The 5 year plan to £50k
- Thread starter FoxEye
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Business lingo bingo right there.
You got a full house
Haha, no disrespect to you Freefaller as its just the environment you work in but reading that made me want to blow my brains out.
One I used to hate was when you'd be having a chat in person and suddenly they'd stop and say "can we take this offline", argh makes me cringe.
Just graduated with a degree in CS at age 22, going into a job in September starting at 36k. My role is 'IT Analyst' but it will involve a bit of support, infrastructure projects and various bits and pieces. Currently aiming to just save money for a deposit, me and my girlfriend (also a new graduate and about to start a masters in marketing) are on track for a 50k deposit within two years and we are looking at moving north so that should put us in a nice position for a sizable house, I currently live in Kent and its fine but housing costs are astronomical.
Hi
Just want to focus down on this paragraph for a moment.
Did your self-taught programming skills help you land this job? I notice it was a management job rather than strictly a dev job. Did you have to demonstrate those programming skills to get the job? Or was the job more about managing a team rather than doing development yourself?
Curious to know, as most jobs involving programming in any capacity expect you to have a portfolio of work you can demonstrate, and normally years of experience in a similar role.
Yes, definitely. Whilst the role I got was 'management' in terms of level, it was a mix of managing a small team and also being hands-on in the development of a new data warehouse/BI environment + analytical applications. In theory I was responsible for defining business requirements, communicating these to the 'true techies' in the team and agreeing what needed to be developed, validating/QA through the development process etc. In practice I ended up 'rolling up my sleeves' and writing SQL, developing applications etc. as well when necessary to hit deadlines.
However, to your point about technical portfolios - no I didn't need to have one to get the role, as I was not 'in theory' supposed to actually be doing the technical work. However the fact that I could do it (helping out where necessary, and also holding the techies to account where they were slacking or doing things in stupid ways) added a lot of value.
I'm convinced that having a strong mix of business and technical skills is key to where my career has taken me. We really struggle to recruit consultants who have strong industry/business knowledge but also have good technical skills too. Whilst I don't do much hands-on coding work nowadays and am horribly out-of-date on development tools and languages I am still very capable of doing the 'holding to account' bit from a design perspective.
I earned relatively little earlier on in my career (I'm a software developer). Started out earning £8k (in 1995).
By the time I was 30 I was earning about £32k working as a web developer for a medium sized asset manager. 6 years after that, at the same company, I'd moved up to £50k (£67k with the bonus) and hit the ceiling for that company (by then, working as a developer for the front office). But I was growing bored and I'd just been turned down for a role in the architecture team.
I moved on, not really for that much more money, but for a better working environment and more prospects. The company in question was a large hedge fund. The date was August 2008. Join the dots...
Luckily, I survived several culls and made it out the other side. Since then, I've simply taken on more and more responsibility (currently run 3 development teams and I'm on the senior management team for the group). Done all the jobs that no-one else would do, and run the teams that no-one else wanted to run.
The pay is now really good, as is the job, and way beyond what I thought I would be doing and earning by now (I'm 45). Although I still do write and ship code.
I guess the point is, you don't have to jump company, you just need to find the right one - one that will recognise and reward being good at your job (and not just a "hard worker", which doesn't mean anything really) and make the best use of your skills.
By the time I was 30 I was earning about £32k working as a web developer for a medium sized asset manager. 6 years after that, at the same company, I'd moved up to £50k (£67k with the bonus) and hit the ceiling for that company (by then, working as a developer for the front office). But I was growing bored and I'd just been turned down for a role in the architecture team.
I moved on, not really for that much more money, but for a better working environment and more prospects. The company in question was a large hedge fund. The date was August 2008. Join the dots...
Luckily, I survived several culls and made it out the other side. Since then, I've simply taken on more and more responsibility (currently run 3 development teams and I'm on the senior management team for the group). Done all the jobs that no-one else would do, and run the teams that no-one else wanted to run.
The pay is now really good, as is the job, and way beyond what I thought I would be doing and earning by now (I'm 45). Although I still do write and ship code.
I guess the point is, you don't have to jump company, you just need to find the right one - one that will recognise and reward being good at your job (and not just a "hard worker", which doesn't mean anything really) and make the best use of your skills.
I'm 29 and work in motor claims. I started as a claims handler 8 years ago on £12k, now a manager of 20 earning £30k, plus £5k overtime a year, company car and potential to earn £10k a year bonus depending on performance. Bonus is near impossible to hit though so very unlikely I'll be getting that!
I want £50k basic but my role has nearly hit the ceiling already in terms of salary, so will have to move on to get it.
I want £50k basic but my role has nearly hit the ceiling already in terms of salary, so will have to move on to get it.
Freefaller said:It's a good target to aim for!What do you when you've exceeded doubling your age? 2.5? 3x?
I used to have a target like this, and then it all went out the window. It's a great aim and really motivates you, but you can smash 80k at 40 no problem. If you have 5yrs left to get to 40, and you're just shy of 60k now, you should have seriously no bother. You'd probably get that in 2 with one strategic move.
Go smash it
When at uni it sounded like a good thing to aim for. Now, in this industry if I was "only" on £100k at 50 I'd probably be feeling rather underpaid.
It doesn't help now that I'm paid in $ which also changes things significantly, so it's all out the window.
Now my aim is just to be paid well and not have too much responsibility. Stay technical and do the 9-5 thing, or a little contracting for even more time off. Perhaps in the future that will change, but at the moment I'd rather keep the stress down.
Get some cash for a nice house, nice holidays and a few toys.
Edit: I look at pretty pictures, make the occasional pretty picture and occasionally hope to find something... (geoscientist in oil and gas). Whether it's the same industry by the time I'm 50 who knows!
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Soldato
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Can sympathise with the OP, we seem to share lots of very similar traits (although thankfully not cats) - similar age as well.
Can't offer any advice really, moving out hasn't changed my life a great deal other than obviously having my own place, but it hasn't magically opened up a world of opportunities, it's overrated.
Work has never interested me -as in the sense that the typical advice of trying to follow a career path of personal interest - well I don't really have any so from that point of view jobs seem pretty pointless, so coming from that angle you just have to settle on the fact you'll always be doing a job you hate, as for that matter a great percentage of 'regular' people do already.
I have no answers or advice, just sympathy for your lack of ability to change you situation, pretty much your whole situation is the same as mine except for the cat and £40k in the bank.
Can't offer any advice really, moving out hasn't changed my life a great deal other than obviously having my own place, but it hasn't magically opened up a world of opportunities, it's overrated.
Work has never interested me -as in the sense that the typical advice of trying to follow a career path of personal interest - well I don't really have any so from that point of view jobs seem pretty pointless, so coming from that angle you just have to settle on the fact you'll always be doing a job you hate, as for that matter a great percentage of 'regular' people do already.
I have no answers or advice, just sympathy for your lack of ability to change you situation, pretty much your whole situation is the same as mine except for the cat and £40k in the bank.
Nonsense. It's the negativity in your post that stops you from achieving much. It's not about money or materialistic thing. It's about being happy in your own skin. And you don't sound that at all.
@Telecaster: If you really are anything like me, then my sincere commiserations
I can only speak for myself in answering grudas. I'm not sure what being "happy in my own skin" means, or feels like. I do know that I've never had any confidence or self-belief, and that most of that stems from a sincere belief that I'm completely deficient in <something> that other "normal" people possess. I can't put my finger on what it is, but I keep telling myself I must be different, because the situation I'm in is completely abnormal, and far from ideal. How can everyone else be so at ease in this world, when to me this world feels completely alien. Everything from talking to people, to getting a job, to you name it... it all feels like it's not for me. Like it's above and beyond me. Incomprehensible. Futile.
I honestly can't see a way forwards in many aspects of my life, from work to relationships. It's maddening.
How can you do anything when everything seems futile. Impossible. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh! OK it's late and (when I'm tired) my brain loses its ability to filter out the crap I should post from the crap I shouldn't, so I should definitely stop posting for today. Nobody wants to hear my self-indulgent crap anyhow.
But telling me to "be positive" is like telling a monkey to fly to the moon Something's just wired all wrong up there. My brain is fubar
I can only speak for myself in answering grudas. I'm not sure what being "happy in my own skin" means, or feels like. I do know that I've never had any confidence or self-belief, and that most of that stems from a sincere belief that I'm completely deficient in <something> that other "normal" people possess. I can't put my finger on what it is, but I keep telling myself I must be different, because the situation I'm in is completely abnormal, and far from ideal. How can everyone else be so at ease in this world, when to me this world feels completely alien. Everything from talking to people, to getting a job, to you name it... it all feels like it's not for me. Like it's above and beyond me. Incomprehensible. Futile.
I honestly can't see a way forwards in many aspects of my life, from work to relationships. It's maddening.
How can you do anything when everything seems futile. Impossible. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh! OK it's late and (when I'm tired) my brain loses its ability to filter out the crap I should post from the crap I shouldn't, so I should definitely stop posting for today. Nobody wants to hear my self-indulgent crap anyhow.
But telling me to "be positive" is like telling a monkey to fly to the moon
Something's just wired all wrong up there. My brain is fubar 
Soldato
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Yes well that's pretty obvious. I can only echo what Foxeye wrote in response to you. Hard to be happy in a life that seems completely at odds with everything you believe.
The normal bit of their brain that everyone else seems to possess from birth appears to be missing, all the normal things people take for granted and don't think twice about seem like abstract ideas to me and completely abnormal.
are we talking about autism here?
Soldato
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I've no idea what it is, just explaining how I feel.
I've no interest in relationships with people, I try to avoid them at all costs which is hard at work.
Never spoke to anyone about it? A diagnosis later in life won't do a lot but at least it confirms your suspicions you're different.
There's still careers out there if you struggle with the social element of work, engineering and science sector has plenty of roles where you're mostly left to your own devices.
There's still careers out there if you struggle with the social element of work, engineering and science sector has plenty of roles where you're mostly left to your own devices.
Yeah - my friend works in software sales pulls over £100k and says it's a complete doddle. Makes me feel a bit ill tbh
Not just about the money... got to factor in working hours and stress. Sometimes I do regret my career choice for these reasons (law related) - I earn what I consider to be quite a lot of money but, my god, there's got to be much easier ways of earning it.
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