To ask whether you enjoy your job?

[Bollypears]

..... and if so, what do you do?!

I work in Corporate Governance and it’s mind numbingly boring and monotonous. I fell in to this career years ago rather than choosing it but now my experience, qualifications and skills are all very specific to this field and don’t seem to be particularly transferable. Due to my role being quite specialist and well paid, it’s not easy to change career without taking a substantial pay cut which I just can’t really do (mortgage etc).

Every day consists of clock watching, wishing the day away and thinking about how much I’d rather be anywhere else but there. I work with nice people, the role is relatively low stress, performance wise I’m doing well... I’m just utterly bored and demotivated inside. From Monday onwards I count down to the weekend and even by Sunday I feel horrendous about the thought of another week at work.

Some of my colleagues appear to love their job and I wonder whether I’m the odd one out. I often daydream about quitting the job all together or getting signed off work just for a break from the boredom, but of course I don’t. I sit at my desk and/or in meetings thinking to myself, is this really how life is supposed to be?

I’m genuinely interested to know whether others feel the same or if this isn’t the norm. I know those who come across me at work would have no idea I feel this way. I can’t speak to many people about this IRL as it’s a bit shameful. I know I should be grateful to be in well paid employment but it doesn’t help how I feel.

For those who do enjoy their jobs, I’m very interested to know what you do if you don’t mind sharing please!

I love my job but it is minimum wage, I'm a support worker for older adults with learning and physical disabilities and behavioural problems, it is extremely rewarding work, my colleagues are great and very welcoming and supportive to newcomers ( I'd never worked in care before), I love the variety, one day I can be taking someone to the coast and eating fish and chips on the beach, the next I might be supporting someone to attend an appointment or we might be baking at home. Done days it's very hard physically and mentally demanding but when a client smiles and thanks me or holds my hand for confider it makes it worthwhile.

I'm a loss adjuster and love my job. I've got into a niche area of the market. No two days are the same and no two claims are the same. Learning something new everyday still as I've only been doing the job for 4 years

I'm a carer in a nursing home. It's minimum wage but I absolutely love it. I get so much satisfaction from my job, and my 12 hour shifts fly by.

I’m a therapist working primarily with people who have experienced trauma. I really love it, it’s born out of my journey to heal from my own childhood trauma.
It can be demanding, but mostly it feels like an exchange, because my deepest heartfelt wish it to lower the impact of trauma on individuals,

I work in Data Protection and love it. Every day is different and the job still challenges me as much now as it did on day one, which I like because it keeps me invested. We've got a lot busier since the introduction of GDPR last year, the days tend to fly by in a blur!

@CloudsCanLookLikeSheep I'm willing to bet we work for the same company!

I'm an Auditor in Finance. Never planned to be an Auditor but I absolutely love it and work for a great company. I also have a lovely team which helps because generally no one is happy to see an Auditor.

I work in TV scheduling. It is very interesting and fulfilling and I get to watch a lot of TV at work. It is a mix of being creative and analytical which suits my way of thinking. I feel very lucky to have my job and enjoy going to work.

I love my job. I'm a nuclear physicist. No two days are the same and I am using my degree and PhD all the time. I used to teach but it was so dull! Glad I switched careers. My colleagues are nice, my wages are pretty decent and I get good employee benefits.

Yes I love it. I work in a popular tourist attraction and meet lots of interesting people. only work part time which gives me good work life balance and the moneys crap but it enjoy it.

I work in environmental education and it's great. Helping people learn things that bring them joy and important scientific concepts. My.colleagues are lovely. Sadly the contract ends in a few weeks and work is hard to come by so I don't know what I'll do next, I feel very sad.

Another accountant who enjoys her job. Well paid as a ‘technical expert’, extremely sensible hours, outside of ‘business as usual’ so only rarely have any significant time pressure. What makes it is that I really like the people I work with.

I'm a theatre nurse and LOVE it.

I teach Secondary and absolutely adore it. Always amazed by the negative / hesitant responses I get when I say what I do.

I love my job

Work as therapist within forensic mental health. It’s challenging, exhausting at times and can be rewarding

Rubbish pay and more work is constantly put on us

I'm a university lecturer and, so far this week, I love my job. Last week it reduced me to tears.

I'm always challenged, never bored, with a lot of autonomy and in a role that makes a positive contribution to society. My colleagues are mostly lovely, interesting and intelligent, as are most of my students.

However at times I also come home from work feeling frustrated, exhausted and as if I'm a completely useless waste of space. So, swings and roundabouts

University Tutor here. I adore my subject and I love working with the students. When I'm in the flow of teaching and see the results in the students, it is brilliant and I really feel happier than I have in any other job.

However.

I can't afford to live on my current wage. I don't have a salaried position and they are getting harder to come by. I never know at the end of one semester if I will definitely have a job next semester. I was only offered part time work this academic year, despite being one of the most qualified in the department as well as a favourite with the students who specifically requested that I teach on certain modules. Those modules were given to lecturers who haven't yet covered those areas in their own research or practice and they have no industry experience. There seems to be an impossible to navigate hierarchy that I can't quite make sense of or climb. I don't have a teaching qualification like a PGCE or QTS so it feels like the only other work I can look for is part-time office work that is paid throughout the year. I don't get paid during the ridiculously long university holidays so there are several months of the year that I am desperately trying to find temp work. Its unsustainable but what I love to do.

I also have a horrible commute and the mornings are especially stressful. That alone is enough to make me wonder if it's all worth it some days.

I'm thinking of retraining but don't know what to do. I'd do a PGCE but I honestly don't think I'd cope based on what I've heard of the course and secondary schools in general.

I have a support role in social services child protection. I enjoy my job, it's interesting and in a small way I'd like to think I am contributing to helping vulnerable families. I work part time, pay not brilliant but a lot of that is around lack of proper pay rise for last 10 years.

I love my job, I work in a preschool. The only downside is the pay but I love it so much and there’s no stress to take home, child friendly hours etc it’s worth it.

University lecturer - I love it.

Very interesting, intellectually challenging but not stressful, love working with students, lots of autonomy, well-paid, great location.

I've steadfastly avoided any promotion and in particular anything to do with management. That way lies grief.

I’m a Personal Assistant to a busy Director in a corporate environment. It’s mainly diary management, organising meetings and admin. I do enjoy what I do but I do have ‘ugh’ moments where it’s super busy, and some people have a tendency to think of you as ‘just’ a PA as you’re support staff and think they can ask you to do all sorts of grunt work even though it isn’t part of your job.

But overall I enjoy it! I like that I work with a range of people across all areas of the business, I like that it’s problem solving and I feel satisfaction when I can sort things out for my boss (especially when a curve ball comes my way).

At the end of the day it’s still work, if I didn’t have to work I probably wouldn’t (would do something part time or volunteer). But as far as jobs go it’s a nice one, the salary is decent and I have a good work/life balance. I’ve learnt that I’m a ‘work to live’ person rather than a ‘live to work’ one, I find my satisfaction from other areas of my life. I also do a bit of writing as my creative outlet. It works for me.

I work in veterinary emergency and critical care as an animal care assistant. I love what I do even if it can be very stressful.

I work in an office for a company that is kind of a goverment body. Its not a civil servant job and my email address does not end with gov.uk, but its something that the government have created.

I love my hours. Its an early start, but also an early finish.

The rest of it. Well erm not so much.

I only choose to work in an office because it fits my lifestyle. I like my evenings and weekends free. I like to leave work and not have to do any more with it once Im out of that door.

Part of me is thinking about looking for another job, but Id never get these hours (7-3) and these mean the world to me.

I’m self employed, various farming jobs but currently most of my time is spent gamekeeping. I LOVE it.
The people I work with (over the last 15 years) have been mostly great - passionate, knowledgeable, and generous with their help and advice - which makes a huge difference to every job. The lack of colleagues in current main job has been a surprising joy, though. I like the autonomy, and just being able to get on with a job the way I think it should be done, without having to humour anyone, or jolly them along... so the peacefulness! Silence, and a spectacular view, watching the sun set, or a rainbow, a sparrowhawk hunting or a doe with her faun... I can stop and stare and really appreciate how lucky I am.
But, the pay is mostly around NMW, the work is casual, seasonal, and the actual payments are unpredictable, as with any self employment.

I am an editor of a scientific journal. I work full time from home (head office is overseas) and love my job.

It's challenging in that by its nature I am looking at studies using new technologies. I love communicating with the authors.

Some of the work we publish makes the news and that makes me feel I'm contributing to stuff that makes a difference.

Before this position I did a really specific, quite odd scientific job, which was really hard to explain to people, but this one I am able to tell people what I do and I enjoy that.