This is a really interesting thread. However, earnings alone mean virtually nothing, as you could earn very little (as we do) but pay comparatively little in bills etc.; or, conversely, you could earn £4K a month but lose most of it on the finance arrangement on your new house and the repayment of the loan with which you purchased your Audi R8. To put things in perspective, I had a temporary full time job last year and my wife and I had an aggregate annual income of about 20K, and we felt SO RICH... we were able to save £500-700 every month. Even the low-end salaries that some of you guys are describing seem like a lot to me... hell, 24K is a lot of money for some people! I'll be 32 in a week and I've just started Uni so that I can get a "proper" job. Studying for an Hons degree in Computer Arts and I know that I'm guaranteed all kinds of work after the 4 year course, however my goal isn't to climb any career ladders or to find success... I simply want to be able to provide for my family, consistently and securely.
Just saw this thread has been bumped again and saw all the talk of contractors in IT. I'm currently contracted and that applied to my previous post with salary.
I agree with what you're saying here. I firmly believe in the saying that 'the more you earn, the more you spend and the more you want'. I now work as a limited company, to provide my services as a contractor (as I'm sure most contractors do). My tax bill for this year was nearly double what my annual salary was, when I was 18 and working. It's digusting and amazing to look at now. Historically, the more I've earnt, the more I've spent; because my life has adapted to every pay rise. I've only now at 30, got to the point where I'm starting to dump large chunks in to savings, because I know that next year, I'm starting a family. Businesses certainly prefer contractors. They have to pay them more, but leaving off all the perks and holiday sickness does equal things out.
This is a ridiculous generalisation - depends on the business, depends on the role. Contractors are great to accommodate ebb and flow, no doubt about that, but for anything else there's pros and cons of either side of the fence. Filling strategic roles with contractors is an awesome way to drive a business to the ground - I've seen it first hand on more than one occasion.
Agree Tad completely. There are roles in my team which suit contractors perfectly (and sometimes it is enforced as some projects come out of capex, therefore there is no ongoing budget to create roles from once the project is over, therefore contractors are actually pretty much the only option!) - and other roles I wouldn't dream of contracting.
Well, 6 months after applying for the post primary full time permanent version of my part time temporary job in the primary school, I heard back from the school today. I was not short listed for interview. As the summer drew to a close and the new academic year started, I was put under even more pressure and stress over the past few weeks. My job satisfaction there has gone from being sky high 9 months ago to being practically zero now. If I didn't have my other jobs to fall back on and enjoy, I don't know what state I'd be in by now.
For those interested, I published my first GitHub commit earlier: https://github.com/byronlcollier/WindowSizer (main code file is here https://github.com/byronlcollier/WindowSizer/blob/master/WindowResizer/frmMain.vb)
As I mentioned before, I was not shortlisted for interview at the school I applied to earlier in the year. Since I wrote that post, my job satisfaction has not improved any; in fact I'd say it's a shade worse on some days. This term has been pretty tough; I’ve been stolen from, lied to, forced into things at the last minute and expected to complete work in half the time it would normally take. My boss has had a short fuse of late, and I’ve been chewed out on three separate occasions for absolutely no reason. On one of those occasions there was a witness present, and the boss found me and apologized sincerely 15 minutes later, admitting that he was out of line. My morale in the job is completely shot to pieces at the moment. I still love the school, the kids and 99% of the people I'm working with, it's just the problem of it being a full time job and only having a part time post. The job itself is a thankless one. As much as I love most of the people I'm working with as well as the kids, and knowing the building (layout, infrastructure, systems etc.) like the back of my hand, it has seemed to me for the past 11 months that the management are not willing to make a commitment to me by increasing my hours or offering a full time, permanent post for what clearly is a full time job. For this reason, I applied for a full time permanent job (same rate & scale as I'm on at the moment) in a post-primary academy a while ago. I received a letter today informing me that I had been shortlisted for interview. If my interview next week goes well and I am offered the post, I still don't know if accepting it is the right thing to do. I have two other jobs to think about, which will both suffer if I am tied to a full time Mon-Fri 9-5 with a higher work load than the one I’m in at the moment (bigger school, post primary therefore more focus on ICT).
Thought I'd chime in, been a while since I last posted. So I ended up on a placement year last year with a salary of £21k (ish) which was quite a bit better than any other placements I'd been looking at. I'm now looking at graduate roles, and they seem to be mainly £25-30k, looking at software engineering type roles mainly. This also seems regardless of location, although I haven't looked at that many in London to see if they have the 'London bonus'.
This is in response to Uni, not George. Damn my slow typing hands! I can't quite recall what your other two jobs are, so this post might not have much merit... feel free to ignore if necessary! It all comes down to how you're prioritising the three jobs that you have. If the school post is really there to provide a steady bread-and-butter income and leave you with time to develop the other two jobs (I seem to recall you being self-employed?), then it comes down to whether working full-time will leave you enough scope to continue to develop the other jobs - presumably with the intention that if they get sufficiently off the ground they will become your main, full-time job(s). OTOH, working somewhere where you don't feel appreciated, your workload is unreasonable, your boss a dick and chances of promotion slim to none? No thanks! Especially given that you say that it's basically a full-time job but for part-time pay. Unfortunately, it seems to me that you might need to make some tough choices regarding which of the three jobs is the most important (and indeed most viable). Fair play to you for having three plates spinning simultaneously, but it doesn't sound like there are enough hours in a day to do all three without something having to give. Anyway, the most important thing is - good luck with the interview. Hope it goes well, and I hope that you end up being in a position to make the choice
Thanks for the reply. Primarily I am a freelance electronic, computer and network engineer, so you're right about the self employed part. That's supposed to be my full time job, however sometimes my school job takes precedent and the vast majority of my time and energy at the same time. So, my freelance work is closely followed by my school job (which is as a tier 2 ICT technician in a 450 pupil primary school with a staff of 65). My third job is mostly at weekends; General tech with a live sound, lighting & media production crew, my background is in media so I'm learning the ropes as far as lighting and sound go and passing any media knowledge to the rest of the guys. It's only a sideline, but one that I thoroughly enjoy. You're right, I took the school job to provide steady income which I could invest in getting my own startup off the ground. That's going all right, I'm not making a fortune but I'm earning a living at least, and I do still enjoy the work for the most part. I was in the unique and fortunate position for the first 18 months in school of being allowed to work as much overtime as I deemed necessary - this often saw my total working week amount to well over 30 hours per week, sometimes over 40 (contract is for 25), which was very useful both in that I achieved a lot and was paid a lot in that time. "Free reign" overtime was completely abolished early this year though, I'm told due to impending budget cuts and continuing pressure from the Board of Governors. So, my workload has increased, but the hours have decreased, so my stress level has skyrocketed and job satisfaction has plummeted. It doesn't help that I am constantly asked to peform duties which go above and beyond the call of duty/job description. I have, as the Principal has said on many occasions, a "wide and unique skill set" and so I didn't mind performing other tasks for the first 18 months or so, when I was being paid for the time that I walked through the door to the time that I finished that day's work, which as I've said was at my own discretion. Things are vastly different now. It's gone from being something that I really enjoy to something that I dread. I will repair something tomorrow, turn around and do something else, and by the time I've completed the next item on my list (I work from a line managers list now, can't be pulled in 5 directions at once any more... not supposed to be anyway) the thing I repaired half an hour ago will be broken again. Yes, I would say the workload is unreasonable, there are plenty of times that I feel unappreciated by some members of staff - there are many who do appreciate my workload and understand time scales etc. and overall I do not have the time required to get the ICT equipment in the school into the condition that I want it and correctly maintain it. All of the stress and disruption was caused by our 4 month long over budget, over time, overkill rennovation and heating system overhaul. It has put the entire staff, especially the SMT, under immense pressure and so far done more harm than good. There were days in September and October that I could not talk to a teacher in their own classroom for the noise of the Kango hammers, circular saws and SDS drills running in the background. The physical and mental mess it has left has definitely not made my job any easier. In the grand scheme of things, taking the full time job should I be offered it is the right career move to make. As loathed as I would be to leave the friends I've made and work I've started in the PS, there's no denying that the academy one a good post. I would have experienced, tier one ICT support staff (I have had one ICT student this year since September which has helped a little) whom I could delegate work to. It's a full time permanent job, as opposed to the part time temporary one I'm in at the moment. It would probably force me to put my freelance work on the back burner for a while; career wise I don't want to be an educational ICT technician for the rest of my life, my field and I would say "true calling" is still electronic engineering after all, but the academy job would provide a healthier steady income and a way to build towards my eventual goals. I could write a book on this... I have a lot to think about
Thanks for the detailed explanation - I was in the same place as Bawjaws where I could remember the broad overview of your situation but not the details. In general I agree with Bawjaws in that you cannot do everything all at once - we all have to make choices and often won't be apparent if it was the right or wrong one until long afterwards. I would suggest you need to decide what is most important to you. Is it your time to develop your other skills/business, your friends you have built up from your work, or having a sustainable steady income with probably less stress than currently? I would ask about your current situation - you say that you work of a list, do you have any input into prioritising this? As you are the one doing the work you can suggest that it would be good to work with your boss in setting the schedule (shows forward thinking, planning, and responsibility). I think if you decide to stay where you are, you need to learn how to say "no", and cut off your day at your scheduled time unless you are actually in the middle of a job (from my viewpoint anyway).
While we're updating this thread it's probably worth chiming in... So, a few weeks after the above post I was pulled aside into an ad hoc meeting with my senior manager. I honestly thought I'd completely f'ed something up and was in for a rollocking, but it was quite the opposite. I was given a promotion to the next grade up and a £3,736 pay rise to match it... Gobsmacked was an understatement - it's the first time I've ever been handed a pay rise and promotion without having to apply for something. Without really having to do anything I'd just been told that as of next month my annual pay will be £28,305 instead of £24,569. I found out later in the day that I didn't get this because I'm awesome and kick ass (I am and I do, but that's not the point ); the role I'm doing is supposed to be at the higher band anyway... I was just being brought into line with everyone else doing this role in other areas... Still, in the last 18 months my wages have gone up by a hair over £7,500 so I'm really not going to complain. Plus it's taken two months to get the pay rise sorted, and a nice little benefit of this is that my December wages will have a back-dated adjustment - nice little bonus for Christmas (it's just a shame I'm being pragmatic and spending it on debt! ). My job title is actually "Senior MI Analyst", but as far as my manager and my manager's manager is concerned I'm an "MI Developer": I'm the guy building the data and ETL back-ends that run our reports, not the more "analyst" type guy who designs the reports and makes endless changes at the behest of capricious stakeholders. The "Senior MI Analyst" role is supposed to be a mix of both analyst and development work, but I don't tend to get too involved with the analyst stuff. I've used "MI Developer" as my email signature and job title ever since I started. This is going to sound like I'm being a colossal douchebag, but I am the most talented developer on our team. I say that without any intention of hubris - my management chain has started realising and acknowledging this. The only person who is equal in technical skills (our primary weapons of choice are VBa and T-SQL) is now my manager and he rarely does any development work because he's always busy with manager-y stuff. My workload has skyrocketed lately and I'm having to shelve jobs for weeks because I simply don't have the time - jobs which should only take me half a day or so. To be effective we need at least two other people with skills that equal mine. I can't delegate any of the work that I have to anyone else because I know - and they know - they can't do it. We've tried, and it didn't end well. Ignoring the fact that I make a lousy trainer, I don't have time to train anyone else up to the same level because I've got too much bloody work to do. On a number of occasions I've actually asked my manager to tell me which of my priorities should be my priority - using exactly those words, I might add - and the response was basically "All of them". I refuse to work longer hours to compensate for the lack of resource on the team. I see what that does to people, such as our management and senior management team (including my direct line manager) who are still replying to emails on their Crackberries at 11:45 on a Sunday night, just so that they have a clear inbox ready for Monday. If I give an inch they will take two miles; it's happened to me in previous roles, it's happened to me in this role, and it happens to the people I work with. No way, f' that. I have no idea what I'm going to do next. This pay rise will give me a bit of breathing room for a while, so I'm in no great hurry. They're certainly in no rush to get rid of me: the team truly would be f'ed if I left and I know for a fact that there is no budget/scope for recruitment for the next few months at least. Basically as long as I don't f' something up royally I can take my time to plan where I want to go. My immediate priority is to pay down some debt, start getting some savings going and move house - I'd like to be a bit more "settled" before I start making decisions. The other half and I have quite a few credit cards and if we don't start bringing the balances down the repayments are going to start crippling us; hence spending my back-dated pay adjustment, and most of my annual bonus, on debt. We're toying with the idea of taking out another refinancing loan to clear the cards and bring down the repayments, but there's a nagging reminder in the back of my head that paying off debt with more debt is a bad idea. That makes it sound like things are pretty bleak but in reality it's not that bad; it's all under control and we're already paying far more than the minimum amount - I'd just like to be paying even less . We really do need to move out, so getting the bond together on a new place is going to be the next priority - I want to pay for it out of our own pocket this time, and not use a credit card. Basically, to cut the rambling short, the job f'ing sucks and so does the company I work for, but I'm coming to the realisation that things are actually quite positive. We're managing our debt and we'll soon have more than enough money coming in, so let's start worrying about the things we want to do in the future rather than just making sure the books are balanced each month. I'm not staying here, but I'm in a far better position than I've ever been; I can afford to take the time to put my house in order before I have to think about finding another job. At 32 I've been an "adult" now for 14 years, but I've only started to feel "grown up" within the last 3-4 months. Hell, at this rate we might even be able to have a proper holiday soon - it's only about 22 years overdue for me .
That's awesome news. It's nice to start feeling your worth in life and getting more of the results you expect. 30K for Cardiff, is that Good, the average or could be better? If the second two are the righter choices, then next year go for bigger!
All told, my annual "earnings" are around £32k, including annual bonus and benefits. According to Google (here, here and here) the average wage sits around £30k, although it does vary wildly depending on what you actually do. Generally pay in Cardiff is higher than the rest of Wales. Personally I think it could be better, I think somewhere in the region of £35k to £40k would be more like it for the kind of work that I do - although I do have a good grasp of programming in general, my bread and butter is T-SQL data analysis/extraction/transformation and data warehousing, so it's somewhat specialised. Many of the SQL Server jobs I've seen recently expect people to be versed in the DBA side of things as well, and the roles that specialise in one area or another tend to pay a little higher. I keep coming back to the idea that I want to be doing something that I enjoy doing - something I genuinely look forward to, and don't feel like it's a chore or just something I have to do. I have no idea what that is. Maybe it needs to be something that I have a personal stake in, i.e. some form of self-employment. I really enjoy electronics engineering and would like to do much more of that, I'm just not so sure I can make a career out of the hobbyist side of things. Even if I was earning more money I'm still not sure that the sort of work I do now is something that I would look forward to every day. But, for now, f' it. I'm in no rush. My working day stops when I leave the office at 4pm, and I've got far more important things to concentrate on.
I have my job interview this morning... Any last minute pointers? Something tells me I'm the first on their list as well, given how early it is. Not sure if that's a good thing or bad.
Late reply because yesterday was a hectic one! In all honesty I was disappointed with the interview, I think I could have done much better. The questions I was asked were not particularly difficult, but in hindsight there are a lot of things I wish I'd said which I wasn't able to work into my answers on the fly. The sad thing is that having seen the school (been in it, that is, I've driven past it countless times) and learned more about it, as well as having time to consider my options, I really want the job and would be prepared to leave my current one if offered it. I won't get my hopes up though, I think the interview could have gone a lot better. You never really know, maybe I made more of an impression than I think, but having thought about nothing else since I walked out of it I won't get my hopes up.
I wish I'd seen your post earlier, I would've tried to give you a couple of pointers (having recently been through quite a few interviews myself). I do wish you well with the decision. Being first or last in the interview day is a good sign, as the recruiters are much more likely to remember you which is always a good thing (unless, of course, you make an extremely bad impression). Don't worry too much about what you didn't say, sometimes it is good to stick to the points and not waffle - as long as your answers were comprehensive enough for the questions asked. It may be a good idea to write down the questions and your answers - did they mention a second interview at all, or will decide on the first one? I'm assuming that you asked plenty relevent questions at the end? This is often what can make you stand out compared to other candidates if the interview questions return fairly similar answers. On the more subtle points, ask yourself how you sat and how your voice actually sounded during the interview - these can make just as much an impression as your direct answers - if you sound confident you can convince a lot of people of anything!
