Career in Crisis - Time for a Change?

fiisch

Has anyone successfully retrained and done something completely different mid-career? Is it too late for me?

I'm 30, married and have a five-week old baby, and my career has left me feeling burnt out and with serious "imposter syndrome", despite working with some lovely people and being extremely well paid.

I've been in financial services for 9 years, the last two as a business analyst. I did some lowish paid operational work, before working for a large organisation and starting to climb the ladder. I gained the job of "business analyst", although I've since learned I wasn't a real business analyst.

I took a job in the City and it was a disaster. I hadn't a clue what I was meant to be doing, and the mentor assigned to me had little to no interest in helping me. I read around the subject, completed the Business Analysis Diploma, and still didn't really understand what I was doing and little to no confidence in my work. After 9 months I was truly fed up - I was finding excuses to work at home, and hid in my study procrastinating doing anything but work.

I lucked out in January and got a job close to home, which was offered to me as a contractor on a lucrative day rate (kinda happened by accident - I didn't intentionally go contracting). My boss and team are very supportive, I work a standard 35 hour week, but I'm given very little to do and my week's work could be compressed into an afternoon. I try and be proactive, but I just feel a spare part, not really contributing to the project.

Because my CV shows my job titles as a Business Analyst for the last five years (in reality, it's one, and even then I don't feel like I learned much on the job), recruiters can't see passed this and BA jobs are all I can be considered for. The money is fantastic, and that has always been a big motivator for me, but I have little to no career satisfaction, and given I've already tried to learn the subject, I wonder if it's a) a tedious job which I'll never enjoy b) just not suited to me as a person.

I've invested a fair amount of time and effort into my career so far, but I'm seriously considering a career change - potentially a GDL to convert my existing degree to do law - but then I'm unlikely to match my current salary for a good few years once I do qualify, assuming I can get a job in the legal profession. My alternative is to keep finding new BA contracts and hope something sticks, but given my lack of knowledge, I'm worried I'll be exposed, and as a contractor I can't exactly stick my hand up and plead ignorance.

I'm at a loss, as I should be ecstatic - easy job, great pay, and I get lots of time to spend at home with the new baby, but my job situation depresses me. I used to enjoy my career, and chasing additional qualifications and promotions excited me, but I feel like a succession of bad bosses (before this one) and ill-advised moves for the wrong reasons have left me feeling jaded. The irony is, I've had positive feedback in all the jobs I've done, but I can't for the life of me understand why!

Suck it up and lump it, or find something I enjoy? Any stories on here which may inspire me?!?!

(Sorry if I sound like a moaner - I know things could be much, much worse, but there's nothing worse than feeling unhappy in a job, especially when I'm normally a pretty optimistic person!).

Masomnia

A friend of mine is a business analyst, and I never could seem to get to the bottom of what he actually does - maybe this is why

My initial thought was whether now was a good time to take a large pay cut when you have a 5 week old, but maybe studying again would be easier to fit around a young family than working. Or at least pretending to.

JReacher1

Sounds like you just lack a bit of confidence. Business Analysis is not a hard job to do and as you say is quite lucrative.

Have you thought about staying as a BA but in a different industry? The good thing about being a BA is that it is a role that exists in lots of different industries e.g financial services, legal services, eCommerce, digital entertainment, media etc.

paddyrg

I went from Manufacturing Engineer to IT Programme Manager to Film Producer - there are no rules.

sangie595

Why do you think that law would be different? I mean, ok, it's another job, but it won't necessarily be more engaging. You could go through a lot of low pay to end up back here. I'm not suggesting that people shouldn't follow their dreams if they can - but it doesn't sound much like that is what you are doing. I certainly wouldn't suggest jumping into something like this with an unclear reason, an unclear strategy, and a baby at home.

And no matter what you think, you must be good at what you do because people employ you to do it. If you were rubbish you'd be gone!

ACG

Do you have an idea of how long this job will last?
I will be really honest in that if I was on good money, working from home in a job I could do in a day I would be over the moon.

If the job will last a while, why not make a start at uni? You can probably run the 2 side by side based on the amount of time you think it will take up.

fiisch

Thanks chaps. I'm not working from home now - I was WFH in my last job which was a permanent BA position. Mind you, with a 5 week old at home, I think I'd rather be in the office at the moment!!

The job of "Business Analyst" is very vague and seems to cover a number of different roles depending on what company you work for - certainly, I always think if you can't explain your job in one sentence, then there's something wrong...!

At this stage I'm at a bit of a loss - law is an idea, but I haven't researched fully, I'm just exploring different avenues at the moment, as I'm not sure I can do this for the next 40 years! It's something I think I'd be good at - I have a great track record managing complaints for friends/family simply by targeting complaint emails to relevant legislation, and I have a strong sense of what is just, so it seems a suitable career.

I cornered my boss today and went through my To Do list, and still he didn't really give me any work - I seem to have had a succession of technically-brilliant bosses who don't want to relinquish control, and they end up hoarding work, staying in the office very late while their team have an easy ride.

The thing is it's crushing doing nothing - I'm glad someone mentioned being a BA isn't hard, as at the moment it feels like an insurmountable challenge, and I think being low on confidence right now hits the nail on the head. The thing is - there does seem to be rules in changing titles, and so far it's seems almost impossible, with recruiters immediately losing interest if I talk about anything other than BA roles. I feel somewhat trapped at the moment, but unsure how to find and break into the career that suits me, and maintain (or at least have a clear plan on getting back to) a decent salary, even being willing as I am to take a sizeable cut...

asajj

I'm exactly in the same position as you, slightly older and I'm a financial analyst not a business one. I considered changing but I don't know what I want to do either. I don't want to go through all the hassle of changing career then find out I'm still feeling the same.
I hope you will find what you are looking for but if money is good and workload is low, you can try to cram some studying in meanwhile.

MinnieCooper

I would love to have great pay and stay at home like that. Are you sure you want to give that up? Think of the future when your baby is of school age.

trailingspouse

Insurance claims negotiator, childminder, primary school teacher, director of a consultancy company in the pharma industry. There really are no rules.

Planet_Switzerland

One thing I've always found with office work is that the workload has always been small. My first office job was a data entry job in my summer break when I was at uni. It was supposed to last all summer, but two or three weeks later it ended because I had entered all the data which needed entering, apparently they didn't think I'd do it so quickly.


When I did my first career job I found myself having much less to do than in the various office jobs I'd done previously. This is a trend that's continued, it's quite ridiculous how little I have to do in my current role, yet I'm earning over twice as much as I was earning 10 years ago.


It does get rather boring, but at the end of the day I go to work to earn money. It would be good if I did enjoy it, but I even if it was something I enjoyed, after doing 40 hours a week every week of it I'd get bored of it sooner or later.