Alternatives to 9-5 jobs after college

Parent Cafe
21

Not every desk job is boring. I am an independent project manager. I change clients every year or two. I often am managing multiple projects or one large project at a time. I am always learning new stuff and meeting new people. It isn’t fun every day, but usually isn’t dull except right at the very start and very end of an assignment.

In the past several years I’ve worked on helping an international bank make changes to business & systems for a major new tax law, managed the upgrade of software infrastructure components, managed moving a large system to a hosted vendor, helped a hospital resolve thousands of billing issues, helped two hospitals merge together, worked on making sure your credit card number is encrypted from the swipe and through the rest of the systems at a major big box retailer, helped a bank upgrade its wires system, and more.

22

This is very true! When we told our engineering colleagues that we wanted to start our own firm, most of them said, “Oh, I could never do that.” Really?? It’s not that hard. But they didn’t like the risk involved. From our viewpoint, though, we had been laid off more than once and knew that being an engineering employee is risky anyplace!

And we really enjoy our jobs. Like @mathmom said, we’re always doing something different - we design buildings, dams, and other structures. Right now DH is working on a defense project in Alaska, a high seismic zone. He’s using sophisticated software and having a blast. I am detailing precast concrete, which I enjoy because it’s a puzzle to fit all the pieces together correctly. :slight_smile:

23

I strongly disagree with the idea regular jobs don’t require creativity. Most professional jobs require creativity in solving problems. How closely your job relates to your major depends on your field. As for most jobs being boring, that’s life. I’m sure there are CPAs who find taxes fascinating. To anyone else, discussing corporate tax strategies is a good way to put them to sleep.

24

I don’t have a 9 to 5 job, many times it’s more like 8 to 8. And that would be 8pm to 8am. I would be much happier and feel far better if it was 9am to 5pm…though if it was M-F every week, I would not like that. Working during the day and sleeping at night is a happy month. I also get the excitement of working weekends and holidays. So there is something to be said about a regular schedule.

25

In addition to figuring out what your interests are as other commentators have noted is to look at your own personality in relation to those interests.
Some personality types/traits tend to mesh much better with some jobs than others.

For instance, those who are very creative and/or extreme “big picture” personalities tend to find jobs which are centered on mundane repetitive tasks or those involving meticulous details(A.k.a. getting lost in the weeds) to be a working nightmare whereas others have far less issues with that and may even enjoy it.

On the flipside, someone who are extreme “big picture” personalities who aren’t detailed oriented or hate that sort of thing aren’t likely to be happy or proficient working in jobs requiring meticulous attention to detail…such as troubleshooting engines or computer hardware systems.

Someone who is a very social and enjoys interacting with people on a daily basis is unlikely to be happy with a job which requires them to work alone for long periods(sometimes for entire work days/weeks). On the flipside, someone who isn’t very social or prefers to work alone may not be happy working on a large team full of social extroverts or customer service.

One thing to consider is taking a personality test like the Myers-Brigg to see what your personality type is and see which jobs are likely to suit you best…while also being mindful of the fact one’s tested personality type isn’t necessarily one’s fatalistic destiny.

26

Just some friendly advice here: You will find adult life much more tolerable if you pick up some hobbies outside of work and enjoy them frequently. Take charge of your life, and don’t rely on the job market for happiness and personal satisfaction as you can’t always control what happens. In other words, if you love your life outside of work, you will not need to have a rockstar job in order to find happiness. If you are able to find one of those rockstar jobs, great… but you don’t need one to be happy, and that’s the point.

The reason so many people take high paying but “boring” jobs is because they are able to comfortably fund their lifestyles outside of work (i.e. own a nice home in a nice neighborhood, eat out at nice restaurants, go on vacations, send their kids to college, buy cool toys, etc.), and that is more important to them. At the end of the day, work is work – you take the best job you can get, and learn to create a comfortable lifestyle around it.

27

Can I give your post ten stars, @fractalmstr? Well said. Even an avid workaholic needs a hobby or some life outside of work, because chances are high that person will retire or be forced out of work at some point later in life. This is what happened to my FIL - he lived to do his work. When it become physically challenging for him to do what he thought of as his life, he reluctantly agreed to retire. And he was dead within two years. No hobbies, no interests outside of his widgets. All he did was sit on the sofa, watch TV, and reminisce about past work. No interest in grandkids, gardens, hiking, book clubs, volunteering, etc. - anything a typical retiree would enjoy.

28

That only works if one’s high paying, but boring job allows adequate free time for sleep and life outside of work.

Jobs which require an understated minimum of 60-70 hours a week(i.e. biglaw, ibanking, consulting, medical doctor(especially at the intern/residency stage), startup/business owner, etc) are ones in which one ideally should like what they do at the very least.

It’s a reason why one startup co-owner cousin has no issue happily working 100+ hour workweeks(he really LOVES what he does) and why several biglaw associates I worked with quit after a few years (Found they hated working in a biglaw environment and ended up burnt out).

29

True Cobrat, but situations like that are not ordinary. Your cousin, while happy right now, may not be happy in 2 years… you never know. His passion for what he does is ultimately reliant on an economic market that can accommodate his start-up, and who knows what that market will be like in 2 years. I mean, I wish your cousin luck in his business, but telling people – especially young people – that the key to happiness in life is getting that glamorous rockstar job is irresponsible advice, IMHO.

These types of jobs should be thought of as an added perk to an already great life, not a requirement for a great life.

30

He’s actually been at it for over a decade and that startup has expanded greatly since then and he’s doing very well.

And my point isn’t that he should be getting a glamourous rockstar job…especially considering many of those may actually end up being like the very types of jobs in which one must like what one does because the nature of the job/profession is such one won’t have much free time for a life outside of work or sleep.

It’s more to be discerning of the jobs one seeks…whether they’re the glamourous rockstar jobs or the “boring ones” so one can ensure one has enough free time outside of work for sleep and a life(hobbies).

31

Healthcare, law enforcement. 24/7/365

32

We all had to pay our dues, in the beginning. Kids may envision the grand moments in their working lives and forget you have to work it and prove out, to get there.

The poster’s relative could choose to put sleep in his schedule. Doctors do, police do, even folks working on some cutting edge, high priority project (like in the days before the rocket launches,) can work it out over time. The firefighters on the line now are working long shifts, but then getting some downtime.

This is different than being a workaholic and trying to convince others there is no choice. Different than seeing yourself as indispensible.

33

Working 100+ hour weeks isn’t healthy. If you’re consistently working 14+ hours a day, 7 days a week, you’re not getting enough sleep.

34

Of course there are alternatives to a 9-5 job. I started out with a 7:15-4:30 job, for instance. Lately, I’m working an 8-8 job.

:smiley:

Seriously, you’re not giving the wise folks here much to work with. What do you regard as boring? What do you regard as interesting? What are you planning on majoring in? What is your dream job?

35

“I’m just sick of the promise of college getting you a “real job” with no creativity,”

I don’t buy the “no creativity” assumption. There are a LOT of jobs. There are also a LOT of types of “creativity”. You don’t have to be an artist drawing pictures to be creative. There can be creativity in the way that a piece of software is designed, or a septic system is designed, or a mathematical problem is solved, or many other things. This might depend upon what you mean by “creativity”.

Also, jobs don’t have to be inside an office. I used to know someone who was a forestry major and worked outside in the woods for most of his career (with black flies, be careful what you wish for). Obviously teachers and professors stand up in classrooms and teach students, then return to offices for office hours or labs for research or a different classroom to teach different students. Various health professionals deal with a wide range of patients. EMTs get to visit people in their homes (and try to save their lives in some cases).

“And the reality of it is most times you don’t even get a job,”

You have some influence on this depending upon what you major in. Some majors do indeed provide little hope for a job in the major. Other majors provide you with a good chance of landing a related job.

There are several reasons to go to university. If you know what you want to do with your career and if your desired career is one where you need a university degree, then getting into that career is one reason to go to university. If you know that you like a particular field (for example biology) you might not know what careers are available in that field. For first year or two studying it in university may both provide you with some exposure to what different subfields exist and what jobs exist in those subfields, and also prepare you for more detailed study in a particular subfield.

One fact of life is that at some point you are going to have to support yourself. You are going to need to have some way to bring in enough money to pay the rent, buy food, buy clothes, pay taxes, and if you have kids to support them. For the vast majority of us that means that you need some sort of job. In most cases you have a better chance for that job to make use of some creativity and/or pay well if it is a job that requires a lot of specific knowledge, such as what you might gain from studying at a university.

One reason that many parent encourage their children to get jobs while in high school, is so that the children can get a sense of what jobs are available to someone with at most a high school education. In many cases this motivates students to want to do well in university in a field that will allow them to get a job where they can use their intelligence and creativity and where they can do well.

36

It’s true, graduated and landed a well paying, good benefits, boring 7-3:30 “electrical engineering” job with state government. Someone said when she worked in private it was 10 times more interesting. It’s different than college in what feels like a world where nobody is your age or same stage in life at work and outside. Also concurrently going to graduate school to advance opportunities later on can lock up the rest of your life. But financially, it’s pretty solid. Can purchase a house soon once I lock down where I actually want to work…