tell us about your job

[kickpushcoast]

I'm a manager at a pretty popular lounge/bar/club. Its a nice, upscale place with a good clientele, and really, REALLY hot women. I work about 25 hours/week, but of course the hours are crazy, I don't get off work until about 4am on most nights. The flip side to this is that I have alot of time to hit the gym, play poker and work on my music production hobby.

Moneywise, its very good, I run the door on the busiest nights, and people have to tip me to get in, or else wait in line all night. This can be very lucrative, I do share the money with the door staff, if I didnt I could drive a Bentley to work. One of our owners/investors is one of the most famous people on the planet, so I guess its cool shooting the [censored] with him and his other famous friends, some of which are actually pretty cool people.

I'm 30, with a degree, and alot of business experience(I was VP of a medium sized health club chain when I was 24), so sometimes it feels weird to work at my "job" as opposed to furthering my "career" but the hours and the money are great for now, especially combined with my extra smedium cash game grinding.

Dealing with people when they are drinking is tough though, and it really does wear on you, if you can't shrug off all the dumb things the customers and employees do, you won't last too long.

Also, I work with some of the coolest people i've ever met, most people that work in bars and clubs have good day jobs and alot going for them(or they re in school), and when we're off work and hanging out, we have more fun than probably just about anyone.

[registrar]

What do you do? "Academic Registrar" in a sixth form college/retake college. In reality, business development/marketing: but that would be a -EV job title in this market. I still do some teaching.

Do you like it? Not especially. I probably work less hard for more money than anyone else I know or at least my peers.

What makes you in particular well-suited or poorly-suited for your work? I am a great salesman and I'm a better teacher so selling educational courses comes naturally.

What kind of people do best in your work? No one else really does this. I carved out my own niche after deciding that I wanted to move away from London and responded to a job looking for a Principal wih good business awareness saying that good Principals are never good businessmen and that they should employ me because I would make them a lot of money. I offered myself on a three month trial and said that I would be very expensive to keep after this had expired.

What qualifications are necessary for people considering work in the same field as you? It helps to be well-educated and have a reasonably posh voice and use long words.

What is a typical day like? I get up at 8.30, rush the kids to school, arrive at 9.15, read emails, piss about on 2+2 and go home at 5.15. At busy times, when recruiting, I spend half the time on the phone and half the time interviewing/recruiting students.

What kind of problems do you encounter? It's no challenge whatsoever these days but I have a large mortgage to pay and I'm too lazy to find anything else. Dealing with rich parents and their useless and spoilt children gets kind of annoying as well and once in a while what is sold is not necessarily what is delivered and this is always messy.

What are the biggest (most common) sources of frustration and elation? Closing any sale is always satisfying. Personally, I generally can't stand teachers, especially the self-righteous trust fund whingers you find a lot of in this town (Oxford), so working with them is always frustrating.

How much can one expect to make in your position? Generally, this sort of position, whether as Vice Principal, Director of Studies etc. gets £30-40k. I get more than this and have received income-linked bonuses of over £60k in the last three years.

[Slow Play Ray]

What do you do? I am a mechanical product design engineer for a Fortune 50 company. Currently the bulk of my work centers around explosion protection components.

Do you like it? Sometimes. I work closely with a really cool group of people, and I live very close, so that helps the bad days along.

What makes you in particular well-suited or poorly-suited for your work? I'd say seven years of engineering school, but the fact is passing those 'fundamentals' really get you nowhere in the real world. They provide a decent foundation, of course, but what suits me to my job is simply my logical nature and my natural tendency to wonder how things work and how they can be better. There's no substitue for experience either. What makes me ill-suited is laziness.

What kind of people do best in your work? People like me, but less lazy.

What qualifications are necessary for people considering work in the same field as you? A BS in mechanical engineering should do the trick. An MS never hurts either, and an MBA can move you up the ladder quicker. A PhD will hurt you more than help you though.

What is a typical day like? Arrive 15 minutes late, check email, read news/sports. Get coffee and toast, 2+2, more news/sports, etc. When I actually get cracking at working it can vary widely from day-to-day. I may spend all day on solid modeling or analysis software, running small tests in the lab, running explosion tests off-site, chasing a paperwork trail all day, putting out fires in manufacturing, or any combination of those and countless other tasks. That is the best part about my job - the variety; since we are a relatively small engineering group, we are pretty much responsible for everything. I generally try to leave on time every day.

What kind of problems do you encounter? General idiocy and unexpected results.

What are the biggest (most common) sources of frustration and elation? Frustration: general idiocy (particularly among non-engineering project team members) and unexpected results. Elation: when major tests go as planned, and when projects are finally completed.

How much do you make? Enough to live comfortably and support my many vices while still creating a nest egg for the future.

How much can one expect to make in your position? In my current position, it's presently pretty tough to get north of $120k but with some business smarts it's a pretty straightforward climb to an executive position, and then the sky's the limit.

[NicksDad1970]

I'm the chief dispatcher for a concrete company. I've been here for 10 years.

I'm treated fairly well by the boss. I make a decent income (nothing compared to the balla high stakes players around here, also nothing compared to you stock traders or lawyers)

My job in the summer is much harder than the winter. During the summer I'm usually there by 6 am and not out until at least 5. Sometimes I'm in earlier and stay much later. In the winter it's usually like 7 -4.

The way my job works is I'm pretty much hated by EVERYONE. I have drivers mad at me for working them too long. Other drivers are pissed at me for sending them home too early. I have customers mad at me because they can't get their concrete when they want it. I get the bosses pissed if I have trucks sitting on the yard. Dispatchers mad at me if they work too long. My wife mad at me if I work too long etc.

My job consists of scheduling drivers, loads for the customers, scheduling vacation for 75+ employees, writing letters when peeps mess up, calming customers down when things go wrong, and many other things.

In return I get a decent check, they pay for all my fuel, all my lunches, some of my breakfasts, a yearly bonus, a turkey for Thanksgiving and a ham for X-mas. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[Gildwulf]

What do you do?

Public Affairs Research Consultant at a consulting firm on Bay Street in Toronto. I do everything from statistical analysis using SPSS to making presentations to client relations to helping run focus groups to creating questionnaires. I have my hand in at least 7 different projects at a time and I'm project leader on usually 3-4 projects at a time.

Do you like it? Most of the time it is very challenging and engaging work.


What makes you in particular well-suited or poorly-suited for your work? My skillset is perfect for my job. I have a strong background in politics/public policy, so I understand the basic issues we look at every day in a broader sense. I have excellent research skills, as I worked as a research assistant for two years in my Bachelor's degree. I write very well and type quickly so I can meet the sometimes brutal deadlines (especially for media). I also have good 'boardroom presence' which is an important part of client relations. And a good sense of humour, which is important in any profession that involves schmoozing.


What kind of people do best in your work? Smart people who can talk about public policy who are good shmoozers, good writers and can run a set of numbers and understand it easily.


What qualifications are necessary for people considering work in the same field as you? Everyone else at my office is 25+, has an advanced degree in public policy, economics or business and 3-5 years work experience. I am 22 with an Honours degree in political science from a top school and good research experience, and a semester's worth of credits at UChicago where I dropped out of my MA. I lucked out big time.


What is a typical day like? Coffee to start at 9am, browse 2p2, meetings. Client calls. Running data analysis, writing questionnaires, lunch, 2p2, contacting the media, billing clients, writing syndicated reports, 2p2, content analysis and writing, go home around 7pm.


What kind of problems do you encounter? Very very tight deadlines and overload of projects.


What are the biggest (most common) sources of frustration and elation? The timelines can be difficult. Getting projects in the media is always fun (I just had a four page spread of a poll I did in a major syndicated magazine. I also regularly publish polls in Canada's major newspapers.)


How much do you make? Low for Bay Street but I get paid more than anyone else in my age cohort I know.


How much can one expect to make in your position? low six figures

[Kintamayama]

What do you do? I’m a freelance Japanese translator. Basically, I translate documents, mostly legal, financial, and IT-related, from Japanese into English.

Do you like it? I can’t say I love the actual work, but I love the near-complete autonomy the work provides, along with the high pay and low time commitment.

What makes you in particular well-suited or poorly-suited for your work? I have an unusually high level of competency in the Japanese language, and am a relatively good writer of English. My desire to be independent drives me to do a type of work that most people, even those otherwise qualified, do not care to do. However, I have a short attention span. I’m not naturally attentive to detail, which is a requisite of this work. Though I’m a people person at heart, I have almost no contact with the outside world while working. Though I am an energetic person and would prefer to be physically active throughout the day, my work demands that I sit at a computer all day long.

What kind of people do best in your work? Book worms. Linguistic nerds. Detail-oriented people. People who desire an autonomous lifestyle. People who like to write, but lack the creativity to otherwise do so. People who are curious about a wide range of subjects, but who dislike settling on any one area.

What qualifications are necessary for people considering work in the same field as you? Surprisingly, no academic qualifications are necessary. Basically, a translator needs to have the following three skills: a high level of competency in the source language (the language translating from), the ability to write well in the target language (the language translating to), and knowledge of the fields in which one is translating (or the ability to fake it well). In the case of Japanese, it takes a minimum of five years, usually much more, to gain sufficient competency in the language. It then takes several more years to learn the unique “skill” of translating.

What is a typical day like? I usually wake up pretty early, around 6:30 or 7:00. After checking my email and surfing the net briefly I get right to work. My brain functions best in the morning, so I try to get as much work done as early as possible. However, I also have a short attention span and have trouble sitting still for very long, so I tend to break my work up into short sessions throughout the day. After working 2-3 hours in the morning, I’ll go work out and then eat breakfast. Then I’ll either put in another hour of work or go take a nap if I feel like it. Another couple of hours in the afternoon, and then I’m usually off to the driving range to work on my golf game. I’ll usually put in another hour or so before dinner and then I’m done, except for corresponding with customers, usually via email. Since the work flow is irregular, I frequently work weekends, although in reality I seldom work more than 5-6 hours a day tops.

What kind of problems do you encounter? Unreasonable deadlines. Poor-quality source documents with lots of illegible text. Occasional jobs in fields I am not familiar with, which slow the process considerably.

What are the biggest (most common) sources of frustration and elation? Again, work in difficult, unfamiliar fields. Frustration when a client wrongly insists that the English should be written differently. Frustration at the lack of human contact. Not much elation in the work, other than occasional feelings of accomplishment after completing an interesting or large project. Elation at being outside playing at 1:00 in the afternoon instead of trapped in an office in a salaried position. Elation at having near total control of how I use my time throughout the day (thanks in no small part to the fact that most of my clients are based in Japan, and are asleep while I am awake).

How much do you make? It varies by year, but usually in the $50k~$100k range. However, over the past six years, I’ve probably averaged no more than 25 hours of work per week.

How much can one expect to make in your position? It depends how much you’re willing to work. I know of translators who make upwards of $200k per year, but they produce a high volume of work at the upper end of the pay scale. Many translators are people like me, who get into the field because of the opportunity it provides to make a good living doing what boils down to a part time job.

[Vavavoom]

What do you do? European High Yield & Distressed Bonds (Broker). Also partime DJ (Weddings/Birthdays etc)

Do you like it? I enjoy the good times and hate the bad times... When we're busy its a great job, when we're not its horrible...The only reason anybody ever does this job is for the social aspect of it. the entertaining side involves all the top restaurants/clubs/bars/strip clubs..and the fact that it can be very lucrative...

What makes you in particular well-suited or poorly-suited for your work? I used to be a holiday rep. I am an extrovert and a quick thinker. Good with numbers and very hardworking. I'm popular which helps immensely as this job is not what you know its who you know....

What kind of people do best in your work? Those who get in the right product at the right time, and have good friends (realtionships) on the other end of the line...

What qualifications are necessary for people considering work in the same field as you?
A contact in the city... who has decent credentials...

What is a typical day like? I'm up @ 5.50am - In work for 7am and finish at 5.30pm - I get in @ 6.10pm....During my day i have 4 bloomberg screens up keeping track of the ITRAXX/World Equity Indices/All my bonds and then my message screens... I surf/browse the internet all day with 2+2/Myspace being the main recipients. I also multitable MSN as well..Thats about it..

What kind of problems do you encounter? More established relationships...They get first look on the prices and so the chain is started...they get the first counters and etc...being second is no good in my product....

What are the biggest (most common) sources of frustration and elation? Taking margins out of trades...and losing money on trades...As we're execution only the gamble in us to make money is what creates this..

How much do you make? A decent amount for someone my age who has been in the job 3 years with the prospect extremely decent twice yearly bonuses.. On my old desk - there was 7 of us...and the 2 bosses were on £1M each.... luvverly !! in $$$, i'm aiming for approx $110K this year..

How much can one expect to make in your position? I think if i'm earning £200K a year in 3-7years then its fairly easy money and I'd be very happy with that... Being 30 and getting £250 a year is my aim...



Vava

[ScottieK]

What do you do? financial analyst for commercial loans at a bank.

Do you like it? Yes. Compared to my last job, this is a breeze and much more rewarding.

What makes you in particular well-suited or poorly-suited for your work? I understand financial statements, ratios, credit analysis, accounting principles, and loan structuring. I'm fairly good at math (specifically arithmetic and algebra) and have a naturally analytical mind. I'm solid in all MS-Office programs, and we use Word and Excel a lot. I also have an MBA in finance.

What kind of people do best in your work? Detail-oriented, analytical minds who are good at math. Business training and computer experience is also good to have.

What qualifications are necessary for people considering work in the same field as you? A business degree, preferably in finance or accouting....maybe prior work experience in a financial / accounting work environment.

What is a typical day like? 8-5, M-F. A loan renewal or request is assigned to me. I assemble all documents necessary to get the request approved, including loan grade models, risk models, profitability models, relationship profitability numbers, and financial statements. I also test any loan covenant requirements that may exist. Then I work on the credit memo, which is the bank's analysis and rationale for approving the loan. Sometimes I work with the client and their accountant to go through statements, inventory reports, tax returns, and anything else I need. Then I work with my bosses to make sure we address all relevant issues in the memo.

What kind of problems do you encounter? Getting information from the client in a timely manner can be a hassle. Sometimes I miss material issues that need to be addressed in our memos. Numbers that are referenced in many sections of the package must be uniform.....if a number changes, I have to make sure it is updated in all sections.

What are the biggest (most common) sources of frustration and elation? Getting rush orders from our line of business managers upsets our work flow. Sometimes they aren't even sure what the client needs a loan for or how to structure it. Also, getting a writeup back that is bleeding in blue ink can be frustrating. Satisfaction comes with getting a loan package done and being able to move on to the next one. Seeing a building or project in town that I helped finance can be fun.

How much do you make? $48K/yr, plus bonuses, 401k matching and benefits.

How much can one expect to make in your position? The real money is in the sales positions with the line of business managers. They mostly work on commission. Analysts work on salary, and there is probably an upper boundary around $70K.

ScottieK

[limon]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
most (maybe all) great hustlers are married the single ones end up on the rail. marriage forces you to choose only the best hustles and not chase every coin flip. also the life of a hustler is very lonely becuase few can understand or would condone most of what you do so a partner in crime who knows everything helps somehow.

[/ QUOTE ]

I see alot of you in me Limon except this one part. If you have been with ur girly for 11 years + marriage how much hustle did you have for women? I have dated girls for 12/15 years of my life and the last 2 years off were amazing. I agree with missing a night or two with someone/ some of that confort, but otherwise I have an open-end ticket everyday to enjoy the world. If this is life on the rail then I am a bird.

fyc

[/ QUOTE ]


lol. reread carefully. i was w/ her 11 years LONG DISTANCE (aka OPEN) relationship.

[limon]

[ QUOTE ]
limon,

"would you bet everything (THAT ISNT YOUR WIFES) on a coin flip getting 60/40?"

What if your wife didn't have any of her own assets, limon? Would you still be willing to take this wager now that you are relatively established in life?

[/ QUOTE ]

if i was married no. i made a commitment and i do live by the gamblers code. if i was single/when i was single 51/49 looked like printing money.