Need perspective - comparing professional success and age

[Anonymous]

I know I shouldn't but I do and hate how it makes me feel.

I am 36 still a manager and my colleagues are director and senior director at the same age. I wish I made better choices in my career.

I keep on comparing my progress with those ahead of me and could use some tips on how to stop this..

Please be kind to me I need help getting over this feeling

[Anonymous]

Do you have a good social life and support? Family? Kids?

I felt like my career was stagnating in my late 30s and early 40s and to get through borderline depression, I focused on the stuff I did like about my job (interesting and meaningful work, stability, good hours and benefits) but most importantly, I was happily married with kids.

At the same time, I continued to kick ass at my job while applying to as many jobs I could that I genuinely wanted and interviewing for them.

I’m now in a much better position, on par or higher than my peers, but also better, awesome coworkers, meaningful work too, etc.

Good luck!

[Anonymous]

i'm 49 and have never made manager. but a good friend who had a stunning career trajectory and made VP at multiple places dropped dead in the middle of a meeting two years ago.

we each have our own path to walk.

[Anonymous]

Comparison is the thief of joy. Live life forward.

I was jealous of a coworker who made it to VP while I was stuck as a director. He got let go two years ago and has not found another role yet.

[Anonymous]

I was a manager at 30, now at 36 am a senior independent contributor since I have two kids to raise and want better work life balance and not to be in meetings all day. We just hired a CISO who looks about my age or maybe a few years younger and has three little kids, so I definitely get what you’re coming from, OP. But then I remind myself that frankly I like my life. I adore my family, I don’t actually want to be responsible for all the corporate security, and anyway nothing would ever get done if everyone was c-suite. If you’re not happy with your life, decide what’s making you unhappy and work on that for sure, but it’s not worth the energy to assume that if you had someone else’s life all your problems would be solved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:i'm 49 and have never made manager. but a good friend who had a stunning career trajectory and made VP at multiple places dropped dead in the middle of a meeting two years ago.

we each have our own path to walk.

At least he did not die a failure

[Anonymous]

Don't obsess over titles, which mean different things in different environments. Smaller companies can often be more generous with "higher" titles, even though job responsibilities in those roles pale compared to "lower" titles in larger organzations where managers and executive have far more responsibility for more people, more revenue, etc.

What matters is your satisfaction with your role in your organization, meaning your compensation and whether your ambitions have been recognized and achieved/are possible to achieve. If you're not obtaining the compensation you want, don't enjoy your job enough, and/or don't see a realistic path to achieve your career goals, you either need to start looking for more suitable opportunities elsewhere or need to critically examine your own qualifications and achievements to see whether the issue is with you or with your employer.

[Anonymous]

Once you have a family you (may) realize that professional success isn't the most important thing.

[Anonymous]

I’m 49 and a director but at a small company where titles are meaningless. I bet I could argue for “senior director” if I wanted.

I’m about to take a job where I will be demoted to manager but in a huge organization. I seriously don’t care about my title.

But I know what you mean. Some of my friends are just crushing it career-wise and sometimes I get a bit of FOMO. Then I remember that I don’t want to do all that and I’m fine.

[Anonymous]

Titles are suuuuuuch bs.

Bigger question op, do you like what you do? If not or if not enough, find another role. Don’t justify why you can’t change for x y z too long. You’ll probably get more salary that way too.

A few things changed my perspective on this:

Covid, I was laid off and unemployed for 4 months. Best thing that happened, forced me to get out of a rut.

Saw how much people with high titles are sometimes traveling too much for my taste, or they are divorced or have affairs, or just in general have a life or a job I don’t really want.

Had a friend die in her 40s unexpectedly. She was successful, career wise, but no one talked or cared about her job as part of who she was when she died

[Anonymous]

I hate Mangin’s and I would hate directing too. I loathe managing people it gives me anxiety. All I want is to be an independent contributor who does high quality interesting work and controls my own schedule.

[Anonymous]

Money is compensation for doing stuff you don't want. If you can be happy with less money, you win at life. It's not a victory to waste and pollute more.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:i'm 49 and have never made manager. but a good friend who had a stunning career trajectory and made VP at multiple places dropped dead in the middle of a meeting two years ago.

we each have our own path to walk.

At least he did not die a failure

Bruh failing to breathe is the most basic failure.

[Anonymous]

I have written this before, but one day when I was feeling sorry for myself, my mom of all people told me to write a list of everyone I ever worked with who had a superstar career - WSJ notice or millions in comp or Senior Global Worldwide Executive VP of Schlubco, Inc. came up with 40ish names out of hundreds of CPAs, MBAs, JDs, etc. That's around 7%.

The message is that you are only looking at the Hall of Famers. A very small percentage get there. And I would say that out of that 7%, I can see half of them had superior soft and hard skills. The others were either in the right place right time or were outstanding ass kissers.

[Anonymous]

In my job, I have access to all of the employee satisfaction scores for all levels up to executive vice president. You know what? The higher the level, the more dissatisfaction employees feel. The real cliff happens between director and senior director. You know who is also the most unhappy? The “smartest” job families like analysts and professional staff.

I have a hard time with this exact thing, but then I remember that there is WAY more to life than work status. My goal is to work with good people and do good work so I can enjoy my time off with my family doing things I want to do.