Now and then; I have a healthy ego. But I doubt there’d be much interest.
Well, I appreciated the overview!
Glad to. Any other questions, let me know. I like my job and am glad to talk about it.
I’m a videogame designer, although these days I’m more like a videogame “script doctor”. I work for Sony and at any given time there are three or four different PlayStation projects I float between, giving advice and critique, and generally trying to figure out how to make the gameplay better.
Land surveyor here. As far as I am concerned it’s an excellent combination of physical and mental work as well as being both indoors and out. The pay and prospects may not be the best, but I’ve gotten to go many places most people aren’t allowed and seen some fascinating things as a result. Not to mention the sense of history and tradition that be found if one cares to look. And hell, I have the occasional day where I’m being paid to go hiking and four wheeling.
I work for Apple in the Education Department. We handle contracts for K-12 schools and universities that buy in bulk. I love my job and the company I work for. Can’t beat monthly beer bashes and Steve Jobs days. (extra vacation)
Up until two years ago, I was a full-time Database Adminstrator and a part-time Taekwondo Instructor. Then the economy cratered, I got laid off and now I run the school full-time. Of course, with the economy sucking as badly as it is, no one has disposable income for Taekwondo lessons…
I’m a paralegal with a mid-sized, international law firm. I, too, fell into my job, more or less. I’ve been at it a little shy of nine years. My work mostly involves white collar criminal defense, although my firm has a number of other practices that I see a piece of from time to time.
I take pictures and, thankfully, there are enough people out there willing to pay me for it.
I’m an accountant in private industry. I help run a rental car business and my actual job duties change from day to day. I actually have several unofficial titles because of all the different aspects of the company that I tend to get involved in. Besides overseeing the accounting staff and producing financial data, I recover stolen vehicles with the help of law enforcement, and I operate our in house print shop.
I love the people at my company and that’s what keeps me coming back every day. But, really no one likes to work for a living.
When I was 18, my life’s ambition was to become a bartender. (Now I don’t even drink!)
Last month, when my boyfriend was in the hospital, he mentioned that he has thought of the possibility of switching over to this profession. He loves the fixing things aspect of his job (he trained as a mechanic in high school before going to college) but over the last few years, he’s been forced to do more “broadcast” and less “engineer”.
For someone with a 4-year degree in Communications (concentration in TV Production) and 10 years as a television engineer, would you recommend going back to school for specific training? Is there a specific technical school that teaches this type of job? Or, since he has plenty of engineer experience, is it something he could learn on the job?
I don’t know how serious he was about changing jobs but I do know that he’s sick of being treated like a paper-pusher, especially when it takes him away from broken equipment.
As for me, I’m currently a full-time college student. I really want to go to medical school for Pathology but if I ultimately decide that I don’t want to be in school until I’m 38, then my next interest would be in Antigen’s line of work.
I’m an academic - a reader in organic chemistry at a UK university. Run a research group that looks to invent new ways of making molecules, in simple terms. I’m currently on a fellowship that means I do very little teaching, so it’s really all research focused.
It’s a special job in most respects. It gives you the chance to be genuinely creative - thinking up new scientific ideas from scratch and making them happen in the lab is very challenging and intellectually invigorating. Particularly with long term projects where you have a real journey in your understanding. Running a research group is a lot of fun as well - I enjoy the different personalities and being on the ‘shop floor’ of the lab.
The big drawback is raising research funding - difficult at the best of times but looks to be entering a nadir in the UK in the coming years. Knowing that your stuff has to be world class to get funded is one thing - knowing it can even be world class and not make it is very demotivating.
I am a Technical Director for a mid sized theatre company. Basically there are two parts to my job. One is for rentals. When a company is renting one of my theatres I have to co-ordinate with them on what they need and what we have. I also deal with schedules and booking extra crew.
For the productions that we do in house my job is to basically make sure that the designers get what they want and stay in budget. This may mean ordering gobos for the lighting designer, trying to borrow a dozen footlights or some wireless mics, or tracking down a projector, or really anything they need I have to find. I also design and build the special effects for the shows. Let see I have made a bookshelf that opened and closed using pneumatic pistons, every weather effect you can think of, I have created new ways of rigging drops of various types and sizes. I have my own recipes and techniques for making blood. I have made a smoking cannonball style bomb and hung people from the rafters. It’s always different and I work with a great group of people who are good at what they do, and even when things aren’t going well and we have been working 14 hour days all week we still can laugh and have fun.
On the side I also do set design. So I meet with the director and we discuss what we see the look and feel of the show should be and I create it. I oversee the painting and the props and often times pitch in and wield a paintbrush to get what I want. I just started this two years ago, but last year one of my designs was nominated for an award. If I could I would be a set designer full time. Who knows maybe one day I will.
I’ve got one word for you, young man. Just one word: “Plastics.”
My first career right after college was working in local radio. I had a variety of jobs, the best one being the assistant to the news director.
Then I changed directions and worked in the brokerage industry. I was a broker, margins analyst, then I worked in securities lending. I loved this career and would have happily worked in this field for years to come, but for the bursting of the dotcom bubble in the early 2000’s.
I resigned from my firm in 2003 just as the corruption in the securities lending industry started to take off. Now I do volunteer work with a pit bull rescue group.
I am a PhD biologist that now works as a head of business development for a diagnostic technology company. Prior to this gig I wad head of a technology development group with several chemists, biologists and automation engineers reporting to me. I am thought of as an expert in healthcare research although my early research background is in bacteria and green algae. Sometimes a path opens up.
I can say that going to grad school was the most fun. 14 hour days but such comradery and beer drinking.
My current job pays well and the company has great benefits. Creativity is stifled though as we are a huge company.
Find what you like and go forward and work hard
I’m an attorney, but unlike most people’s images of attorneys, I’m essentially a research attorney. In legal terms I’m known as a “clerk” but I’m not like a file clerk – I do legal research for a team of judges in a municipal court. I also sometimes help them write their decisions.
Before that, I taught horseback riding (I mean, before law school).
Before that I worked as a marketing copywriter for a major bookstore chain (you know the little blurbs they post in the store and in their giveaway flyer? Me.)
Before that I was a customer service rep for the same bookstore chain, above.
Before that I was in college and I worked in an archaeological conservation lab (I took photos of artifacts, and filed the slides, and did some very basic lab tasks, but mostly I washed the test tubes).
Before that I was on summer break from college and worked as a bank teller.
Before that I was in high school and worked as a gofer in a public relations firm.
I spent five years doing software development at a large media company, but it wasn’t for me. I went back to get my master’s degree with the intent of going to work for a large bank and making a lot of money, but when the system blew up, I decided that I liked research better. I’m now in my second year of a PhD program and loving every minute of it (even if I don’t always like it).
I’m a medical director for a state prison system. Half time patient care, half time administration. So I’m only part bureaucrat.
Before that, I was a Family Medicine doc in private practice, where I did everything from deliver babies to urgent care to cardiac stress testing.
I work at a small company so my job is to do whatever is needed. I’m technically a mechanical technician (glorified mechanic), but I do design work, sales work, programming, machining, product testing, field service and more. As a bonus I also get to change the light bulbs and fix the toilets.