Has anyone had a big career change?

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#1284891 15-Apr-2015 16:21

KiwiNZ:
HTroy:

I found corporate life just isn't me, due to specialisation the roles have too little variation. I like the broad range required by self employment.

I have heard mortgage brokering work can be easier than insurance brokering, because people tend to seek out mortgage brokers but not insurance brokers. Several insurance brokers now do mortgage brokering to generate leads for their insurance brokering.

Where are you based?

Palmerston North, but there is a two hour commuter train to Wellington that has plugs and tables for laptops so I can reply to emails and do work during that time. It beats driving to Wellington, as I can't do any work if I'm driving.

New Zealander's are somewhat under-insured for everything from house, health, life and job-loss insurance. But at least those people are potential customers for brokers.

We used a Mike Pero mortgage broker once and he was pretty good. At the time it made me think I could do that job, but when I looked into broker jobs on Seek all of them said "experienced only". Did you just apply anyway?

If you are interested in a position and it says "experienced only" apply anyway. The worse they can say is no and they cant say that or different if they don't know you.

A job advertisement is a listing of the requirements of the 'Perfect' candidate, if you have about half the requirements give the advertiser a call, submit your CV, and then during the interview sell them on your personality.

Regarding the insurance brokering role, I was quite lucky, as through church I met someone who knew someone.
For you, how about ringing up that broker from Mike Pero?
I'm based in Hamilton.

dickytim

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#1285266 16-Apr-2015 06:57

I went from Logisitcs to IT consultancy last year and absolutely love the new career, which I hope to make it.

Logistics seems to be such a negative field to work in where IT projects feels somewhat constructive.

I count myself lucky that my current employer had enough faith to hire on attitude above experience, a risk that I believe they feel paid off well :)

JimmyC

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#1285628 16-Apr-2015 14:20

I was a professional musician for 10 years (ie: made a living solely from performing and recording). During the latter years, recording was moving from tape to hard disk and I found myself getting into computers more seriously. I decided I really enjoyed the subject matter (and certainly a regular income!) and managed to get an entry level IT support role. Over the next couple of years I completed my MCSE and stepped up to a systems engineer role. Been doing that now for 15 years, adding in service delivery and project management along the way. Personally, I see the traditional systems engineer role being largely obsolete in 5-10 years time, with cloud and managed services taking over the brunt of the workload. It pays to be flexible, adaptable, and never be too stingy to learn something new.

I don't look at my job as a career incidentally. My job is what I do, it's not who I am. I admire people who merge those two and live their jobs, but I haven't found that level of satisfaction yet, and frankly can't imagine such a role.

Whenever this subject comes up I keep thinking about an interview someone did with Paul Henry quite a few years ago. Paul used to be a foreign correspondent type journalist before moving to TV. He was asked whether he thought the move to television would hurt his career in journalism, and he replied - "I don't have a career, I have a life". That really struck a note with me.

andrew027

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#1285643 16-Apr-2015 14:48

My career has evolved, rather than radically changed. I started off as an IBM mainframe computer operator, then got into hardware and software technical support, then into systems programming, then training operators and programmers, then soft skills and leadership training, then training and instructional design, then training management which included working with external training suppliers, which lead to general vendor and contract management. Then I got laid off and, after being out of work for seven months, used my instructional design skills to get a job as a technical writer on a government IT project, taught myself content management theory along the way, and now I manage and administer a knowledge base for a large government department.

I'm all for people making a change in their careers provided thay have done the maths and can live as comnfortably as they'd like on the money they'll earn, but I always wonder about travel agents. The last two times I went to travel agents (about three years ago now) I told them what I wanted and they put together the cheapest deal they could, but it still seemed expensive to me so I went home and spent about two hours on the internet looking at options myself and saved literally thousands.

sep11guy

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#1285649 16-Apr-2015 14:52

andrew027: The last two times I went to travel agents (about three years ago now) I told them what I wanted and they put together the cheapest deal they could, but it still seemed expensive to me so I went home and spent about two hours on the internet looking at options myself and saved literally thousands.

Happened to me last 2-3 times as well. Going forward, i think many wont bother with agents ( unless like for complex itineraries were you require support etc ) , people would just book online. easy and simple and the agents online are pretty much same as brick and mortar agents.

Looks like they could go the video ezy way !!

Handsomedan

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#1285658 16-Apr-2015 15:01

I've made several career changes in my life.

I left school at 15 to become a hairdresser.
After completing my apprenticeship and working for a few years, I decided to become a sales rep - first step - selling mobile solutions and digital PABX's, as I knew nothing about either.

Did that for a bit and changed jobs/products/industries, but stayed in sales for a while.

Went to the UK and dropped back into hairdressing (as it was something I was good at and knew how to do on the fly), after a prerequisite pub job.

Woke up one day and decided to be a banker. Wrote up a decent CV and got myself a job in Credit Control for a major UK bank.

Came back to NZ and fell back into finance/banking in various roles, before changing tack again and becoming a Relationship Manager in a totally unrelated field.

One day I woke up and became Head of Sales for a large Global organisation and promptly enjoyed that for a couople of years before falling back into banking and becoming an institutional banker.

And here I am, 30-odd years after the journey started, looking after relationships again...loosely in banking, but kind of on the periphery.

I do wonder what's next...

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Nezratul

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#1285669 16-Apr-2015 15:23

Hi there,

I think that money isn't everything.
Few years a go I was working in one sales position and earning about 1,7 - 2 k$ (NZD $) in month, but I could still have fun and travel around. In Finland if you earn under 2k$, government says that you are in low income class and will get some benefits from the "system"(government). I was happy with my job, but then they fired me and 10 others. Notice that 2000$ in Finland is about 3000$ in New Zealand, reason for that is difference in cost of living.

At same time when I was working on the sales company, I started my own company which was based on my idea to have Power over Ethernet automation system for home, office and industrial purposes. When I got kicked out from that sales position I started to run the company and my monthly income dropped from 0$ to 1400$. I was still very happy because the job which I was working with was so f'ing fun! I loved every minute and every second while I was doing it.
Well.. Then there was "one guy" who kinda robbed us and I had to quit on that business..

One medical software company heard that I was looking for a job and they offered sales engineer position. I took the position and my salary jumped to 3500$/month and work was much easier than in the first place where I was earning 1,7k-2k. In few months my salary started to grow(because of sales provisions) and I was earning 7000-8000$ per month. But Still. I wasn't happy. Actually I wanted to quit.

It took me 8 monts to understand that I was suddenly getting sick and over stressed in that position. Nothing was fun anymore and everyday I hated to go work, because it felt like I don't belong there.. Same time my girlfriend was planning to go travel in New Zealand and I made my decision that I would like to go travel with her.

And now I'm here :) Looking for job and new opportunities, new experiences and new friends.

The thing I wanted to point out.. Is, that do what ever you really like to do. In most jobs you don't get paid to well, but you may enjoy every moment doing that job. If you are happy in your worklife, you may be more happier in your civil life too!

I learned that I'm happy when I'm doing something that interests me and gives me correct challenge (what ever it may be..). The good salary is always a good salary, but it doesn't make you happy, if the other factors in your work is against you.

P.S. Sorry about my bad English :)

Engineer

jarledb

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#1285674 16-Apr-2015 15:27

sep11guy:
andrew027: The last two times I went to travel agents (about three years ago now) I told them what I wanted and they put together the cheapest deal they could, but it still seemed expensive to me so I went home and spent about two hours on the internet looking at options myself and saved literally thousands.

Happened to me last 2-3 times as well. Going forward, i think many wont bother with agents ( unless like for complex itineraries were you require support etc ) , people would just book online. easy and simple and the agents online are pretty much same as brick and mortar agents.

Looks like they could go the video ezy way !!

Yes, at least for fairly easy travels the travel agencies are already redundant. And more and more sites allows you to book fairly complex travels with various stops etc.

To me the industry has more or less already changed into a commodities industry, and working for a traditional travel agency is not a future proof job at all.

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toyonut

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#1286221 17-Apr-2015 12:44

Yep, I went from a plastics engineering job back to study a Bachelor of applied Theology with the intention of becoming a youth pastor. Alongside studying I worked with special needs kids and in a care program and in a respite house. I also worked in a friends desert shop for a while. Working with special need kids was hugely rewarding but super low pay.
My wife got pregnant and we had all sorts of not so cool stuff come from that which I won't go into here. I dropped out of the BAT as I couldn't cope with study.
A friend asked me to help him sort some computers out that were being used for test environments. I picked a few things up and went on to help him set up a System Center environment with a Hyper-V server and then manage the environment. I managed VM's and when an offer came up for a role in the TS department full time, I applied and got it. I have picked up a lot in a couple of years and I love working in IT. I learn new things every day and really enjoy it.

Try Vultr using this link and get us both some credit:

http://www.vultr.com/?ref=7033587-3B

HTroy

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#1288455 21-Apr-2015 13:01

andrew027: The last two times I went to travel agents (about three years ago now) I told them what I wanted and they put together the cheapest deal they could, but it still seemed expensive to me so I went home and spent about two hours on the internet looking at options myself and saved literally thousands.

This is a good point - I do wonder if Webjet and similar companies will bankrupt travel agencies soon.

We got married in Rarotonga to have a "cheap" get-away wedding and used House of Travel as the agents. It cost us literally thousands of dollars and they screwed up the dates so we ended up getting married on a Monday! Everyone loves Mondays, right? Who wouldn't want to marry on a Monday after all the money we'd spent? I wish we'd just married in our own backyard.

DravidDavid

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#1288474 21-Apr-2015 13:22

HTroy:
andrew027: The last two times I went to travel agents (about three years ago now) I told them what I wanted and they put together the cheapest deal they could, but it still seemed expensive to me so I went home and spent about two hours on the internet looking at options myself and saved literally thousands.

This is a good point - I do wonder if Webjet and similar companies will bankrupt travel agencies soon.

We got married in Rarotonga to have a "cheap" get-away wedding and used House of Travel as the agents. It cost us literally thousands of dollars and they screwed up the dates so we ended up getting married on a Monday! Everyone loves Mondays, right? Who wouldn't want to marry on a Monday after all the money we'd spent? I wish we'd just married in our own backyard.

Travel agencies from what I understand are for rich people who want to go on an over-seas adventure but don't care where they go and want to put very little effort in to making it all happen. You pay a premium for that.

We could have booked our Wellington trip/tour through a travel agent too for a bazillion dollars, but instead we bought last minute flights for $30.00 each, packed a day bag and called the tour company ourselves. Not too difficult. We did a weekend Wellington getaway for sub $200.00 before returning Sunday night. Got to bed on time too :)

My parents on the other hand had a travel agent plan their trip to Canada to do all the touristy things along the way. They ended up forking out $30,000 for the whole trip!

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Handsomedan

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#1288570 21-Apr-2015 15:24

We used a travel agent to book our family escape to the Gold Coast last year.

To do it ourselves would have given us an enormous headache and would have saved us maybe a hundred bucks. I looked into it - it was simply too hard.

The travel agent handled it all for us, made it easy, hassle-free and fun.

I'd use them again in a heartbeat.

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Starlith

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#1288788 21-Apr-2015 20:44

I used to be a marine engineer in the Navy, I was in the job for 7 years. My career stalled and I lost the love so I backpacked around Europe for 4 months and got a job in London as a 1st/2nd line service desk. Been in the job for 3 months, best decision I ever made. Anyone know if my experience here would be useful in getting a job at home? I have no IT quals but I'm considering doing a degree when I get back.

Handle9

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#1288798 21-Apr-2015 21:10

I started out as an electronics product development engineer (I did electronics engineering at uni). I worked in product development for about 3 years, then changed jobs, got made redundant and them couldn't find a job for a few weeks. I got a job in technical sales then moved after a few years to where I work now.

I've had four roles in 9 years, I'm now ops/project manager running a small team of engineers. All the role have had their strengths but I have come to the conclusion, for me, "life style" is a bit over rated. I'm happiest when I very busy and a bit stressed. If I'm not like that I get bored, lazy and grumpy. My wife reckons I'm a nightmare when I'm not flat tack at work.

Each role I've gone into has paid better than the last but the ones I've gone to for the challenge have ended up much better than the ones I've gone to for money.

Brawler

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#1292035 26-Apr-2015 22:39

I'm looking to change careers at age 32, I am currently a qualified mechanical engineering and looking to work in the programming industry. I applied at Victoria University to study computer science to get me going on my new career path. Is IT a good career in NZ at the moment ?

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