Complete change of career, anyone done this?

patman99

I have 20 years experiance within the sheet metal industry & am a fully-skilled CNC setter/operator on press-brakes & multi-tool punching machines.

Back in 2010, the firm I worked for moved to France and I was made redundant.
Ended-up working as an incoming quality asurance technician for a medical device company for 30 months.

Am now a handy man in a care home for dementia patients and loving every minute of it. I may only work 32 hours a week, but I now get full WTC so the weekly income is the highest I have ever earned.


When inbetween jobs, I had to attend a 'Pathway back to work' course (6 weeks without having to sign-on, heaven). The lady who ran the course told us that her current role and her previous one needed people with 'degree-level experience'. She has an A level in Art as her highest accolade, but got both jobs because she had been in work for 20 years+, so both employers deemed that this alone qualified her for the role.

InsideInsurance

AubreyMac wrote: »

That's good. Did you have to be a graduate to apply for the graduate scheme?

As an internal applicant you had to be "degree caliber" and have the support of your manager but didnt actually have to have the normal requirement of a 2.1 degree

Gogette

I'm 40 and I'm currently an Admin officer and I've been working in Admin for the last 20 years (with the exception of the 3 years I took to do a degree in my late 20's).

I hate my job and am hoping to have a complete career change next year when the fixed rate comes to an end on my mortgage and I can sell without paying a penalty.

I want to travel and teach English to adults, but I can't afford to take a year out to do the PGCHE, so I have applied and been accepted on a Celta course in September. It will be over the course of a month (yay generous annual leave) and is a recognised qualification, and will allow me to escape.

It's a bit pricey, but I've been saving up for the last 18 months and I can't wait to leave my current life and at least give something different "a go".

My degree, having been useless over the last 12 years will actually come in useful now because to teach in some countries and gain the right visa, you have to be a graduate.

My 40's are going to be so much better than my 30's.


Gogette

AubreyMac

I don't have a degree and don't think I'm capable of obtaining one (I am a bit thick).

I am not sure on what I want to do but what I am good at probably wouldn't need a degree anyway but experience. I am better at creative 'hands on' tasks and anything that deals only with facts, so I reckon I would be a good mechanic/builder or doing something like airline data control but to be honest I don't want to do either.

I loathe and resent doing anything that requires any form of emotion/compassion. At the moment I work in social services which I found really interesting at first. But now (since my role has changed due to restructure) I hate the job and only stay because it's very secure and well paid which is important especially now that I have a 35 year mortgage.

I'll need to seriously think about re-training or doing another job soon though as I can feel that I'll need time off for stress by the end of the year if things stay the same.

kentlan

Before you change the way you want to earn something, you should sum up all your qualities and combine them with your hobby. So you should be sure you've got an extra choice so you should ask some friends of yours about something you always wanted to do to change your life. There are also web services that contain huge database of available job vacancies in your region. Have you tried them out? Try to find something you never tried to do. It sounds crazy but it worth it!

flea72

Yes. Worked in admin for over 20yrs. Jacked it in 3yrs ago to go to uni and retrain as a radiographer. I graduate in 2 wks time ��

anamenottaken

Cyberman60 wrote: »

I spent my first six years after leaving school working in branch banking for Midland Bank, now HSBC. During that time I also studied and passed my banking degree with the help of day-release and night school sponsored by the company.

The money was poor and I had friends working in IT doing well for themselves, so in 1982 I took an aptitude test via a jobcentre application at Control Data to do a three month course in computer programming.

On passing the aptitude test I waited a few months and then started the government sponsored TOPS (training opportunity scheme) course in Oxford Street, which I passed 3 months later, and which allowed me the way in to IT with a major white goods manufacturer/distributor. From there I worked up from trainee programmer to project leader/development manager and started my own consultancy business in 1996, working throughout Europe.

I've been retired for 8 years since the age of 52.

I remember ......

Was interested in training to be an analyst/programmer but was considered to be too old to be taken on for the training. I was 35 and 1 month and I think the top of the age range for training was 35.

pinpin

juno wrote: »

Have you considered getting a degree? It does depend on your current education level and financial situation, but if you genuinely want to be a teacher it would be worth considering.

I'm nowhere near clever enough for a degree, unfortunately.
I really want to find some sort of course that won't be too difficult, and that will give me a 'skill' that will qualify me for a job.

It doesn't really matter what the course/job is. There must be one out there.

I wonder about book-keeping or something. However, people always say that I then need to do a full accounting qualification, but if I ONLY want to get a job doing book-keeping, then I hoped that I could learn 'bookkeeping' only through a short course, get a qualification, and then land a job.

(Bookkeeping is just an example. Anything will do. Any short course that can lead to a job)

pinpin

flea72 wrote: »

Yes. Worked in admin for over 20yrs. Jacked it in 3yrs ago to go to uni and retrain as a radiographer. I graduate in 2 wks time ��

Did you already have A levels?

flea72

pinpin wrote: »

Did you already have A levels?

No A levels. I didnt have gcses above grade D either. I did an access course to gain entry to uni

Dont write yourself off as not being clever enough for uni. Im pulling a 2:1 with minimal effort, which for someone who flunked at school, i think is fairly good going