To wonder if anyone has accepted that they may never have an interesting well paid job.

[ArtisanPopcorn]

I've been in my admin role for 8 years. In the first few years I applied for more than 10 internal roles that either paid more or were more interesting had lots of interviews but didn't get any job offers.

Since DD was born (she's just started reception) I've worked part-time and have only applied for a couple of jobs as part-time roles are few and far between. Still no luck.

I did think once DD started school I would do an MA to boost my chances but I now realise the logistics of school are complicated and I struggle to juggle everything as it is so I can't see that happening.

Has anyone been in my position and come to terms with the fact that they may never have a well-paid interesting job? I know I should persevere but getting my hopes up time and time again is getting me down.

For info I do an admin job at a university. Lovely place to work with good family friendly policies, 50% off MA fees for staff and hundreds of really interesting roles which seem increasingly out of my grasp.

You are giving up ! And too early
If you want betters it’s achievable

I do quite like my job but fulfilment for me was always going to be found outside of work. I have phases where i make a concerted effort to spend free time in an interest way or doing hobbies that bring out my inner artist. But right now. It's winter

You are me! I have worked in an university admin role for years with the intention of moving to something better.

But I delayed it when I was trying for a baby...

Then I was going though IVF...

Now I am PT so as you say it is really difficult to progress once you are PT (which is a whole other thread)

My plan is that once my child ous in school I'm going to set up a little business I can work on on the days I'm not in work - won't make me tonnes of money, but will give me some job satisfaction at least.

And also be grateful of the benefits that working in a uni provides, not everywhere offers such good flexible working

If I could go back in time I'd tell myself to put myself first. I kept not applying for jobs because I thought I might be pregnant the next month and didn't want to mess an employer around 🙄

OP maybe it’s the work environment rather than the actual role?

I worked at a uni a while ago in a reasonably well paid FT role. The people were lovely and pension/holiday were great but I found it both boring and stressful. I hated all the red tape and bureaucracy which I think is typical of large organisations.

I now do a finance/bit of everything PT role for a small family firm and I love it. I have one manager (who owns the company) and I am well paid. You do need to be flexible and do stuff outside the job role- I do whatever my time and skills allow, whether that’s updating our H&S policy or replenishing toilet rolls. I’ve seen a few similar roles advertised on similar money but most seem to want an finance/accounts/bookkeeping background. It might be something to bear in mind when looking at your job search.

I think it's honestly a question of choosing what to sacrifice

The reality is that well paid and interesting will encroach on your life ,or it will take a long time to get there. I was talking about this recently at work (this is not a comment on you OP just how this conversation came up) and we had a lot of new into the industry people wanting the world in the job

Fewer hours than the job entailed , wanting to do the complex side of the job straight away because it was interesting rather than recognising that those jobs are earnt through experience and talent , expecting unrealistic money , refusing to put themselves out in anyway and we were discussing the sacrifices it took for us (senior management discussing this) to get to the roles we were in

I do have a reasonably well paid and very interesting job , but it does encroach on my life...thats just reality ...the higher up I went the more accountability and responsibility which meant not being able to switch my phone off , dealing with incidents and deadlines that had to come above hobbies etc

To get to this point I've done 19 years in the industry and at the beginning working crap paid jobs with insane hours but It gave me experience few people can top

The next level for me is the holy grail in my industry , well paid,controlled hours and I'm within sniffing distance of it ...but it will probably be over 20 years of sacrifice in a lot of areas by then

So it does exist but it doesn't come overnight or easily

I have. I thought I wanted to go into a line of work after my degree but realized I couldn't hack shift work. Ended up in NHS admin and my problem is that as you move up that career ladder your pay increases slowly but your stress levels rocket.

Honestly I was only working to please other people and avoid being judged as a layabout. I didn't earn enough to move out of my parents house until I moved in with DH and going out to work just felt like a waste of time.

Slightly different scenario but I bummed out at school due to various issues, didn't do really bad, but not what I could have achieved had I not had some of those issues.
I trained in an area close to my heart, but soon realised it was pretty unsustainable when I had a child, long hours for very low pay and zero flexibility. I loved it though, my dream job.
Having come out of that I had nothing to fall back on. Started in care, did some vocational training, climbed the ladder, couldn't deal with the stress.
Moved into hospitality, same thing happened again. Had (for no qualifications) a decent wage, independent of tax credits etc. Again I just crumbled under the stress.
I'm still in hospitality now, but at supervisor level, rather than management. I'm good at what I do, and I care. Means managers want to promote me when an opportunity arises. I just can't deal with the mental load, and I end up a complete mess and off sick.
I'm tempted to go for promotion again, but each time I do, the same thing happens. My MH cannot deal with it.
My job isn't life saving, but it is interesting, and more importantly, I can do it without falling apart.
I've accepted that I won't rise above this level, and I work more hours at this level to make ends meet, but that's the trade off.
My mental health and lower standard of living, or higher standard of living for a short time and then mental illness and no standard of living on sick pay. Not a choice I ever wanted to make, but one I have had to.

I saw through the 'fulfilment through labour' lie back in high school.

Yeah, you tell them.

Fulfillment through labor doesn't pay rent or buy food and I agree it is a load of crap

I don't think it's necessarily true that all admin jobs are boring. I find my job to be really interesting- public services admin role- I work part time but FTE pay for my job is between £22k and £25K - so I don't know how well paid others consider this - average?

I think if I was you @ArtisanPopcorn I would continue applying for roles within the university but I would be a lot more pushy regarding feedback on unsuccessful applications- being told there were better candidates doesn't help you. In what way were they better? What extra experience do you need? Is it about how you structure your answers in interviews, or if you aren't getting to interview is it about how you present your CV info within your application.

I would also push your line manager in respect of your appraisal. Tell them you want to progress but remain with your employer. Can they provide shadowing opportunities for other roles, is there a project or part of a higher paid role you can take on whilst you are in your current role?

You may also want to consider whether it is the pay or the interest in what you do that is more important to you. It's not necessarily the case that a higher paid role is more interesting. Do you earn enough money to live comfortably or are you struggling Day to day?

In our case DH and I both earn 'enough' so we aren't struggling to put good on the table / pay the bills but likewise have a very modest house, second hand cars, clothes from supermarkets/ eBay etc neither of us would want the stress or uncertainty that may come with a higher earning job and hence would probably not add to our quality of life. On the other hand if we were struggling financially then yes we would look to move towards something better paid.

How 'interesting' your job is also needs balancing with the rest of your life; if you have hobbies you enjoy, part time studying then what you do 9-5 is perhaps less important.

I felt a bit like you op so at age 37 I went all out and got what I thought would be THE MOST EXCITING job ever!

Pay starts poor but after 10 years ends up at around 39k but it's shift work and often now extremely dangerous.

And I'm 8 years in and so infinitely pissed off with it I long to be back working normal hours with normal people.

Exciting decently paid jobs really aren't always what you think they'll be.

I feel now I need danger money to make mine worthwhile. I lose tons to a pension so come out with not that much really. And my terms conditions and retirement age keep changing. It's challenging mentally and physically and is probably killing me. My boss had a long chat with me last night as he noticed how down I am and how utterly pissed off with it I am. I told him I'm considering leaving. He's going to let me have a stint for a few weeks in a slightly more "elite" dept to see if I can get passionate about it again but then ....who knows.

Just trying to say boring is sometimes ok!

I feel like I could have written this OP.

I’ve been in the same job for 8 years too. Started as admin support, and on paper am still admin support. But looking at jobs out there, I am very well paid for it. I have obviously gained a lot of knowledge in the industry in that period of time, and have applied for jobs internally to get me moving up. But I won’t get any because I can’t do their shitty internal management course, due to it taking place hundreds of miles away, meaning I’d need a 2 day trip every month for a year and I just don’t have the childcare.

But, I went to leave last year. Got a new job, handed my notice in. A few weeks later retracted my notice and knocked back the new company. I’ve got it good here. My job isn’t stressful or interesting, but they’re really good in terms of my disability, they’re really family friendly, I work from home 3 days a week and am pretty much left to my own devices. I can go work from any site in the country if I want to, and there are thousands of them.

Better the devil you know and all that. I’ve gotten used to the fact that I might still be doing this job in 40 years like other ladies in my role, and that is okay. I don’t HAVE to progress

Hi OP, I am in a very similar position. I have been 5 years in my part-time Admin role at a university. The pay and hours are good but it seems almost impossible to move on. I've had 6 interviews for roles at the next grade in the past 2 years but there is always a "better" candidate. I have a degree and MSc and had a variety of jobs in voluntary sector and local government over 15 years but had 2 years out of work after my second child and then took this admin post to try and build a career in HE admin. I told myself for the first 4 years that I could cope with the boredom because the pay and flexibility are so good but now I'm really starting to resent how bored I am and am feeling trapped.