Do you have a job or career

[EmKai]

I feel a bit bad like I should have a career. I’m happy with just a job though that fits around the kids. Anybody else?

I have a job, which I guess could become a full blown career if I wanted. I work full time in local government. I had a career before I had kids, when I had the time, ambition and energy to want to prove something.

There has been a suspicious number of similar posts to this over the last couple of weeks.

if you’re insecure about it, do something. I couldn’t not have a career, I want to be a positive role model for my children and that includes a showing them women can achieve balance, work hard, earn well and do anything their dad can do and more.

At my stage of life now, I'd say a job, as I'm 50 and not sure I'll climb the greasy pole much more (reached senior management level). My jobs have always been in the same profession and I've moved up, so up to this point, yes I've had a career.

Having said that, if a promotion was offered and all was well with it, I probably wouldn't say no.

I have a career.

I don't want a job, I want something I enjoy and I want the money to afford the lifestyle I want.

Different people prioritise different things. I love my field and wanted to make a difference. It wasn't that I wanted a career, rather than a job. That's an odd perspective.

Do you want more money, more prestige, more power, more enjoyment? What does 'career' actually mean to you?

I am a professional and have a career. Been in the same profession before kids so was easier to keep going.

Job. It’s a source of sadness for me. I don’t really know how to make it to ‘career’ now. I’m mid 30s and really lacking in confidence. Well done those of those of you who have done it, esp those of you juggling parenting commitments!

I have a career, I’d couldn’t have done a job with no direction.

Career, I'm the sort of personality who constantly needs to be learning, pushing and aiming for something. So a career is a good outlet for that and makes my home life much more relaxed.

There's nothing wrong with not feeling like that though

Iv just moved from a job to a career.

I have a 'career'.

I treat it like a 'job' though.

I don't emotionally invest, I don't work weekends, I don't let it define my identity.

I’ve had a career, made redundant from it after 26 years. Now I have a job thatI’m enjoying but also it’s paying me until retirement (9 years to go). I’m leaving the careers to the young uns now.

^wss.

It doesn't rule my life, I keep my work within boundaries, but I always know what I'm aiming for, and generally I get it.

Well, the first thing is to know what career it is that you would like/enjoy. Working that bit out might switch negative thoughts to positive.

You can still get into pretty much any career you like! But if you don't know what you want to do then you can't work towards it.

Mid-30s is absolutely not too late - you are less than half way through your working life.

I have a job that pays very well. I work to live.

I have a career and I get a great sense of satisfaction from what I have achieved.

But if you have a job and you're happy with it, then that's absolutely OK as well.

There is no moral aspect to this, it's just about what matters to you as an individual imo.

I had a career ( teacher), and now I have a job (cleaner). I loved teaching and enjoy cleaning. I think choice is important. I could go back to teaching if I wanted.
My niece went to university to study economics, but works in tesco, on the tills and absolutely loves it.
She has a choice, though, as opposed to being stuck in a job, I guess.
Whatever makes you happy, really.

The only difference between a job and a career is how the person, views it. I started in a ‘job’ and it became my career.

if you don’t want to view it as a career, now or ever, that’s really ok

I started off with a job, which then morphed into a career when someone took me under their wing and mentored me.

After dc I didn't really want to go back to all that merry-go-round, so since then I've either been freelance or part-time. I'm semi retired now, and it is the best of both worlds. I can still use my knowledge and experience, but there's no pressure for me to get higher up the career ladder.

Dunno really! I work in a professional, white collar, fairly well paid job, for the civil service, with quite a lot of responsibility so I suppose it would meet the traditional definition of a "career", however on the other hand its not what I trained or planned to do and has no link with my degree or post grad quals, I have no intention of progressing upwards, sideways or in any other direction, plan to reduce hours once I get to the next tax band, and if I won the lottery or even premium bonds would be gone before they could buy a leaving card!

What is the difference between a job and a career, and why does it matter?

I have a career. It started with a job and I enjoyed it enough to stick with it, which gave me the momentum to progress.
The dividing line for me between job and career was when I landed the first role that needed qualifications and experience to attain. Prior to that, it was a job.

From my point of view, a job is something you do for a set number of hours, and then you come home again. You are happy to receive such payrises and promotions as come your way, but that's as far as it goes. A career is where you are actively seeking promotion and advancement, and have ambitions to climb to the top of that particular industry tree, whatever it is.

So in your opinion it's the attitude of the person actually doing the job rather than the job itself that defines whether it's a career?

Everybody needs a sense of self fulfilment to be happy. Due to the fact we live in a capitalist economy, career is the most valued obvious means of achieving that. However, it's not the only means.

For some people it's family. For some it's hobbies. Others find it through charity work. There are loads of ways. Many of the non-paid routes (e.g. raising family or volunteering) are massively undervalued and often sneered at but the country would grind to a halt if people stopped doing them.

They are all equally valid but some are inherently more risky for individuals due to the lack of monetary remuneration they receive.

I have a career. I'm very happy. I've known equally happy and fulfilled people without one.