Career change advice for a chronically ill civil servant

[FairTurtle]

I need career change advice!

I'm a civil servant, working in policy for a central government department, earning just over £50k. I live in London, am single and have a mortgage. About 2 years ago, I developed a pretty major chronic illness which greatly impacts my day to day life. I'm still able to work full-time, but it's 100% remote. I've often thought of cutting down my hours to just 4 days a week but I don't think I'd be able to take the pay cut.

It might be in vain, but I'm trying to consider alternative and more lucrative work/career options that would give me greater flexibility, more control over my hours and the ability to be paid a little more, over time, without having to commit hours and hours to applying on promotion to highly coveted jobs like you do in the civil service. I also need to retain the ability to work 100% remotely (civil service pay is basically stagnant, and you can only get paid more by being promoted, which isn't that realistic for me). I'd be able to study/retrain in my spare time a little, and can probably raise some finances for that if need be.

Essentially, I'm trying to recreate a more viable career path for myself, given my new circumstances with my health. I'm not paid terribly, but obviously costs are increasing for everyone and I'm just aware that going into the future, a civil service career might not be the best way to achieve greater financial security. I'm a Grade 7 (if that means anything to anyone here!) and am nowhere near being able to apply for Grade 6 roles. Even if I was, I'm not sure I'd be able, with my health, to take on that level stress and responsibility. I'm feeling a bit a silly, with the benefit of hindsight, that I didn't embark on a more lucrative career choice to begin with, like law or accounting, which would presumanly allow me to maintain a decent salary even if I was to reduce my hours.

Obviously, this isn't an easy question. I can't really see any clear options, and I doubt such a job/career change even exists, but I figured I'd ask just in case anyone has any helpful experiences or perspectives to share.

In case it's relevant, I'm 31 and have a 2.1 law degree from a fairly prestigious Russell Group university. I did maths and economics at A level and achieved A*s (just adding this because I've vaguely considered something like accounting!)

Thanks so much for reading!

You say you work in policy, can you be a bit more specific about your skills / experience / what it is you actually do?

I know it doesn't go far in London but £50k is a pretty good salary, so you'd presumably need to move into something at a reasonably high level to avoid taking a paycut. You'd not be able to start from scratch in a new career and work from the bottom up, for example.

I would also be concerned about the 100% remote requirement. There seems to be a lot of pushback on that from companies across the board, the sort of jobs I've seen advertised as 100% remote aren't highly paid, more stuff like copywriting which is terrible pay unless you are very experienced and have built up a lot of contacts.

One of my family works in fintech as dev op/ build op, earning 80k after 3 years work, and from home 100%, agreed due to health reasons. They have a maths degree but no formal IT training. Most of their colleagues have a computer science background. Potential earnings are pretty good.
If you have a facility with computing, you could probably study for some sort of qualification fairly easily.
It seems a lot less hard work than something like law, which is very competitive and demands long hours .

@DelphiniumBlue That's interesting, thanks for sharing! Do you know much more about what dev ops etc are? 80k after three years of work experience seems pretty incredible...

I clicked on this as someone with Ill health (but good degrees) and a bit older my goal would be 50k and wfh 4 days (so 40k) but i can't see a way to get there!!

50k at 31 is really impressive.

@HungryWombat If I could maintain £45-50kk for 4 days a week I'd be happy!

And thank you. Not sure where you are, but it's fairly standard in London (with the additional weighting) for civil service jobs at my grade.

Wishing you the best of luck too!

The civil service is very accommodating and will give you all the reasonable adjustments you need. Maybe you need to think about relocating from London. As PP have said that is a pretty good salary. Also not all grade 7 jobs pay the same- some departments pay a lot more than others - keep a look at civil service jobs or have a Google and maybe think about a dept move instead too.

*FairTurtle, embarrassingly although *the family member lived with me till very recently, no, I dont really know much about it, other than they build and maintain IT systems- could be for banks, or any industry really. There are various coding languages, FM learned one to start with and then a few more. I do know his maths helped, as did a can-do attitude, and being very solution focused. It was hard to start with, a steep learning curve, but now he’s on top of it he really doesn’t seem to work long hours. Occasionally he’ll work late or at the weekend if there is a crisis, but that is rare.
Hopefully someone else on here will know more. I do know it’s mostly male-dominated, but FM has said for that reason they are keen to appoint women.

@Bathymamouth Thank you! They have indeed been accommodating, for which I'm grateful, but in terms of pay, there's just no option to earn more without going for promotions, which get harder and harder the further up you get. I'm just not able to compete like that anymore.

I will look at depts with a higher minimum salary, but I think it's only likely to be a grand or so more.

Just to clarify, I'm not complaining about my current salary. I'm aware it's good. It's more that when I think about this being my salary forever - which it will, in this career, given my health circumstances, that's what's driving me to consider different options which may be more lucrative long-term.

Yes I'm not in London but would love to work up to say 40k for 4 days.

I clicked as getting out of my profession the civil service is exactly what is usually recommended for those wanting more flexibility/wfh /reasonable adjustments...

I think it's incredibly hard to move sideways into soemthing that is both wfh and well paid but following along as I'd happily retrain if I could be couldn't retrain full time outside the home with commuting to do so which is a bit of a vicious circle.

So many local gov jobs are literally 25-35k (admittedly not London) and wanting a ton of specific experience which hasn't made the "jump down with the aim of working up" idea work for me yet either as local gov is the other employer often suggested after civil service!

Id like to have been an Ed psych and they can earn a fair bit once established but I'd have had to have trained before I got ill which I could kick myself for!

I'd look at it another way and relocate to somewhere much cheaper but still nice if you're fully remote. Midlands, Worcestershire, Cumbria, Yorkshire, Scotland, Northumberland, Lancashire.

Your mortgage would be a lot lower and therefore £50K will go further. You'd obviously need the stamp duty/moving costs up front.

@HungryWombat Civil service is very good, generally, for flexibility and adjustments. I think your goal is doable! I'm not sure what you do now but you can earn almost £50k in some SEO roles, and around £55k in most Grade 7 roles. So worth looking into ways to get a foot in the door.

I'm just being greedy, I guess!

@Turmerictolly Thanks for the suggestion but it's not really viable. I'm single, chronically ill, and all my friends/family/support network are near me.

Oh no don't limit yourself!

I've just been on a similar path this last year but failing despite good degrees but having chronic health issues (but still fully able to work from home) I've been so fed up at not being able to make progress myself. I'm a bit older than you too so you're probably in a better position to career change and obviously already being in a well paid job means you have a good cv/better change to leap than I currently do!

Welsh Government, Scottish Government and the CMA (there will also be others like this - still civil service but not your traditional whitehall dept) all pay higher than some Government departments.

I wasn't meaning to quash your ambition at all apologies. I think I'm just jaded with the options and finding it difficult myself! I'll lurk for ideas though. I have 2 fab Russell group degrees just feel my initial career choice wasn't a good one!

@HungryWombat Aww, no worries at all! I'm sorry it',s been tough and I can relate. It's really difficult to accept that illness has cost you career progression and opportunities.

Feel free to DM me if you ever want to swap ideas x

If anyone has any experience with, or is in accounting, I'd be really interested to hear about it. I know it's not as simple as "do the exams then set up a freelance practice", but perhaps it'd be feasible to get a remote junior accountant role when starting out?

Local govt perhaps? Good flexibility and support for health conditions and perhaps easier to work your way up the career ladder?

The risk with retraining is possibly (depending on your condition) having to squeeze in hours of extra study or worrying about flaring at exam time.

Whenever I feel glum that my earning has been curtailed by my health condition I remind myself that many people with my condition cannot work at all, and that I am lucky that I can. But I get that I would probably feel less lucky if I was trying to make that salary stretch to London living costs.

Sorry it's rotten when your ambition and ability is limited by your health

I don't know about accounting but a lot of places want their more junior staff in the office more regularly.

Is there a way to make some sideways moves using your current skillset instead?

@FairTurtle hey sorry to hear about your condition, very tough on you and stressful, you are defo right to be thinking longterm about income etc. I work in the public sector and whilst the salary is not what I could earn in the private sector the flexibility, pension and potential support if you needed to take sick leave is really worth alot. I would think about how you could increase your income from something else and keep your current job as its 'safe', I don't want to pry and please do not share if you aren't comfortable but depending on your illness and how it progresses you may need a job where you know they will look about for you, the public sector and civil service do that. With your education level could you look into online tutoring? Or do you have a spare room/garage you could convert and let? It's hard getting a side hustle despite how easy ppl make it seem lol but earning more isn't necessarily what you might need, with the additional stress and responsibility is the after tax take home really worth it? Especially if you are unwell at times, the stress will not help that and might make it worse. In terms of working a 4 day week, I too didnt want to take a pay cut, so opted for a 9 day fortnight, have every other Monday off, get additional holiday allowance for bank hols; you only have to do an extra 45 mins across the other 9 days to make up the hours,I was doing extra every day anyway! Good luck with it all x

@CassandraWebb Thanks for being so empathetic! That's exactly it. In my head, I'm still the same person I was before I got sick, but physically and even mentally, I just can't handle the same stress levels and life demands.

I probably do need to try to change my perspective a bit, tbh. I'm fortunate in many ways. I just feel very left out when around friends who are all very into their (lucrative) careers! I actually like my job. Just wish the pay was higher!

I get that. I know I have the aptitude for high flying work as I did it for a while. But it took an enormous toll on my body.

I've stepped back now to a level my body can cope with and although I have some regret that my body wouldn't let me do it, finding a right level to work at is important with chronic illness, as you do need to ensure you have some of your energy left to enjoy a life outside of work

@FairTurtle your friendship group sounds bit different to mine lol but £50k at your age is incredible. Focus on yourself and your health for a bit. You've put it out to the universe now, concentrate on your well being and continue doing a good job, money is super important obviously but finding your 'ikigai' is too, everyday think about 1 thing you can achieve in work to give it meaning, can you get involved in mentoring or set up a staff network, or is there someone you know is struggling and can you help them? The money is important but only in so far as it provides you a comfortable life, if you are comfortable hold for now, the money will come...