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Need some input
March 31, 2014 at 1:18 pm
So, I just started a job with a Fortune 200 company, great benefits, great support, potentially great money. But it is commission based sales and service support. (Selling Life Insurance, annuities, mutual funds, rolling over IRAs, etc.)
I also just got offered a job in the career field that I want (tech) for less money but it's guaranteed(salary rather than commission), not exactly the job I want, (it's the company that I really want to work for, still a Fortune 500 company) but still great benefits.
In my place, would you take the job with better potential money (I'd like to start a family soon) but more stress (sales), or the job in the field that I like, even if the actual work I'd be doing now is less rewarding but the pay is still decent?
I am firmly impaled on the fence.
"There remain four irreducible objections to religious faith: that it wholly misrepresents the origins of man and the cosmos, that because of this original error it manages to combine the maximum servility with the maximum of solipsism, that it is both the result and the cause of dangerous sexual repression, and that it is ultimately grounded on wish-thinking." ~Christopher Hitchens, god is not Great
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RE: Need some input
March 31, 2014 at 1:31 pm
Starting a family is enough stress, and it's important that you are happy with what you do. Depends on how much the difference in income is of course
The fool hath said in his heart, There is a God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.
Psalm 14, KJV revised edition
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RE: Need some input
March 31, 2014 at 1:34 pm
(March 31, 2014 at 1:18 pm)SteelCurtain Wrote: So, I just started a job with a Fortune 200 company, great benefits, great support, potentially great money. But it is commission based sales and service support. (Selling Life Insurance, annuities, mutual funds, rolling over IRAs, etc.)
I also just got offered a job in the career field that I want (tech) for less money but it's guaranteed(salary rather than commission), not exactly the job I want, (it's the company that I really want to work for, still a Fortune 500 company) but still great benefits.
In my place, would you take the job with better potential money (I'd like to start a family soon) but more stress (sales), or the job in the field that I like, even if the actual work I'd be doing now is less rewarding but the pay is still decent?
I am firmly impaled on the fence.
Good question!
I'm not going to give any advice. I'm just going to provide you with examples.
I have two friends who have messed up their family lives by giving in to work demands and stress.
One is a high ranking boss at a global spedition firm. It took him about ten years to loose his wife and ruin his relationship with his children.
We were at a party once and both of us were pretty drunk. He had a mini-breakdown and told me it was his job that killed the love between him and his wife. He also said his children don't give a shit about him because he was never really there.
I used to be a little obsessed with making money, impressing my boss and co-workers and so on. But over time I began to understand that it made me feel like crap. I didn't even have time to enjoy all the money I made because I was working too much, and when I was free I spent too much time worrying about work.
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RE: Need some input
March 31, 2014 at 1:37 pm
Forget the starting salary for a moment and factor in the potential to increase earnings. If you are selling on commission now will you still be selling on commission in ten years? If so, what kind of shape will your nerves be in? There is something - actually much - to be said for job satisfaction as long as you aren't sacrificing too much money. You have to be able to live.
Don't worry about office politics and corporate horseshit. That's the same wherever you go.
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RE: Need some input
March 31, 2014 at 1:44 pm
Family = safety
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RE: Need some input
March 31, 2014 at 1:50 pm
My two cents:
a) Never ever work on provision.
b) Work is like a relationship, if you don't see yourself being happy with your job far into the future, you shouldn't even consider it.
c) You can raise a happy and stable family on a lower income, but not with a dad with lower performance. My parents have always put family before career, and from a child's POV, I'm truly grateful for that.
d) If you have an opportunity to start at your dream workplace, especially if you have the possibility to advance to the position you would like, take it.
When I was young, there was a god with infinite power protecting me. Is there anyone else who felt that way? And was sure about it? but the first time I fell in love, I was thrown down - or maybe I broke free - and I bade farewell to God and became human. Now I don't have God's protection, and I walk on the ground without wings, but I don't regret this hardship. I want to live as a person. -Arina Tanemura
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RE: Need some input
March 31, 2014 at 1:52 pm
Personally, I would take a substantial pay-cut to work in a job that I enjoy doing. I actually enjoy much of the work I do now, and even then, the daily grind of doing it over and over gets to me.
If you want to support a family, you're going to have to be content with your daily life, and no amount of money is worth sacrificing that for.
Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cozy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigor, and the great spaces have a splendor of their own - Bertrand Russell
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RE: Need some input
March 31, 2014 at 2:56 pm
Do not take the insurance sales job - it's not going to last. Follow your heart - you won't go wrong.
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RE: Need some input
March 31, 2014 at 3:06 pm
(March 31, 2014 at 1:18 pm)SteelCurtain Wrote: So, I just started a job with a Fortune 200 company, great benefits, great support, potentially great money. But it is commission based sales and service support. (Selling Life Insurance, annuities, mutual funds, rolling over IRAs, etc.)
I also just got offered a job in the career field that I want (tech) for less money but it's guaranteed(salary rather than commission), not exactly the job I want, (it's the company that I really want to work for, still a Fortune 500 company) but still great benefits.
In my place, would you take the job with better potential money (I'd like to start a family soon) but more stress (sales), or the job in the field that I like, even if the actual work I'd be doing now is less rewarding but the pay is still decent?
I am firmly impaled on the fence.
Do what you enjoy, you'll do a better job and it won't feel like a struggle to get to work in the morning.
MM
"The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions" - Leonardo da Vinci
"I think I use the term “radical” rather loosely, just for emphasis. If you describe yourself as “atheist,” some people will say, “Don’t you mean ‘agnostic’?” I have to reply that I really do mean atheist, I really do not believe that there is a god; in fact, I am convinced that there is not a god (a subtle difference). I see not a shred of evidence to suggest that there is one ... etc., etc. It’s easier to say that I am a radical atheist, just to signal that I really mean it, have thought about it a great deal, and that it’s an opinion I hold seriously." - Douglas Adams (and I echo the sentiment)
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RE: Need some input
March 31, 2014 at 3:46 pm
Personally I'd go for the job that gives me the biggest opportunities to advance in the future.
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