What jobs do people have that pay £200k+?

[Diamondpearl123]

I am thinking about making a career change to earn more (aiming for £200k +) but would like to understand what types of roles I should aim for and whether they are realistic for me. Grateful to understand people’s experiences and hopefully start a good discussion. Some questions below. Thank you

• What is your job?
• What is your salary?
• How many years into your career are you?
• What are the key qualifications/experience for the role?
• What hours do you work?

Well she won't earn into 7 figures as a senior manager or a director at the big 4 - she'll be lucky to earn that as a partner - although if she's climbed up the partner ranks quite a bit then it doesn't seem like you know - because if she was on seven figures she'd be a managing/senior partner not a managing director - which sounds a bit like a vanity title, especially the global head bit.😂 But don't assume seven figures is default for most partners because it really isn't Maybe you don't know as much as you think!

I think it is a traditional industry yes, but certainly I know women at the top of this industry. A good friend of mine, early 50s, is on the board of one company and has been there for 30 years. She is extremely well paid. Clever lady but no quals beyond degree I think.

It's not reverse snobbery! I fought long and hard to build my health and safety career but as a woman trying to build it in male dominated industries it's always been hard, I've always earned less than I should have done and people need to be realistic. The OP as a woman will still have it massive harder than men to try and get in to top level roles especially if she hasn't got the relevant experience.
There's no 9 to 5 job anymore even for those on £20 to £30k jobs! It's usual at least 8 til 5 and many companies want to minimise the money they spend on h&s staff and expect one poor overworked soul to cover their sites across entire country and never be at home! And that's for jobs at about £35k! Do you see it now? Very few employers want to pay you ginormous salaries for you to sit and have less stress and demand than poor sods on £30 to £50k jobs!

@FlyingCatGirl I didn’t say it was easy. I work in a highly paid, highly specialist role and have three postgraduate degrees and finally fully qualified at 36, by which point I have four children under six. It was really, really hard work but we always managed to keep a good family life balance with both of us working in professional roles and feel we have a really good quality of life. Yes, I live in a relatively affluent area and have successful friends, in a range of professions not all of whom are well paid.

But I really do want to counter the posters who, with great confidence but no actual experience assert that working in a highly paid job brings with it impossible hours, no work life balance and no useful contribution to society. And that no one born outside the Southeast or the upper middle classes has any chance of achieving such a role. None of those things are particularly my experience or the experience of people I know who are well remunerated. They generally tend to work in interesting, influential roles, have good family and social lives and feel pretty proud of what they have achieved. Of course there will be exceptions to that, people who choose to leave their roles and take other paths, but that is no different to people in any other type of job.

We know levels of compensation in certain industries and types of jobs . Big tech for example grades all jobs by levels and there is a lot of information out there which level means what kind of package (roughly) and jib level of each person is known to everyone within the company and is part of the job advertisement or discussed at interviews. It can all be researched.

This thread was mostly people talking about themselves. obviously I know what I earn, what my husband earns and which companies we’d go to if we want to maintain or increase their salary level.

I earn that kind of money and so does my DH. He works hard, me less so - hence I’m on here before I head into a meeting!

I have a very good stress tolerance, great multitasker and clarity of thought. I’m part time. We exist.

I'm not jealous or insecure! Are you telling me that I'm so worthless that I should feel insecure? I lost a job I loved through redundancy and that hurt and the job I now have isn't great. I'm proud of how hard I have worked over the years to achieve what I have, my partner through no encouragement from his mother built his career and is a Senior IT Network Engineer for the NHS but he earns £45k! He shouldn't feel less of a person or be jealous either! I'm hugely proud of him.

Please don't tell me my industry! I live in the north where industry is collapsing left right abd centre, I was made redundant from the steel industry. Yes there are H&S jobs out there but a) they want more experience than I've been able to get! I would have got far more experience had the steel plant not shut b) I would have to be away from home all week! And for what? Maybe £40k? Money might be your god but it's not mine! My partner and I have a financially comfortable life! We've just come back from Sri Lanka and head to Seville in April! We aren't on tiny salaries, but you think £200k is a normal average salary and that's why you think I need to be jealous!

But what do you do to earn that salary and how many years and what qualifications etc has it taken to earn that - that's what people need to realistically hear. My partner and I have stressful and responsible jobs! Don't ever forget that people on normal average salaries work hard too and have a lot of responsibility. If my partner can't resolve IT network issues for the NHS, it starts to impact patient care including emergency care like scans, x rays and blood tests! I made my living in wanting to get people home from safely everyday. We are also in the North which is a different world to the money that can be earned down south.

I'm not saying that individuals don't know their own salaries and industries. It's just some of these posters seem to know the salaries of long lists of varied people in varied roles/industries and some of them just don't ring true. I think a lot of assumptions are made based on people's perceived lifestyles.

The reality is that most industries will have people in a range of salaries. Even for professions seen as highly paid such as law for example there is a real range. There are very good and fairly experienced lawyers earning c£50k and then there are equity partners in large firms earning seven figures.

The other reality is that most of these jobs are not easy to get into despite what some would say and most require decades of experience to get to very highly paid levels and a definite trade off in terms of work life balance.

Times have also changed in terms of the job market. DC has 4 A*s at A Level, is on track for a First at a good university and has excellent legal work experience and relevant extra curriculars but it is still a massive challenge to get a training contract because the profession is absolutely swamped with graduates and is being affected massively by advances in technology so law firms do not need the number of junior lawyers they used to. I would never advise a sixth former to do law now.

You are looking at specialist roles, large corporations, v senior level and YEARS of experience. Rarely your standard 9-5…

I want to make the point here that despite a lot of MN brags that £200k is a normal, average salary that is easily earned, it massively isn't especially up north! We are losing industries hand over fist up here and believe me the mire people being made redundant, the more I am noticing organisations offering shit salaries because they know people are desperate! A good salary up here would be 40k! And the thing is my partner and I have a joint income of maybe just under £75k and we have no kids and a very comfortable life! We have a nice home and we travel a lot. Neither of us feels like we want to earn more money, certainly not at the cost of excessive stress, being away from etc. my partner sees how stressed his boss is! My dad was a workaholic and that lead to health issues that took him at 67 and robbed him of his retirement years so I think differently!

The whole point of this thread was to disclose that professions can have a range of salaries, so one doens't have to stick to self limiting beliefs because there are paths and industries within the same profession that are more well paid than others. Most posters here were not basing the information on perceived lifestyle.

Obviously there are C suite executives who are paid 150K but there are also industries where you don't have to be near C suite to be paid 200K, all while in the same profession and even same specialty. Same about solicitors. In some industries you don't have to be working in magic circle private practice or be a partner, you can be in-house and not even a GC or AGC.

But people need to KNOW that it is possible and go seek out opportunities there.

If you don't want to be earning more money, why are you on this thread at all?

I'm not telling you that you should feel insecure. There are a million of very worthy jobs which don't pay very well. Equally there are lots of worthy jobs that pay very well.
You come across as insecure being very angry about people saying that it is possible to earn 200K and not work 80 hour weeks or accusing people of gaslighting.
I honestly don't understand what you are doing on this thread if you don't want to earn more and are very happy.

The one big change in recent years is the ability to work remotely in high paying roles that would previously have been office based in London/SE.

It is worth targeting those type of roles as they bring with them a far better standard of living than those still anchored to London.

10 years ago my role would have been almost entirely office based in London. I am now fully remote and can live anywhere while still earning the same 200k salary.

I’m not from the SE so choose to live in a lovely semi rural area in the Midlands. A 200k salary here provides me with an infinitely better standard of living than a similar salary in London would do.

My one key bit of advice to anyone considering a career change or starting out in their working life is to target roles that have the option of remote working. It is almost more important than the salary in my opinion.

Neither of us feels like we want to earn more money

this thread is not relevant to you then.

Well no - that might be your point in coming onto the thread but this thread was actually from an individual wanting to know about salaries because she is wanting to career change and asking about what is realistic for her.

So in law for example there is little point in telling someone who is already an adult with another career behind them and who in all likelihood has various financial commitments, family commitments and ties to a particular area, that it's realistic to career change and become a solicitor and they will stand a good chance of earning £200k.

The profession is now undergoing rapid and fundamental change, there are literally thousands of applicants for most training contracts and vacation schemes because there is a significant mismatch between the number of graduates and the number of junior roles, it costs a large amount of money (circa £25k all in to convert your degree and then pass SQE) and most people have to go through multiple recruitment rounds (only open once a year) to get a training contract. Then even once they do qualify (for a non law graduate this is a minimum of 4 years after starting the conversion), they will need many years of experience and hard work to get to that salary level unless they are one of the few hundred each year that go into a magic/silver circle or US firm. Law is also brutal. If you're not excellent at your job you will be moved on very quickly.

As such, and to answer the OP - law is not a realistic proposition for a career changer wanting to earn £200k.

People saying things like they know someone who was sick of doing legal aid work so they set up a corporate law firm are probably...."mistaken"....(unless it happened a long time ago), and are also minimising the very significant hurdles to overcome to now be able to even qualify to then be able to do the very lowest paid legal work.

OK fine, law is probably not a good avenue for OP just because it takes a while to qualify. I'm a lawyer, in big tech no less, I'm aware of the challenges and the current industry changes. But this thread is valuable information for other already qualified lawyers. She didn't say what her job was to start with, and didn't say limit the responses.

OP herself has a background which may be very transferable to tech jobs and it is valuable information that program managers / project manager adjacent jobs in tech can be paid very well.

IP lawyers, this is your moment to get lots of money -- AI companies and startups suddenly care so much about copyright, data, models and licensing, and they’re paying properly for it. Used to be all about M&A and finance, now the IP crowd are low-key the hot hires

Thats really great. And there are lots of ways to do that if you are willing to learn and be agile.

I would recommend reading personal development/ leadership books
Get career coaching
Get a mentor
Follow thought leaders in your space
Network

Gather up all the feedback you've been given and start to address each item.

It is possible to progress but it takes work. Those of us on those salaries had to make sacrifices & choices not many do make.

Could you take in ironing?

Tip: You should be able to offset a lot of your electricity bill as a business expense.

I know what lots of people earn. I’m a wealth manager and they have to tell me. I’m dealing in facts, not perceptions.

@FlyingCatGirl I don't think anyone is suggesting these salaries are the norm across the UK jobs market- of course they aren't. People are saying they are possible, and giving examples of sectors and roles where they are more prevalent, in response to an OP who asked specifically about that. OP went on to say that she also needed to think about what kind of life she wanted outside work, as this might have a bearing on how hard she was willing to push for one of those high salaries. Some posters wrote about extreme work pressures and stress, others' experiences were easier once they reached senior positions. Most I guess are somewhere between the two. For instance. I worked v long hours in previous roles, but now long hours have been replaced by carrying a lot of risk, mitigated by independent subject-specific experience, and I'm able to work from home (a very long way from London and the SE).

In terms of the safety industry, it's really important, and good employers recognise the need for people to be safe at work and get home safe. That's likely to mean the sector is structured as a broad-based triangle with a safety professional as thevSME in many work places, cluster leads line managing these and a much smaller number of higher paid Directors of Safety taking a strategic view of safety practice, ensuring good policies and practices are in place across wide organisational footprints. I wouldn't ask him, but I'd be fairly sure our Safety Director is earning over £100k, with responsibility for safety in contracts worth many hundreds of £millions. Within this global business there are two layers above him focused on Safety. He earns his salary, not through long hours, but by ensuring the whole business unit has good safety, and this requires top-level analysis, communication and systems skills. He works from home but travels a good bit, and he has two layers of safety professionals working under him- the majority in individual sites and a smaller number running these as teams. He started out as a coal miner in the NW, and has made a great living out of a passion for keeping colleagues safe. He's highly influential and greatly respected in this business.

I'm not trying to teach you about your industry- you know it much better than I ever could. I'm just illustrating how many sectors offer opportunities to earn more as you move from procedural into strategic roles. You clearly have a very good quality of life already and between you and your partner earn well and make a valuable contribution, so you might not want to change anything. I can't say whether you have the aptitude and ambition to earn more in more strategic roles, but those roles do exist, both in your sector and accessible in your home area.

The top 1% of uk workers are in this bracket. I don't think your employment profile, qualifications and experience put you in the top 1%.

B2B tech sales - 200k very achievable in the right company. Can take years to reach this level (20+ yrs industry experience in my case) but also seen those much earlier in their career also achieve/exceed this by as early as age Top achievers last year earned in the range 350k to 1m