If you are fully WFH (or almost) and earn around £50k, what do you do?

[YouCouldUseAFlakeOrTwo]

My job feels like a set of golden handcuffs at the moment - decent-ish salary, lots of WFH, decent-ish pension, plenty of annual leave, nice people - but I am bored to tears and fed up. I've been working in the same area for over 15 years and really, really need a change. However at the same time I feel a bit paralysed because of the above benefits. I know, for example, that I absolutely want to maintain WFH and I need to maintain a similar salary, at least for the next few years.

I have job-searched but I don't really know what I'm looking for, sector-wise. I tend to stick to what I know but obviously that just brings up the same kind of thing I'm doing now, which I want to get away from!

So I'm looking for random inspiration. If you've got a fully or mainly WFH job and earn around £50k, what do you do? What's out there?

if u can afford it, take a sabbaticalfor say 3 months. you will come back refreshed and u can use the time to look at other options without distraction.
good luck.

Like lots of others on here I work in financial services, wfh almost entirely although I tend to go into the office one day most weeks (my preference). I earn 85k in a middle management type role. Transferable skills from other industries are always welcomed but the difficulty is most roles will be filled internally rather than advertised externally so you have to get lucky.

I also know someone who runs a tutoring company, she and all her tutors make a pretty good salary doing it full time! I was surprised when I found out but it could be a good option for qualified teachers. They do a mix of in person and online tutoring.

Data protection manager for a tech company.

But, covid actually did me a huge favour. Before that I would be dropping off at breakfast club and using after school clubs. Covid really made my employer think about ways of working to the point they wrote a whole new policy to empower team members to work when and where they wanted. Covid was a boom period for us and everyone’s productivity went up so they could see something was working. They get to recruit from a bigger pool now as prospective employees don’t need to be based near an office.

But surely you have more to do than dealing with emails?

8 a day would be quite a lot for me, because I have many other things to do and an email could generate several hours of work so wouldn't want many more anyway.

Fully wfh, good benefits, pension etc. I'm a software engineer. I didn't do computer science in uni but I retrained after about 7 years of working BC I hated my marketing job. Currently on 90k but if I wanted to I could easily find a job that pays over 100. Problem is taxes at that level fuck you so I wouldn't be much better off than I am now unless I went up to 150k. Also doable but am comfortable ATM. Married with no kids, husband earns quite a bit more but he goes to London 3 days a week.

@PickyCat this is what I am trying to do - compile a list of companies that offer WFH as standard. I wear many hats so searching on job title just doesn't work for me. I'd rather go on a Company's website and look at their vacancies to see if any are relevant.

Same here! One email = loads of work.
But I also wonder what people mean when they say bored. If you WFH surely you can do other things to fill your time? The danger of getting made redundant and needing to find another job, fair enough but being 'bored' to me doesn't make sense.

Recalling my previous roles I was bored with no work to do but also bored with loads going on... Just pointless bureaucracy and busy work.

I'm on over £60k, I'm a Software Product Manager - so I work with a squad of developers and queue up work for them to do to keep users happy AND deliver company strategy e.g. keep people buying the software.

I love it and have done it for 10 years with a big break in the middle to have children. I have a reasonable understanding of the process of making software but haven't done it myself since making basic websites over 20 years ago- its not a directly technical role. It requires a lot of inquisitiveness, empathy, creativity, design and quantitative and qualitative research skills. Also it requires good people skills as lots of people (stakeholders, CEOs, salespeople and users) have their own take on how the software should be improved next, so you have to listen but then tell them (95% of the time) that it's not your priority right now and why. It works out best if people use their experiences as a deep insight into user behaviour, e.g. if you worked in finance, being a PM of a financial software product is really helpful. I have a background in psychology and also in the background in which my software sits.

Reading this thread just makes me realise how terrible teaching is compared to other professions. I need to retrain! I'd love to have the chance to get bored at work (or even have a chance to stop working for long enough to go to the bathroom).

Define utilities?

How did you get into this? Were you a teacher before?

I'm currently an External Auditor in a top 10 firm. Chartered Accountant. Also bored and wanting to change. Wfh roughly half and earn £50k plus.

Auditing is all I've ever known. Manager level.

Some great sounding jobs on here but can anyone help me with ideas for a career change where I can use my transferable skills?

@Fraudornot the people commenting are not low grades. I’m a civil servant qualified accountant so I’m on £56k, and I’m at a “senior manager” grade. I’d also be on more if I was in London.

if you go in as an admin role/phone operator etc you’re looking at £20-odd k. Not bad for the level of responsibility, but not £50k plus!

Business manager for an executive coaching company. FTE would be about 60k plus bonus but I only work 25 hours a week. I go into the office once a week but could be fully WFH if necessary. It's something you could move sideways into with the right transferrable skills, that's what I did.

DH is a very niche sort of software engineer (bioinformatics 5* to you if you know what that is because I'm not sure I understand it!). He makes a lot more than I do but it requires many years of postgrad study and experience.

It’s quite an eye opener when you hear other people’s salaries and working conditions. I’m not saying people don’t work hard, but hearing people on 60-80k and bored wfh for 8 hours a day is so depressing and makes you realise even more how the pay and working conditions of teachers and nurses is just so rubbish.

I earn £52k part qualified management accountant for a marketing agency in a head of finance role. Bonuses available every year if we hit company targets. Been with company 10+ years worked up from bookkeeper to my current role. Wfh as much as I want, office is local for me so I just go in once a week on average.
I'll go up to about £60k when I'm fully qualified early next year

I’ll take your role if you want 😂

How do you get these roles? I took a basic admin roll (took a pay cut, left HR) and basically changed my job role and I do the admin for a whole department in a college, and for just over NMW! Feel so fed up and angry, I know from working in HR my job role is more of a Co-ordinator role, practically micro managed by 3 people so like there PA’s too but feel stuck! I’m very good at my job and fast and feel that they the pi** knowing this, so I’d love one of your jobs tbh! I work from home 2 days and have to go in 3 but really aren’t needed in so again more frustrating!

I've found the more senior I have become the more I am paid for my experience and knowledge than how much they can rinse out of me for 37 hours a week (very much my experience in entry level roles or earlier in my career). There are busy times, but my current role is very much about having a specialist on the books so to speak, and that doesn't always translate to needing me heavily each week, so there are a fair amount of quiet periods.

Well if it helps I don't think it's the norm. There are plenty of other jobs with shit pay and long hours.
And more importantly redundancy. You're constantly looking over your shoulder.

I have no idea why teachers and nurses are used on threads like this I thought the issue was more working conditions rather than pay. Nurses especially if managed properly you get paid every single hour you work.

Teachers barely get to do any teaching these days with all the other shit they have to manage.

MummyJ have you looked at qualifying as a solicitor? You have the LPC and some years as a paralegal so might be able to qualify under an "eqivalent means" route (or could sit SQE2 exam and possibly your paralegal work could be signed off as qualifying work experience under the new system).

Senior pricing analyst for an insurance company - I earn 23k but only work 16 hours a week, I've been to the office twice in 2 years.

I am head of supply chain in a tech company. 60K plus generous bonus. Fully remote.
There are plenty of fully remote jobs out there - you just need to keep looking and be consistent. Linked in has plenty.
can you move within your own company?
I don’t feel like I have golden handcuffs but I do think I’m underpaid. I haven’t asked for a pay rise yet (I plan to soon) so I shouldn’t complain just yet.
I have both day to day and strategic responsibilities. Balancing the two is hard.
I manage 6 people, 3 of whom are fantastic, 3 of whom are lazy/don’t have the right skills/enthusiastic but struggle to listen and therefore get stuff wrong.
It’s pressured and manic but I love it because company culture is good, in fact the best company culture I’ve experienced in over 20 years.
I don’t feel stressed despite the craziness and long days.
I am finding the 3 direct reports who need help to be a challenge but my own boss is very supportive and aware. He’s not just leaving me to struggle.

I think you will find something but you need to be actively looking abs telling people (not in a way your current employer will know, though).

@6Claire Just start putting yourself out there and big up your transferable skills. I don’t think the market is as kind to jobhunters as it was earlier this year but there are still opportunities especially if you have a mix of skills. Grit your teeth against the possible rejection and go for it!

@Puffalicious - you have an amazing skillset. Have you not considered online tutoring? In my experience it's £50 a session more for SEN specialism. There is a growing market for post covid catch ups and home schooling (so not just after school hours).