I am a woman earning £500k+ a year

[Alljan]

Divorced, co-parent mum of 2.

in response to other thread, happy to answer any questions

Getting on a flight back from the US if there’s a delay!

Good for you OP. Do you have an exit strategy? And if so, what is it and how long will it take you to get there?

Erm take home per month is 13k then I get bonuses and shares vesting which vary. And yep I would be ok to pay a bit more tax. Not loads more as it would become perverse but say back to 50% top rate.

friends never expect anything from me. I don’t think they know how much I earn. Family I try to do a nice holiday for each year and prob expect me to pay for meals out etc.

I’ve just turned 42. I have 50:50 with the kids’ dad so that allows for shorter work trips. For longer ones my mum supports but she’s not local so it takes planning or my ex will cover. For day to day I work mainly from home so can just use after school club (and then log on in evening)

Currently state. One has additional needs which might be catered better for at private secondary but if it were a neutral choice I prefer state route for more grounded lives and where they can walk to school

Not yet - I think I’ve been too focused on getting divorced to think too far ahead. I guess except for staying as physically fit as I can to give myself greater options in terms of health to keep working or not

Do you ever think about saving the vast majority of your income until you have enough to retire and lead a comfortable but modest life, say £50k a year equivalent? I ask because that's what I'd do if I was on your kind of wage?

But I actually mean it…😂
🙌🙌🙌 would love to see and hear from more women in this postion.

i am in tech not much younger but earn no where NEAR that…and 2 mat leaves close together hasn’t helped…

My question:
what advice would you give to women who are/ were serious about their careers but have maybe lost a little enthusiasm post kids due to being overlooked at work (due to having the audacity to have kids) and also legit having less energy to bring to role (again due to kids 😵‍💫) ?

asking for a friend 😉

Love this thread - thanks for starting it, OP.

How old are your children / how many do you have?

Have you generally found it easy to balance motherhood and a great career?

Your ex sounds like a dickwad - congrats on the divorce!

Thanks for answering @Alljan , I’m also in tech, a few years behind you so it’s really interesting. Are you ‘technical’?

You sound great op. And I'm not being sarcastic.

What is tech? I think ds wants to get into this but working out netflix is technical to me so I'm not the best person to advise him...

Thank you. I started this thread with the hope it would be helpful and I am really glad it is.

Advice: speak to recruiters in your part of tech to understand the market even if you have no intention of moving. Get to know your worth! Use that confidence to have more direct conversations with your manager about what you want to be doing. Trust that it does get better especially after the toddler phase and keeping career focused now, even if it feels really hard and involves using energy as will pay off in the medium term

They are 10 and 7. I’ve found it hard for sure at points as I am not always as present as I could be (I have dropped my work phone in the bath on more than one occasion!) and they don’t do as many after school clubs as I can’t make the logistics fit.

WFH now rather than commuting is definitely helping the sense of balance though

I’m retired living on my Civil Service pension. AMA

I am not a software engineer nor data scientist no although I do work with them. Have to be a bit vague but am corporate strategy type role for one of the largest US tech firms

Do you ever spend your working day on Mumsnet pretending to work like the rest of us plebs?

This is all getting a bit daft. I dont know anyone on that salary. But I know folk who have inherited substantial amounts. Much better than having to work for it IMHO.

Thanks for the response @Alljan

I’m guessing you work for one of the FAANG group

couple more questions:
did you move from IC to M track or join on M track?
did you find the move from M to D hard? If not what was the hardest transition and why?

did you renegotiate your RSI/stocks after 4 years and original shares have vested?

btw some of the responses on this thread demonstrate why I don’t tell people who my employer is or what I do for them.

I don't get the responses on these kind of threads. It's not uncommon to to earn this kind of money. My husband did as a corporate lawyer, had a middle of the road boring VW, three kids in private school and a £1m plus mortgage, an ex who he supported (£75k/year, we had the kids). We could go away once a year. Life was comfortable but not without stress. Much money was put into education.

Why is it daft? It's interesting, just because you don't know anyone on such a salary doesn't mean they don't exist. Try being supportive of a woman whose done really well instead.

It's far more interesting than when it's a woman though rather than your husband ...

Were you sad about divorcing? I am going through this now and I am the ambitious driven one and feel I may have not been the wife my husband had hoped for. I feel my husband has kept be back but also I am sad about breaking the family up. Would love any guidance or insight on how you navigated your split. Thank you

Did the ex get any claim on your earnings/shares etc in the divorce? I don’t really know how the finances work in divorce and usually only hear it from the female side.

How do you navigate the corporate world of largely men as a senior management?

I realised since i started working in 2013, back then i am still a minority among sexist colleagues. I was an intern then and couldn't really read through the lines but now i realise they were way out of order.

But now at my current employer mentalities jave improved much much more but I am still a minority. But i am just a senior analyst. Do you feel the same in your world?

What particular soft skill would you attribute to be effective in this scenario?