What's your job and do you enjoy it? I'm sick of mine...

randella

Budgie said:

Crikey, there's a large number of IT people and boffins on here! I love the word 'boffin'.

Boffin is a good word, to be fair.

As re. numbers, it's a huge and varied industry - I meet people from time to time who, bizarrely, think we're still limited to a few dozen nerdy types sat in their bedrooms hunched over a BBC Micro.

Either that or people try and pair you off socially with other IT types like you're single and looking to hook up; it's well-meaning and all, but as a consequence I got introduced to a C# developer at a wedding once who wanted to spend the whole afternoon discussing the best way to write a factory pattern, instead of hitting the free bar like everyone else there.

Sporky

randella said:

Either that or people try and pair you off socially with other IT types like you're single and looking to hook up

"Ah - you two will have a lovely time speaking Nerdlish to each other!"

"Erm... he's a developer, I design data centres"

"There you go, straight into your common mother tongue..."

digitalscream

randella said:

Either that or people try and pair you off socially with other IT types like you're single and looking to hook up;

There's a third possibility - they gather their friends round and proudly announce that they'd cornered somebody who "knows computers", at which point every one of them gets to unload on you about how their computers don't work, how the entire industry is designed just to make money off poor innocent folk like themselves, and by the way...could you fix their computer on the cheap?

colourofsound

There's a fourth possibility!

'Oh, you're in IT? I've been having this problem with my laptop...(goes on to explain problem and expects you to fix it....now)'

Fuck. Off.

octatonic

I used to work in IT but left it to become a musician/engineer/producer type, which I did for about 10 years full time.

These days I'm a self-employed property developer/landlord- it gives me a lot of free time which allows me to do music and some guitar building.

fields5069

"Network design" for a mobile operator, working on the data core. I really can't come round to the idea that we're helping people by getting them addicted to a device which runs/ruins their lives. I don't think it's the industry, I've just come to a point in my life where I'm asking "Why aren't I doing something worthwhile?".

fields5069

blobb said:

I used to fix sewage works.

Then I learnt how to design sewage works that don't need fixing, which I though would be a useful attribute. 

Turns out it's not. So I'm now sat in a cold site cabin, trying to fix sewage works. Apart from we haven't built this one yet, so it doesn't need fixing yet.

But it will need fixing, I'm pretty sure of that.

 

Nice. Sounds like a Magnus Mills novel, a la "The Restraint of Beasts".

Sporky

fields5069 said:

I really can't come round to the idea that we're helping people by getting them addicted to a device which runs/ruins their lives.

Only some people. For a lot of us a smartphone is a genuinely useful tool, helping us find places, check facts, test and measure, all in something that fits into a pocket. It's considerably beyond what 80s sci-fi films thought we'd be able to do in a hundred years.

Though Two Dots has a lot to answer for regarding my productivity.

EricTheWeary

Budgie said:

Crikey, there's a large number of IT people and boffins on here! I love the word 'boffin'.

On the internet in the middle of the day on a Monday I don't think it's that surprising. 

I'm a job seeker and whilst the hours are good it isn't as low stress as you might imagine and the pay is terrible. So, I probably don't recommend that to the OP. 

mellowsun

I no longer have a 'job' but I am working full time.

Set up my own company very recently and currently doing consulting and contracting, showing companies how they can use machine learning to enrich their data 

Sesh

I run a few laboratories at a Uni. Basically I have to ensure everything works, train people to do things properly and safely, and then watch them do the exact opposite because they know better than me because they have a PhD, or think they deserve one. Then I pick up the pieces ready for the next user. Some good people, some good times but mostly fed up these days.

jellyroll

Left school at 17. First job was in a paint factory. Eventually got an apprenticeship with an accountancy firm, studying for exams in the evenings. Am 51 now and head of tax for a multinational property company. It's well paid and only occasionally stressful but I've had no career progression for 10 years. I'm honestly bored but do it because I've 2 kids at private school and another at university. There are worse things than being bored....(I keep telling myself)....

BRISTOL86

I'm currently a management accountant in the energy industry. Been doing the same role for 5 years and did almost the exact same role for another 5 years in my last place. 

Whilst on holiday this year I had a major realisation that I needed to get away from the month end grind, the exact same routine month in month out. On Monday you do this task, on Tuesday you do that task....

When I got back from holiday there was an internal vacancy for a more diverse analytical/forecasting role in a more intereating part of the business. The rest is history. I start tomorrow  

Strangefan

I'm a substance misuse practitioner (drug worker) it's a good job, lots of challenges, but not much progression, the team I work with are my genuine friends, and theres no deadlines or pressure from the service, and they're quite flexible.  
The money is pretty average, but the holidays are very good (33 days a year), I thought that was pretty standard till I met my girlfriend who works for the private sector for rentokil and they only get 24!so I def count my lucky stars, 

Sporky

24's not bad. 20 is pretty standard.

sw67

proggy said:

I'm a printer, I operate a Heidelberg press.

Sometimes I enjoy it and sometimes I don't.

Same here - on of the few left. Just moved from 12 col Heidelberg XL105 to 10 KBA Rapida 106. Good days and bad days like most jobs.

Flink_Poyd

I'm a lift engineer. 

It has its ups and downs 

FX_Munkee

I'm a games developer.
One day I might get a proper job.

proggy

sw67 said:

proggy said:

I'm a printer, I operate a Heidelberg press.

Sometimes I enjoy it and sometimes I don't.

Same here - on of the few left. Just moved from 12 col Heidelberg XL105 to 10 KBA Rapida 106. Good days and bad days like most jobs.

That's a big press. I'm just running a 2 col Quickmaster, right pain in the neck sometimes.

DrCornelius

I left London and 'the city' in 2006 and moved to Dorset. Funnily enough there were no jobs here for moneybrokers so I volunteered at a few worthy causes whilst I worked out what I wanted to do.

Luckily a local mental health charity where I helped them out with some IT bits asked me if I wanted a part time job. I now work 30 hours a week there for not a lot of money but with a lot of variety and with some really nice people. No 2 days are the same, some can be heartbreaking but most of the time you feel really proud of the work the charity does and your small part in it.

I could really do with winning the lottery though as I can't afford to do half the things I used to !