Do you ever regret your career or non-career?

[PavlovtheCat]

I never really followed any direction. I had ended up where i am in my career by sort of default. Well not the position, that was hard work, but the profession. It is close to what i want to do. But, i only realised what I wanted to do by doing this job.

And now, i think it is too late .

Anyone else feel like this? Does anyone wish they could turn the clock back to being 17/18/19 and make different educational decisions?

Has anyone taken a major leap of faith in themselves at the expense of other things, career wise and changed direction? retrained in a profession? How was it?

and i spend about 20% of my time loving my job and 80% wishing i was anywhere else! The bit i love is so hard to achieve. The client based work, that part i like. Its getting to that part i struggle with as its all about stats and targets and its not real anymore. Its like we don't give a toss about change because it is good, but because if we don't the papers will crucify us, and if we don't we won't get this or that funding. It is wrong.

You can probably guess where i work then itsallaboutpootle

NHS Community Drug Team?

Probation.

Aha, nuff said! I worked for Probation a few years ago. Now work for the machine that is the NHS!

ah are you jointly trained? are you one of the 'lucky' ones who can work in either sector on your qualification?

I qualified as a nurse and midwife back in the 1980's and for some reason chose general nursing instead of midwifery. I progressed to a very senior management position in a group of London Hospitals, but after the birth of my fourth child felt I wanted to be a SAHM. Since then I have worked as a college lecturer and teacher of Health & Social Care but never really felt they were for me. In January this year I felt I wanted to do something in healthcare again, my youngest is one year away from secondary school and so I felt it may be my time. Out of nowhere I decided that I would refresh my midwifery. So I have applied for a September course and have been called for the introduction day. I am so excited and can't wait. Was worried that I might be to old at 45, but having watched One Born Every Minute am convinced I will be a good midwife.

I qualified as a social worker in the last year of being able to choose a "stream". i did the criminal justice stream and went into Probation, briefly, as realised it is control not social work mostly. I have been very lucky as have worked for Probation, HM Prison Service and the NHS in last 12 years.

I've had 2 great careers which have provided travel (my passion), excitement and security.

My only regret is there isn't enough time to fit in my third choice. I would have loved to have been a doctor also, but alas that was not to be.

sorry pavlov, its allaboutpootle, had name changed as sick of people on a bf thread having a go because i don't agree with them!

riven you can still do a degree, or a post grad, or conversion or similar. It sounds like it is most certainly your time!

latesemptember oh good for you!!! I don't think 45 is too old to change careers. It is not too old to have children, and we are now definitely going to be working at say 65, so that is 20 years, so they will get their money back regarding cost of training, and then likely to work even longer than that, so lots more years to become an expert. And it is not like you are starting from the very beginning either, not that i think that would make a difference.

missmoopy they have scrapped the degree training now for probation officers. Not happening any more. Except they will re-introduce it next year when they realise they have just given all the experiened officers early retirement/voluntary redundancy and there are not enough officers until the new way of doing it produces officers in about 5 years

thanks Pavlov, I only need 8 study days and 100 practice hours over 12 months and they give me back my pin number. So by 46 I will be up and running. Your right I think I will probably give them another 15-20 years.

I had a career before that I enjoyed. Then I had my dcs and it just didn't fit the bill.

However, I refused to accept that I would be doing a job without any real interest in it for the rest of my life.
I retrained, which involved a lot of financial sacrifices. A lot of hard work from me and from DH.

But I have no regret whatsoever.

For whoever thinks that at 41 they are too old to retrain thik again. The degree/MSc I've been doing, a lot of people were 40+, some 50+ by the end of the course. It is OK to want to do somethingelse at 40!! (and quite manageable too)

When I was younger, I always wanted to have my own business. I still do want that, but I'm too much of a wimp. Maybe one day... DH works for himself and he loves it. He works very hard but on his own terms, which suits him brilliantly.

Ironically, OP, I am a lawyer - and about 50% of my work is employment (mostly tribunal claims) at the moment. I started out at university doing modern languages, but was too scared to do the year abroad so had a mad panic after the first year and asked to switch to another course. The only thing I could realistically switch to with my language A-levels was law, so I applied to move to the law course and was accepted over the summer and went back as a second year into the first year of a law degree. After graduation, I didn't know what I wanted to do so I pootled around working in John Lewis for a while, then got bored and decided to apply late for the LPC starting that year. I then applied late for training contracts and was lucky to get one that another candidate had dropped out of and started that in 2003, qualifying in 2005. I started out doing wills, trusts and tax planning, which I really enjoyed. I worked with a great bunch of people, the hours were very much 9 to 5.30pm and I was very happy. Then I got bored. DH said he fancied moving to London (from Liverpool) and so off we went. I got a job at a Magic Circle firm on a huge salary doing Pensions and stayed there for the next two and a half years, working long hours but getting paid very well. In the first year I paid off all my student debts (£30k of them ) and in the second year we saved up to buy a house. We then returned to the north and I took a job doing a split of pensions and employment work, then 3 months later I fell very happily pregnant. So here I am, 9 months into my job here, 6 months into my first pregnancy and plotting my escape from law!!!

In all honesty, there are lots of negatives about being a solicitor. It can be long hours (although that is very much dependent on what sort of work you do and the type of firm you work for - it is eminently possible to do a 9 to 5.30pm job if you choose the right area of law and the right firm = although those sorts of jobs will not pay the mega-bucks that the City firms pay of course) the benefits are generally very poor and it is mostly about bills and chargeable hours, NOT justice. I'm sorry OP but if your real desire is to get justice for people and win arguments, being a solicitor will do your head in. A lot of the work is research, which you've said you don't enjoy - I'd say 30% of my time is spent on research, which actually I don't really mind. You might find you enjoy it more when there is a purpose to it though.

There are tons of ways into the law - as others have mentioned, the legal exec route is open to you and you can often do those courses at night school (so no need to give up work) but of course combining work, night school and children might be difficult/impossible at the moment. If you want to do employment advice, you could keep your eye out for jobs with the CAB (low pay tho) or in HR. I think you need to do some more research about the options, and also remember that if you REALLY want to do it, there are lots of ways of borrowing the necessary funds to pay your way through. NatWest used to do a very low rate professional development loan aimed specifically at wannabe lawyers. That's what I took to fund my LPC, although I did get some of the money back as the firm I did my training contract with paid the fees for my LPC. I would think it will be relatively difficult to get a training contract that offers sponsorship for the academic stage of training (in particular the conversion course) unless you go to one of the larger regional firms. As I am from the north west I don't know any of the Devon firms or even ( ) what your nearest big city would be, but you should get yourself a copy of The Training Contract Handbook (published by Chambers) and also check out Chambers Online which has a fab student guide section with details of the firms offering TCs and the salary, sponsorship opportunities etc.

Re: jasper's point, it is very very very valid and true that however you spend the next 4 or 5 years, you may be sure that they will pass - so why not bust a gut to make sure that, at the end of them, you're in a place you want to be? My brother oddly enough did dentistry as a mature student - took him 7 years in total as he didn't have the right A-levels, so he returned to college aged 27 and started university at 29 then qualified at age 34. It was very hard for him - but he did it, and so can you.

Now, if someone could just give me an idea for a great business, I would get on with following my own advice.... But seriously, there are good things about law and I do enjoy meeting different people etc and I really do like giving advice and being able to give people an answer to their questions, but be under no illusion that it's all about justice if you're working in private practice - it's about making money for the firm. If justice is what interests you, have you considered the Crown Prosecution Service or similar? They take people on at a low level and give you opportunities to study and work your way up. There is good info on their website.

[marathon post emoticon - I have a good wpm typing speed!]

Yep it is a big issue.

Most of the stdents with me had to remorgage their house/take a loan/live a very little for the 3 years of the course.
Something that would be a major issue for people like Riven.

riven i know it depends on the course you are doing, as a friend of mine has just been accepted onto a masters course part time, with fees paid, as it is relevant to her work experience and what she intends to do with it (social care) i think she has agreed to do 2 years working for that company in return for sponsorship, and another friend got the uni to pay for it as it was research they were already doing and needed doing to gain european funding. But you have to look around, which is what DH is planning on doing. But i agree it is not easy at all.

emsy thank you so much for your post. While you want to change careers, do you enjoy the employment law aspect? Is it ever rewarding? Do you represent staff or company?

If you go into the uni website, the local one, or the one that you are considering studying for, they should have information about funding/sponsorship and which courses have funding, what type and how you might apply. They also have information about hardship funds and other stuff for help with for example books. Also look at some social care research websites. I will see if i can find some examples. They sometimes offer sponsorship to do particular research in the form of Masters and PhDs directly. And there is a book, can't remember the name, that has charities who offer funding for study, not necessarily all the costs, but fees paid for, or some fees, or materials costs etc, i will try to find the name.

And also, once you have seen some courses you are interested in, call the head of that department and ask. Tell them what you are interested in doing, and whether the university has any research opps that would allow you to study for them with fees paid, and if not in the topic you are looking at, whether there are other avenues to go down, other research opportunities. Then, you can apply and sell the reason why you should get that over someone else.

Quote: "emsy thank you so much for your post. While you want to change careers, do you enjoy the employment law aspect? Is it ever rewarding? Do you represent staff or company?"

I do think employment law is one of the more interesting areas of law. Law generally can be rewarding (on a personal rather than financial level, I mean) but that is not its overriding feature in my experience. Having said that though, it may well be far more personally rewarding if you work in a different setting such as CAB or a charitable/free advice setting such as the Free Representation Unit. I have done some voluntary work at law centres and it was about 50% rewarding (really helping people who could not afford proper advice) and 50% timewasters and chancers who just wanted to try and get a bit of 'compo' IYSWIM.

I work for a large regional firm that has a significant insurance practice, so the employment work I do is mostly insured claims. It is a mix of claimant and respondent tribunal work as the referrals come through from the insurance company and they insure both individuals (many people are covered for employment claims on their household insurance policies) and companies. It's mostly individuals and small companies though. My pensions work is exclusively company & trustee work, I don't represent individuals with pension issues unless they come to me via the insured claim route (and I don't get very many of those - I've had probably 3 since I've been here).

I think the key issue for me is that you will always be judged on your ability to generate fees, not your ability as a lawyer to get to the right answer. It was a bit different in London as the clients were much larger (usually multi national corporates) and you could spend the time you needed to in order to get to the answer and the bills would be paid. It's very different working for smaller companies and a whole different ball game doing insured work. That's the difference between the Magic Circle/City firms and regional firms (haven't worked in a high street firm but would imagine they would be even more fee-focussed). In the City, you can just do your work and know the bills will be paid: in the regions, clients are more costs-conscious and you are often torn between needing to spend 10 hours on something to do it 'right' and needing to spend 6 hours on it because that's all the client wants to pay for. It's a source of immense frustration. It also leads to there being 'competition' between colleagues for the 'best' (i.e. most profitable) work as you can't progress in this type of firm unless you are generating good fees.

If I could get a job doing legal work but without any billing responsibilities, I would take it for sure. I am keeping an eye out for in-house roles (working for a company rather than a law firm) and government roles, but as I'll be finishing for maternity leave fairly soon it's just a case of keeping an eye out really. There are jobs out there where you can 'do law' without getting caught up in billing and financials etc, but they are concentrated in London and the other major cities (e.g. Manchester, Leeds) as that's where the big companies (and government agencies) are based. The CPS or Government Legal Service would be fantastically interesting, although relatively poorly paid. The thing is that the 'nice' jobs like this are often very competitive as the vast majority of lawyers want to do the law bit but not the bills bit!!! Also they tend to have better hours etc so everyone wants the in-house jobs.

((sigh))

Feel free to ask if you have any questions. I believe the law conversion course is very very hard (I didn't do it as I had a qualifying law degree) but the LPC is pretty straightforward and it's realistic to do it part time - you can do it at weekends at the College of Law in blocks, so you could still work full time whilst doing that. Some firms might offer you a paralegal position if you did the conversion course, then offer sponsorship for a part-time LPC (there's a girl in my team doing this at the moment) although of course this tends to be an ad hoc arrangement rather than something that you could easily negotiate up front. It might be worth chatting with a legal recruiter about paralegal opportunities in your area if you took the conversion course. If you look at the Law Society Gazette jobs page online and search for jobs in your area, you will be able to find some names of recruiters operating in your local area.

riven please don't talk about yourself like that. do you know what you're interested in? what's your first degree in?

Petsville I went through a similar scenario and ended up being self employed. Check this company out www.marykay.co.uk. I am having the best times ever . Its an exciting adventure.