Work - Life Balance

[Section_31]

What's yours like?

 

My mate's brother-in-law is a partner in a London law firm and he's on stupid money, probably something like quarter-mil a year, but on the downside he doesn't see his kids in the week at all.

 

He's out at 7am and gets in around 10pm, looks in on his kids while they're asleep, has his dinner and then gets his head down. He says he 'loves being rich', but he's also been told he might have to quit at 40 because of a stress related heart condition.

 

Fuck that. I love my job, I actively look forward to Monday, I never finish later than 4.45pm (4 on Friday) never work weekends and don't have to leave the house until 8.45am.

 

I get on with everyone, have a top laugh, got good career prospects and we have a dartboard on the office.

 

But, my wages are a disgrace.

 

Surely there must be some middle ground? What about you?

[madstock]

I used to work in retail management, had to be out of the house for 6:30am, sometimes didn't get back in until 11:00pm, had constant shit, travelling, stress, up to 100 staff to have to keep happy, the general public to deal with and at one point a £10m target to attack, in addition to various other weekly targets. Weekends were not my own, and holidays had to be booked ages in advance. The money was okay.

 

Then I got ill, had to give it up, taught myself to piss about with PCs a bit, and now I can do what I like, work when and where I like, disappear if I feel like it, and the only responsibilities I have are to myself and ensuring that I have enough money to give to the landlady, the Revenue, and the ex. Life is indeed sweet.

[Guest TK-421]

I spend too much time on here but am otherwise satisfied with my work/Call of Duty 4 balance.

[sh#t waffle]

I really want to work for myself, and have total control over just how lazy I am. I quit my last job because office politics were making me stressed outside of work hours. If I'm going to be stressed about work I want it to be for something I believe in and care about.

[Hermes]

Working long hours to afford a bigger house or car etc leads to an early grave. If you can house and feed your family and afford a holiday that's all you need.

 

I wouldn't voluntarily work more than 40 hours a week, by that I mean I'd leave the job to get one with better hours as long as the pay was enough to live on.

[melons]

Working long hours to afford a bigger house or car etc leads to an early grave. If you can house and feed your family and afford a holiday that's all you need.

 

Well said.

 

We had an income of around 60k at one point, fuck that, sometimes i didnt see my ex from one day to the next, what do you get out of it? where does it get you?

 

pathway to an early heart attack for one thing, jobs with high income brackets tend to come hand in hand with excess stress, excess stress leads to a multitude of medical conditions, so hey ho, health and family before income.

 

He gave up his job, i gave up my very part time one and we moved back to Wales for less the a 1/3 of the income we were on. ok, the marriage broke down, but i'm glad we did the move.

[Section_31]

When I worked in a call centre back in the day, I got chatting to this lad who'd been a manager at Autotrader in Warrington. He'd been on 40k plus but said he often got phonecalls in the night from his bosses demanding this and that and was pretty much falling to bits with all the stress.

 

In the end he packed in and went for a temp job, all he was doing in the call centre was taking messages and passing them on to people to do a callback.

 

After four days of that he said he wished he was back at Autotrader, not for the money he said but because his mind was taxed.

 

It's hard to find the middleground.

[Spy Bee]

I used to work in call centres and financial services. Targets this, targets that. Being timed for how long you go for a piss. Being timed for whether you could have dealt with a customer more quickly. It was all bollocks and I hated it.

 

Now I drive a van. I get to be nice to people and people are generally nice to me. I've recently got a payrise, so I'm not doing too bad. I could be earning more and never have any money problems. But it's only money.

 

Don't buy into the hype of greed. Money isn't even real.

[Spy Bee]

It's hard to find the middleground.

 

There is no middle ground between two jobs.

 

It seems quite obvious that one was too much for him, and one was too little.

[Remmie]

Work to live and not the other way around.

 

Clichés aside, I don't understand why someone would want to take home all that extra baggage that managers get for like £3k more. I get paid peanuts but can afford most things I need and want within reason.

[mattyq]

I used to work in retail management, had to be out of the house for 6:30am, sometimes didn't get back in until 11:00pm, had constant shit, travelling, stress, up to 100 staff to have to keep happy, the general public to deal with and at one point a £10m target to attack, in addition to various other weekly targets. Weekends were not my own, and holidays had to be booked ages in advance. The money was okay.

 

Then I got ill, had to give it up, taught myself to piss about with PCs a bit, and now I can do what I like, work when and where I like, disappear if I feel like it, and the only responsibilities I have are to myself and ensuring that I have enough money to give to the landlady, the Revenue, and the ex. Life is indeed sweet.

 

What do you do now, Mongy, if you don't mind me asking?

[Stu Monty]

I have my work and life balance pretty much perfect. My job interferes with my social life a bit when I have to work nights or weekends but in another way it has completely changed the way I viewed a week. I no longer see weekends and weekdays or days and nights as being specifically for one thing. I have seven days in a week and vary what I do with them far more than I used to in an office job.

 

I think little things really do make the difference though; tomorrow I'll be going to work outside in the sun (hopefully) and I'll be putting on a pair of jeans or combats and any t-shirt I like. I'll finish when I've got done what I needed. Things like that matter more than a thousand or two.

[Paul]

I worked for mammon in the form of McDonald's and then Waterstone's after university as, respectively, deputy manager and store manager. Macs was hellish in terms of what was expected and my stress levels were through the roof. Waterstone's was far less stressful (despite more responsibility) but I had a long motorway drive to work every day (Stockport and Blackpool) and that was shit.

 

I changed job primarily to do something more rewarding. However, it was always in my mind that I wanted a better balance between work and home; I also was very aware of how family-friendly teachers' hours are. I took an initial 50% pay cut to become a teacher and that wasn't great. However, having every weekend off and thirteen weeks holiday a year more than compensated.

 

I now earn what I consider to be a very good salary, but would I like more? Absolutely - but I'd be very reluctant to compromise the fact that, if I need to be, I can be home with the kids by 4pm.

[Remmie]

May I just say how much I hate the term work life balance. Sounds really new age lame.

[Paul]

May I just say how much I hate the term work life balance. Sounds really new age lame.

 

Me too. I deliberately avoided using it in my little contribution to the thread.

[Elmyn Noos]

I worked for mammon in the form of McDonald's and then Waterstone's after university as, respectively, deputy manager and store manager. Macs was hellish in terms of what was expected and my stress levels were through the roof. Waterstone's was far less stressful (despite more responsibility) but I had a long motorway drive to work every day (Stockport and Blackpool) and that was shit.

 

I changed job primarily to do something more rewarding. However, it was always in my mind that I wanted a better balance between work and home; I also was very aware of how family-friendly teachers' hours are. I took an initial 50% pay cut to become a teacher and that wasn't great. However, having every weekend off and thirteen weeks holiday a year more than compensated.

 

I now earn what I consider to be a very good salary, but would I like more? Absolutely - but I'd be very reluctant to compromise the fact that, if I need to be, I can be home with the kids by 4pm.

 

I have seriously contemplated teaching on a couple of occasions, but the initial drop in wage, which would be considerable, along with the fact that there don't seem to be many vacancies out there has put me off.

[Remmie]

I reckon I'd be a fucking good teacher apart from the discipline side of things. I'd probably agree witht he kids aboot teacher X being a cunt and then reveal all their weaknesses.

[Elmyn Noos]

I reckon I'd be a good teacher too, apart from my inevitable fall from grace shortly after taking over the running of the netball team.

[Karl_b]

I love my job but as I'm at uni at the minute I'm only there two days a week. I get paid well for those two days and, including my student loan, I have more than enough money to afford to do the things I want; go to gigs, but music and t-shirts, etc. My uni life is starting to drag a bit, I'm in my 5th year now and it consumes a lot of my time, although most of it involves staring at a pc so I'm often distracted, and I'm ready to finish and move ahead with my working life.

 

With me though, I don't just work for the sake of having a job, I passionately enjoy what I do and an architect is what I've always wanted to be. I never switch off, not necessarily from work but I'm always thinking about something.

[Thants]

Mine's pretty good. I compress my hours to 9 hours a day so I get Wednesdays off each week. Therefore I only ever work 2 days in a row.

[Chuck Fadanoid]

Being in college mine is the fucking balls, especially as I usually take atleast one day off a week and no one moans at me anymore - because my grades are half-decent and they've realised that their punishments are pretty pathetic at this point with 8 weeks left to the exams.

 

I intent to keep it that way to be honest; I think the only thing that would push me into getting a proper job would be having a fmaily. Otherwise I'd rather work part-time and chase dream jobs that'll probably never happen.

[I Am The One Who Knocks]

I used to work in retail management, had to be out of the house for 6:30am, sometimes didn't get back in until 11:00pm, had constant shit, travelling, stress, up to 100 staff to have to keep happy, the general public to deal with and at one point a £10m target to attack, in addition to various other weekly targets. Weekends were not my own, and holidays had to be booked ages in advance. The money was okay.

 

Then I got ill, had to give it up, taught myself to piss about with PCs a bit, and now I can do what I like, work when and where I like, disappear if I feel like it, and the only responsibilities I have are to myself and ensuring that I have enough money to give to the landlady, the Revenue, and the ex. Life is indeed sweet.

 

Does this mean you set up a computer repair business or something? I'd love to do that! Howd'you find setting it up and getting business?

[L19red]

i recently took the decision to go contracting and have to say it was a fantastic decision. Less stress because you know you're not arsed about kissing arse. You just get paid on results so shite like office politics and development reviews go out the window. Same job, a good bit more wedge, and the tax advanteges of being self employed. i recommend it to anyone.

[DT]

I turned down £40k this year. I want to finish uni and try to get into something I like instead.

 

It's not all about the money. Or the dum-der-der-der-der-dum (sp?) either.

[billybonzo]

I sold a business 18 months ago and have only really started to get back into work this week after the longest holiday ive ever had, had the sold biz for 15 year and hated it towards the end, im now working outside, ive employed me first joey, i see me son every day but not his mother, my ex, life is good.