What Career Path Did You Choose That You Strongly Advise Against?

[Anonymous]

Physician
The work is intellectually interesting and I feel like I am doing something worthwhile. Additionally, most of the patients are delightful (or at least interesting) and they teach me so much.

BUT as time has gone on the system has evolved so that the administrators have proliferated, and they have consolidated and expanded their power. So basically I work for idiot administrators who have a business degree with no understanding of medicine (if they compare us to “highly trained technicians - like a plumber or mechanic” one more time I am going to freak out), make slightly MORE money than us (one admin said she “would not get out of bed for what they pay doctors here”), work 9-5 (and g-d forbid they work a holiday! But they’d be delighted to report me if it takes me >15 minutes to reply to a page on a holiday), and just view us as numbers (RVU generators). They also won’t come in during covid (apparently every single admin is immunosupressed?), but are happy to send us 6000 useless emails a day, I guess to prove they are actually “working” from home. But then I have to yank off all my PPE and reply to their dumb emails “in a timely fashion” so they don’t report me. The higher level admins have also begun “encouraging” the older/middle aged docs to leave, and replacing them with MDs straight out of training and PA/NPs because the old guys cost too much money. Apparently competence and experience are of no value anymore. Because $$$. And if we make more money then we can hire more administrators!

Also I have 9 years of training after college and about 15 years experience, and I make less than my friends who are govt lawyers. So, stop with your complaining lawyers!

Well, that turned into a rant. But if things continue this way then being a physician won’t make sense anymore, which is sad, because medicine can be rewarding and fun - and on a great day you can even save someone’s life. Which is pretty cool.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is this thread just for women? I'll assume it isn't. I'm a man and was a teacher before it made more sense to be a SAHD for a while.

Any time I meet someone who is thinking of becoming a teacher I encourage them to talk to at least a dozen current teachers.

Teaching in and of itself is great. Kids are usually great. But there are so many things about the job that are awful.

Can the awful thing be avoided mostly by being an assistant teacher?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Women should ask themselves what the traditional male equivalent is of whatever they’re traditionally considering, and consider that instead, because it’s usually more lucrative.

Example, teacher versus tenured college professor.
Nurse versus doctor
Cosmetologist versus dermatologist
Art teacher versus engineer
Admin assistant vs program manager

Obviously these are all very different jobs, but I hope you get what I mean.

Also, women should not shy away from things or jobs with numbers in them. Data science, business analysis, finance, corporate real estate, etc. I wish as many women were interested in business school as they are law school.

Lastly, I wish more women would run for office

Teaching and nursing are stable, in-demand jobs with a lot of location flexibility; nursing can also provide a good lifestyle if you specialize (eg, anesthesia or certain types of NP). Also, you can't count on being a tenured professor.

Yeah there's a pretty big difference between being a cosmetologist and a dermatologist, though I guess what you are really saying is to aim high when it comes to work. There are truly so few tenured prof jobs around now, though. That's sort of the big problem - wanting one of the glam, high paying jobs, but there's just a few to go around. Why not say, instead of being a copywriter, try to be a host on 60 minutes!

But most importantly

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Journalism.

Lasted 20 years before leaving; should have left after 10 years at most.

Well, I did that too and have my regrets. Did not last as long as you. Wish I were better at it, honestly. I had the opportunities and education and didnt excel or persevere. If you have the steel for it, it’s a thrilling and rewarding profession. I was never in it for the money, but was able to easily double mine by hoing into communications.

I loved my stint in journalism - I lasted almost 10 years, before the instability of the market made me move over to comms. Comms is ok, too! I'm glad I had the opportunity to move over to that side of things, even if it isn't as flashy or fun.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How many people will say law.

I'll start - law.

+ 1 million! I'll never let my son go to law school if I can help it.

I used to dissuade people from going into law in the early years but now I've changed my tune. I think it's a very flexible field particularly for women. This, however, only applies if you have your own practice or work in a small firm. Law is really one of the few fields where if all else fails, you can hang up your own shingle and work totally for yourself. It's very liberating. Being an attorney has allowed me to work at home rearing 3 kids. That said, I don't make BigLaw bucks so that's the trade off. But it is flexible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Women should ask themselves what the traditional male equivalent is of whatever they’re traditionally considering, and consider that instead, because it’s usually more lucrative.

Example, teacher versus tenured college professor.
Nurse versus doctor
Cosmetologist versus dermatologist
Art teacher versus engineer
Admin assistant vs program manager

Obviously these are all very different jobs, but I hope you get what I mean.

Also, women should not shy away from things or jobs with numbers in them. Data science, business analysis, finance, corporate real estate, etc. I wish as many women were interested in business school as they are law school.

Lastly, I wish more women would run for office

I’m a doctor and wish I had been a nurse. Nursing was really what I wanted to do looking back on it. I spend a lot more time with charts than I do with patients. And really, the pay isn’t that much better considering the commitment I put in up front and the amount of responsibility I have when I am there.

The nurses I work with in the ED get paid ~ $90k for 36 hours/wk. I work 30 hours/wk, which means that I am 0.6 FTE, and make ~$120k/yr.

I think some of the most fulfilled people I know in the med profession are the highly specialized nurses because they get to do a lot of the most rewarding specialized patient care--nurse midwives, for example.

[Anonymous]

Example, teacher versus tenured college professor.

You think that tenured college professors are evaluated on their teaching? Ha ha.
College professors are hired to do research and publish -- to produce new knowledge.
Some professors pay the bills by teaching students. Sometimes those two jobs are actually facilitated in one contract by their employer.
But they're not hired to teach.



Also tenure is going away. So recommend not shooting for that job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Example, teacher versus tenured college professor.

You think that tenured college professors are evaluated on their teaching? Ha ha.
College professors are hired to do research and publish -- to produce new knowledge.
Some professors pay the bills by teaching students. Sometimes those two jobs are actually facilitated in one contract by their employer.
But they're not hired to teach.



Also tenure is going away. So recommend not shooting for that job.

Plus teachers can mostly choose where they live location-wise. Professors looking for tenure (and even those who have given up on getting tenure) have to go to whatever sh*Thole they can get a job in and move frequently.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is this thread just for women? I'll assume it isn't. I'm a man and was a teacher before it made more sense to be a SAHD for a while.

Any time I meet someone who is thinking of becoming a teacher I encourage them to talk to at least a dozen current teachers.

Teaching in and of itself is great. Kids are usually great. But there are so many things about the job that are awful.

Can the awful thing be avoided mostly by being an assistant teacher?

I’m the PP who has done both. The answer is...sort of. As an assistant I don’t have to worry about planning, though I do modify some lessons. The are fewer meetings, I’m not expected to deal with parents. There is no work to bring home. The negative side is that almost all my time in class is spent on behavior management. We don’t get the planning period so it’s all student contact which can be exhausting. Overall I like the job but could not do it if I didn’t have a higher-earning spouse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What Career Path Did You Choose That You Strongly Advise Against?

Trailing spouse.

Kind of joking, but it's been a meandering career path.

I was a lawyer before and I won't say law wholesale, but I will say that you should really understand what you are getting yourself into with it. It's a great education and degree to have, but becoming a cog in the law firm wheel is really, really not for everyone.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Social work. Low pay, not respected, no work life balance, stressful.

Me too!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What Career Path Did You Choose That You Strongly Advise Against?

Trailing spouse.

Kind of joking, but it's been a meandering career path.

I was a lawyer before and I won't say law wholesale, but I will say that you should really understand what you are getting yourself into with it. It's a great education and degree to have, but becoming a cog in the law firm wheel is really, really not for everyone.

We could probably have a separate thread addressing legal careers and how to make a law degree work for you, but people need to be honest with themselves about what they will be doing, what they are comfortable doing in terms of their personal abilities and skill set, and whether what they want to do aligns with the cost of their education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How many people will say law.

I'll start - law.

+ 1 million! I'll never let my son go to law school if I can help it.

What about it, though?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What Career Path Did You Choose That You Strongly Advise Against?

Trailing spouse.

Kind of joking, but it's been a meandering career path.

I was a lawyer before and I won't say law wholesale, but I will say that you should really understand what you are getting yourself into with it. It's a great education and degree to have, but becoming a cog in the law firm wheel is really, really not for everyone.

We could probably have a separate thread addressing legal careers and how to make a law degree work for you, but people need to be honest with themselves about what they will be doing, what they are comfortable doing in terms of their personal abilities and skill set, and whether what they want to do aligns with the cost of their education.

I'd be so down to read that thread

[Anonymous]

Law. And I wasn't an attorney. I worked as a litigation paralegal for 12 long years. It was the most stressful job I've ever had. The pay was really good, but not worth the toll the job was taking on my physical and mental health. My supervising attorney was great. The work could be really interesting. The hours and the pressure were just awful.