To ask if anyone has quit their good, highly paid stressful job for a smaller one?

[joanneg36]

I am seriously struggling with the 'having it all' at the moment and interested in others' experiences. Has anyone ever quit their 'brilliant' (on paper) job for work/life balance reasons and how did you manage/what did you do next?

I work four days a week in a senior-ish job. London and well paid but not law/city type money. Husband works too and earns similar. My 'four days', like many people, is in reality 7 days work squeezed into 4 and I am on email all hours. Kids are 5 and 1 and I just feel exhausted and as though I can't go on like this.

We could cope financially with me earning less, we'd have to cut back but it would be sacrifices of the meals out/foreign holidays type rather than not being able to pay bills etc. My bigger fear is about risk to my future earning potential and just general fear of unknown. I don't know how easy it would be to find a 'smaller' more part-time job in my industry but I feel I could at least try....

Interested in all thoughts - feel free to tell me to stop moaning and get on with it!

I quit when dd when to primary school. Kept my hand in with various short contracts. Am now back contracting full time and in a much more rewarding role. Contracting gave me a lot of confidence so I now feel I can walk into anything and get on with the job. If I could have stuck at my permanent job (which I doubt) I would be earning less than I am now and utterly miserable.

I did this. I had a very stressful job in London and did a two-hour each way commute. When I was pregnant for the first time, I realised that even if I dropped down to 4 days a week, I wouldn't see my baby awake from Sunday to Thursday. I decided not to go back after maternity leave, and worked free-lance for a bit (lovely, but didn't quite pay the bills) - and then went back to a much more low-key office job.

Quite aside from having precious time to spend with my family, there were knock-on effects that I hadn't expected. I used to wake up in the night and fret - bizarrely I didn't connect this with my stress-inducing job, but it completely stopped when I left - and generally, I found that I was much calmer and happier generally.

Holidays are the main thing that has changed....we used to go away a couple of times a year and do lovely things like skiing and diving...holidays these days are mainly UK-based and camping or renting a cottage with friends in the UK. And we have more days out in the UK. But actually, it's fine: I don't need to spend the whole year looking forward to that few weeks away because the rest is pretty intolerable!

I wouldn't go back for all the big fat salaries in the world...I definitely prefer my slower-paced life.

OP I've just handed my notice in for all the reasons you state. I found it far easier to work ft when the dc's were smaller, now they need time/help with homework, they want to see their mates outside school and do after school clubs and so forth which is impossible to manage. Juggling everything was impossible. DH does his share but his health isn't great and his job takes him away from home a lot. I have 12 weeks to go and it can't come soon enough.

I won't pretend I'm not sorry I couldn't make it work, my job is extremely stressful but I like my colleagues and I am good at my job. I may well return to it once the dc's are adults. But for now, I want to be a better mum to them and enjoy their childhoods with them.

"If the DC are your first concern then your time is far more important than money to them"

Secretus - this comment is unhelpful. Your assertion that if children are your first priority, then the OP would scale back is just harking back to the "them v us" threads.

You basically suggest that anyone who made a different choice consider their children less than their top priority - not true in my experience.

I did. However I stayed within the same organisation, in a new role that was sort of created/ adapted for me. I was very senior, managing a client facing team, and now I am part of a team doing a specific internal project. I took a 40% pay cut but would caveat that by saying that my previous salary was very high. The new job is still very important to the organisation but it is easier to manage time- wise because we are not at the beck and call of external clients.

You say that you are always on email etc outside work hours- is this driven by clients, or internal demands (eg colleagues in different time zones or working through the night on big assignments?). If the latter, particularly if you are senior and well- respected, you may find that it is more acceptable to push back and switch off than you think. The key is to be clear about when you are available, without coming across as too rigid- out of office message saying"I won't see your email till x time but call me on this number if urgent" or saying things like " OK Dave I'll look at this now but I do have to leave the office in an hour and won't be able to speak after 7, what is your deadline for completion". In my experience people often give the impression things are urgent when they are not really, or worse they leave them till the last minute when they know that you'll pick them up to review/ sign off whatever the hour I f they know you can't do that then they will change their behaviours accordingly.

Don't forget you are only paid for a 4 day week. If you are doing a full time job in this time then you are being exploited. I know full well that it's tough to define "4 days' work" if your job is not measured by the time you spend in it but by work output. However it is both your and your employer's responsibility to try to do this. Otherwise you may as well insist on full time salary for 4 days in office and 1 day wfh as that's what you're doing.

If you've been with your employer for a long time you may be surprised at how much they are willing to do to keep you. Be aware that work cultures are changing (our juniors are MUCH more bolshy about work-life balance than we were at the same career stage and we do have to respond to this). Be brave about standing up for yourself and setting boundaries.

It's great that you're already thinking about speaking to them about this. I'd suggest that before any meeting you think hard about the root cause of why you are working all these hours and challenge what may be long- held but mistaken assumptions about what "has" to be done. Good luck!

YY to imagining the life you want to live

If you want to make a change that works, you need to know what you are aiming for.

Yes, I did it last summer. I left my pretty well paid, senior, prestigious job for one that pays about 30 per cent less. It has meant a tightening of belts but I am so much happier.

I was on the verge of a breakdown, I think, looking back. The stress, anxiety and pressure was overwhelming. In retrospect, it just wasn't feasible to do that job with two small children. I felt as though I was failing everyone; my children, my team, myself.

I had a short course of counselling and it helped me realise that not coping was not because i was a failure but that it wasn't the right time for me. I had other priorities. It does not have to be forever, but for right now, it is the best option for me.

It has taken me about 3 months, but my blackberry is not the first thing that I look at in the morning or the last thing at night. I get home I time to put my children to bed. I don't spend the weekends with my phone clamped to my ear. I am not awake at 3 am trying to work out how to fit everything together. I got a whole week off at Christmas :)

I have a responsible role, but I am not responsible for everything.

It has also been good to get out of my pressure cooker of a post and see how other organisations handle things. I think I can take this experience and leverage it into applying for another more senior job when I am ready in about a year or so.

Obviously, you have to work out what is right for you, but my experience has been positive.

I did. I jumped from a corporate real estate law environment to private trust admin. No law. My old job was 14 hours a day on average on call all hours stressful and ruining my life.

New job is more relaxed. 9-5. No overtime. No on call. Much much better. Similar pay.

I work at a senior board level job but I job share. So 3 days each - an overlap of a few hours on a Wednesday and then we are generally booked out separately. Large 30 plus team and multiple external and internal relationships. The company were keen to keep both of us after maternity so agreed to extra cost. It's been a revelation for then and us and has been a huge success. Three full on days and two when I'm very much around, go to school, hand out with my youngest who is 3. I didn't trade seniority but I have got a work life balance and once child care is taken into account my net wage is similar

Just to add. Get on v well with partner. We are complete team. I'm so less stressed

I hang out with my youngest not hand out. I have a reception age child too. Being around for her first year at school has been amazing

I stopped stressful job to become SAHM once kids born, then always knew I would never want to go back to it. I want to drop them off at school and pick them up.

Currently have a job that allows this. Not sure what will happen when e contract ends.

But I still work just as hard during the hours that I'm in. On paper I'm quite lowly, but in practice I wouldn't be happy not doing my best. So I probably do more and have more responsibility than they envisaged. I'd do anything for them though, because it suits the kids so much.

Money nothing like what I used to earn, but my priorities aren't the same either, so it works.

I know this is the very hard bit, but I strongly advise all women to try and power through if at all possible. You have excellent support from your husband, and a 4 day job already. I had a very similar situation when my kids were young and it was grim I won't lie to you (I outsourced a lot) but we are now both earning six figures, and not just my husband. I'm really glad I didn't bomb my career in the early stages. Sure we enjoy the disposable income now, but the real peace of mind is knowing I can support my children should anything ever happen to DH.

Ultimately only you cow decide what's right for you, do but think of the long term picture. Good luck

I don't even have kids and I did it. Senior teacher with 16 y experience to contact centre collections agent for a mobile phone company. About 50p p h above NMW, but 40 mandated hrs a week and no weekends. Bliss.

Oh, and no suicidal feelings either.

I did this 2 years ago. Dropped quite a lot salary-wise, which has meant sacrifices. I am so, so much happier though, and don't regret it at all.

Some really useful comments here, thanks. I suspect the answer for now is to try sticking at it and imposing more limits and if that is impossible, request a smaller role within my company before seeking other opportunities outside.
But just to answer a few comments up thread: I work in a media industry and yes, some of the reason for out of hours emailing is clients and some is colleagues overseas - so very difficult to entirely switch off but could do an awful lot less than I do, as a lot of it is just emails I answer because they're there, and I happen to be connected at the time they arrive.
Interesting also that people have raised the topic of health - I think the reason I'm raising it is because I've just had 3 days off sick. Nothing serious but a minor complaint which is the thing I always come down with when I am tired or stressed so it has focussed the mind!

Yes. I did it after my second child was born.

I left a full-time, well paid, senior job in broadcasting and retrained in an education role (not teaching...that wouldn't be less stressful ).

I now work term-time only, locally and have been doing 3 days a week only for a few years, although about to go back up to 5 days (although 9.30-3.30, so nice hours). Hugely less stressful. No regrets.

The job has scope, though, and I can ramp back up to something more senior/better paid in my 40s, when my DC are older. Thats important for me, simply for financial reasons.

I too hate the comments about missing precious time with your beautiful children. It makes me heave. My child is no less precious to me because I choose to spend time at work (which is also a financial necessity).

OP before chucking it in look at your workload and how you approach it. Are you delegating effectively? Are you doing things you shouldn't? Are you being over helpful? I've been guilt of taking on too much and of being exploited by lazy or incompetent colleagues/bosses. Can you be more ruthless with your tasks at work?

Is your boss supportive? Can you talk to them? Leave your kids out of the conversation. If you're consistently working significantly more than your 4 days per week something has gone wrong.

Not rtft yet. What would make what you do now easier? Cleaner doing more hours, someone shopping and cooking? Could you afford to employ enough help that when you get home you only need to do what you want to do? It might be worth trying before you jack In your current job.

I did many years ago. I had a very well paid, highly travelled, long hours career.

I decided I wanted children and I moved jobs to one ten minutes down the road, 9-5, on less than half the pay.

I don't regret it, as it did work out for me (I've since career changed again twelve years on) but I do wistfully look at friends who stayed in the industry and company and their lifestyles.

I moved from a lucrative City role to a public sector job. It was the right decision.

I found the public sector ethos difficult to adjust to, but a complete change was easier to cope with IMO than taking a lower-grade role in my old profession ... I know of a successful lawyer who became a paralegal, and it didn't really work out, because the lawyers at her new firm were worried about being shown up, and the paralegals wrongly thought that she was going to try to direct/dominate them. On the other hand, I'm friends with a former lawyer who became a part-time PA to a building company director after having a baby, which worked out well. I also know an ex fashion industry woman who works in my DCs' old nursery, happily. I have a friend with a biochemistry post-doc who moved from lecturing/research into something else. I really think it works better, psychologically, if you have a complete change of industry.

Just thinking budgie girl....no one ever lies on their deathbed wishing they had spent more time in the office.

What some of you executive women are doing sounds horrendous and just the thought of how you juggle all those balls in the air fillme with dread.

There are some that thrive on it and some obviously hate it.

What does come through a lot of your posts is ...fear.

It's hard living your lives infear and what ifs. Carrying on and trudging onwhenisuspect many of you would like to pull the duvet over your heads some days and wish work, the nanny, the gardener, the au pair, the cleaner would go away and let you just live the simple life.

I'm pleased some of you have managed to step outside and made the transition to a calmer, peaceful and more gentle life. I bet it did feel terrifying at the time but well done for putting the quality of your life first.

Good luck op . I hope you do what's best for you.

I did it, last year when bullying and undermining and the expectation that I'd work all hours finally drove me over the edge. I went freelance, and although I'm sat here working today I get much more freedom and my 'wage' is building up slowly and I reckon eventually I will be on more than earned in last job.

The only regret I have is not doing it sooner. All of us now have a better quality of life. I enjoy my work, I have a better variety of it and I have a better work/life balance.

Blue bells they might envy your simpler life.

I was 4 days a week but similar situation to yours - always picked extra stuff up, was at a grade where I was expected to travel at short notice, attend meetings outside normal working hours, all things that were tricky as DH was and is a contractor so little flexibility with his work arrangements.

A health condition just made me realise how difficult it all was to juggle and for little additional reward - I dropped grade and hours and now am truly p/t.

It hasn't been a bed of roses. I've had to swallow my pride as i watch my junior colleagues being promoted above me and I have to be very careful not to take on additional responsibilities because I know i can technically handle them. However I am genuinely much less stressed, I don't have to worry about being thrown into attending a meeting in London at a day's notice - if I'm asked to attend I will always go if I can but not if it makes things too difficult at home, and DS loves the fact I can pick him up most days from school. He is a bit older now, and in fact whilst the mechanical bits are easier, he hates after school and would hate to have to go 5 days a week and has loads of homework so me being p/t is good for him.

I'll have no problem getting a role when I want to go back up again, however until DS is at secondary school I can't see that being a possibility - not too long to go now.
I've also been getting mentoring from a senior woman in the organisation who is slightly p/t about not being apologetic about my hours and not feeling I have to do it all myself as when I do step up again that's still going to be an issue unless I address it.
4 days is a poisoned chalice. No reduction in workload from 5 days but 20% less pay. That's why when I go back up the ranks again I'll go full time and expect DH to do 50% can't see it working otherwise.

What about job share? They seem to be really pushing that in our organisation and is a great way to keep your seniority but have a proper reduction in hours. ( Disclaimer - I'd hate it as I am control freak, probably why I am not good at getting others to do thing)

Or if that's not your bag, speak to your organisation. There does seem to have been a bit of a sea change over the last couple of years, they will probably be very keen to keep you if you can come up with a reasonable proposition. Or indeed perhaps your DH could look at stepping back a bit and take on more of the domestic burden.

I know that feeling of getting to the stage where you feel your health is being compromised and it is worth addressing it before you get to the all or nothing stage.