec, etc. Less of a hard sell, more of a technical competence sell. Talks to different people. They generally sustain the conversation past delivery as well working with operations to ensure any tweaks are made, and that can lead to further sales.
I'm going to talk to my boss about it first chance I get. If it doesn't go my way I guess I have to either suck it up or eventually leave.
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