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$$$ at the good job you're not interested in VS $$ at the good job of your interest

YS2003

YS2003

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Dec 24, 2004
2,138
0
Finally I have arrived.....
Which would you take, an excellent paying job you are not really interested in and a good paying job (but not as good as the former one) you are interested in?

I am at the decision point making a choice on my next course of the career path. My current job gets me good salary which helped me with lots of material pleasures (Office Manager--which is just under the head of the facility). I have an offer from another company which I am very interested in because of my strong interested in the job itself (supply chain management). Both of my current job and this newly offered position would give me the good future opportunity at the different schedule as the both are with the global conglomerates.
 
I always thought you should do what you enjoy. If you do it for the money I don't think you'll ever really enjoy your work. That said, if the job that pays more that you don't like as much will bring you to where you want to be eventually, then maybe you should do it. Do it for you, not the $$$.
 
Since you are spending half of your waking day there five days a week I would opt for the job that I enjoyed for lower pay, even if it was significantly lower pay. What's the point of making a lot of money if you are miserable at work for half your day. Which will also drain your energy so that in your off time you are not happy either.

On your death bed would you rather say I was miserable all my life but at least I bought a lot of cool stuff. Or that I was happy but never owned much.

<rant>
Oh and if you save up for everything, no credit cards, car payments/leases and make sensible purchases that lower pay can still bring you nice stuff to own. ie why spend make payments on a brand new $30,000 car which will end up costing much more with interest, when you could save up and buy a really nice 5 year old car for a couple of thousand dollars. Wouldn't you rather spend that $30,000 over time and get all new furniture, appliances, electronics, bedroom set, and a nice used car instead:cool:. All the car really does is move you from one place to another, if is comfortable, in good working order and cosmetically nice why blow a bunch of money on something shiny and new. Which will no longer be shiny and new after a year.

In my opinion the only purchase to be made with credit is a house. Everything else should be paid outright. You will end up with a lot more money and nice posessions in the long run if you follow this. Heck if you live in a lower population area where land is farely cheap you could buy a small piece of land and build an extremely energy efficient hobbit house for practically nothing.
</rant>
 
I've been down this path. I've made pretty good money doing something I was good at but didn't really enjoy, just to leave it all to pursue what I was passionate about. The change in income was about $130K/yr.

This was 7 years ago. Not once have I ever regretted it.

I should mention that I was single at the time, with no debt. That makes it a *lot* easier to make these kinds of decisions. ;)
 
I used to work all kinds of random jobs that paid the bills. Some more than others. The whole time I was pretty much just hoping I could get a little further ahead and maybe someday not have to worry about money. All this hoping never amounted to much.

Now I'm doing what I love. I rarely see my boss, who only contacts me when he notices something really strange. I have a clear path to becoming truly independent and it should take me about three years. And to top it off I'm making more money than I've ever made before. If everything works out as planned I will actually be paying cash for a home in five years.

If you are young and single I say go for it. If you have family to consider than talk to them.
 
Generally, I'd say go for the one that interests you more, but it really totally depends on the actual dollar amounts and the level of interest you have in both. I mean, are we talking 25% more money? 50%? 300%? And in terms of job satisfaction, are we talking a 3 versus a 9? Or more like a 5 versus a 7?

There's just no way to know based on the information you've given us.
 
If the other job still pays enough to sustain you with a few less luxuries then I would take it. If the pay cut is so large that you are going to have to move, or sell your car or anything like that then I would probably stay.

In an ideal world the money shouldn't matter... if only we lived in an ideal world!
 
I will say I took a job back in november because I HAD to have a job. I have no interest in what I'm doing. I could not be more miserable monday through friday from 8-5 i dont think. The only reason i'm there is the money is decent and i need benefits.
 
Take the job you enjoy.

Because of your high interest you will likely excel at it. As a result, you will probably even make more at it in the long run.

BTW, I too have faced this decision and I'm really happy I went with the job I would enjoy rather than chase a few more bucks.

Good luck, either way :)
 
I am leaning toward the job satisfaction over the compensation package. The comments / replies I see on this thread also indicate other forum members are going to choose the job satisfaction. Even if I choose this new job of my interest, I would be able to maintain the current living arrangement and standard (the only difference would be I would be saving a little less because of the pay difference).
 
take the job where you like the people most.

assuming the jobs are both ok for you and the pay is similar then the people are the most important factor. it would need a major negative factor in one of the jobs to decide against good (personally and professionally) colleagues.
 
andiwm2003 said:
take the job where you like the people most.

assuming the jobs are both ok for you and the pay is similar then the people are the most important factor. it would need a major negative factor in one of the jobs to decide against good (personally and professionally) colleagues.
Click to expand...

You raised a good point there. My counterpart in the management team (jobs at the facility are divided in 2 groups, mine and my counterpart's) is not functioning properly managing his group, which burdens my group to compensate his shortcomings (which borders on professional incompetency). Regardless of my comment here, I am not interested in disparaging my current company. I just realized that point was one of reasons I am thinking about jumping the ship to the new opportunity.
 
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