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What advice for a career change?

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Don Taylor

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While im looking for advice on pheasent why not look for some on another topic. Any fellas on here in the marketing field? Im thinking of a career change up at the young age of 48 and looking at going towards a marketing degree to end up as a product rep in the outdoor market. I currenly am a Master Electrician, owned my own shop for 11 yrs with a degree in criminal justice, strange combo I know. Just would like to wake to a something a little more interesting and my current field has lost its appeal for several reasons. Does this sound like a midlife crisis? What do you all think, the opinions of people here would be realistic because many have the same interests.
 
heartofhunter said:
While im looking for advice on pheasent why not look for some on another topic. Any fellas on here in the marketing field? Im thinking of a career change up at the young age of 48 and looking at going towards a marketing degree to end up as a product rep in the outdoor market. I currenly am a Master Electrician, owned my own shop for 11 yrs with a degree in criminal justice, strange combo I know. Just would like to wake to a something a little more interesting and my current field has lost its appeal for several reasons. Does this sound like a midlife crisis? What do you all think, the opinions of people here would be realistic because many have the same interests.
Click to expand...

Do what is gunna make you happy HOH. I don't believe mid life crisis' are real. It's just people finally figuring out what they want.
 
Just a heads up. You're going to be competing with newly graduated 22-year-olds who are willing to work for half the money, and twice the hours they start their careers and lives.

Entry level marketing jobs are tough work. Low pay. And coveted by every department manager at your local department store.
 
Uh....I kinda think marketing would be a personal step back,but whatever works.
 
Thanks for the insight guys, ive thought of some of that nice to hear from others and their experiences, keep them coming.
 
I don't want to get preachy here, but . . . . I tell my son (who is a freshman in college and is not sure what exactly he wants to do ....) is I personally do not love my job. My job allows me to do the things I love.

I tell him if he wants to hunt, fish, hike, ski, take nice vacations, makes a comfortable living to provide for himself and his family, etc . . . . . He needs to pick a field that allows him to pay for all those things.

I've always been of the mind set that I don't live to work, but I work to live. Kudos to those folks that live their job and love their job. I think that finding a job where you truely love your job is rare. Don't get me wrong, I'm very thankful for the job I have and do enjoy the work. I remind myself that I don't have to go to work, but I get to go to work. Most folks that live their jobs sacrifice time spent doing what they love or time taken away from family and friends. Just my humble opinion.

Good luck in resolving this issue at this time in your life. Have you ever thought about moving to a different State that may allow you to make friends with the same ideology of the outdoors? Maybe a career changes is not the answer, but a move. As life happens and we all get older . . . . Priorities change along the way. Best of luck.
 
With your degree in criminal justice and electrician background, why not try to get into a state Department of Corrections as a trade teacher? When I worked for DOC in Indiana the prisons did trades training, as well as high school and college education. You might need a teaching certificate to be an instructor, but I bet you could start out as a corrections officer, at least. DOC pays good money and my prison we could trade overtime for comp days and get extra paid time off. Your CJ degree would be a definite shoe in to a prison job and possible quicker promotions. I know the teachers at my prison made really good money, plus it was a state job with the benefits and retirement.
 
I agree with what most have said on here. I do not have the experience of age being only 25 and freshly graduated a year. But like said above companies will tend to hire college grads for less money. If you truly want to do it and possibly take these lower jobs then go for it! Marketing is a great career I am a business major and have had to take a handful of different marketing classes very fun and interesting classes. One thing I will mention in this new era of business marketing is done a lot different than before. Not saying age has anything to do with ones ability to do a job but kids are exposed to things like photoshop indesign and a vast array of other software's that give them an advantage over people older to them it just comes natural to them. I have had classes with people older than you and I will say they are the hardest working ones in the room.

I do agree with JMG I hear people say all the time do what you love I agree to an extent but I also agree work now so you can play later. Best of luck with which ever way you pick!

Jamen
 
I think John might be on to something. I have a friend that trains inmates in water and wastewater treatment at a state facility here in Ohio. It may be something to consider.
 
Although working trade shows etc as a marketing professional might be interesting, I suspect those folks also spend a considerable amount of time behind a desk and in front of a computer when not on the road. You may find that transition to be a challenge. I'm sure there are a lot of pro's and con's to being your own boss but if I were in your shoes, I'd look at moving out west while you have the transportable skill set and see if that works better for you. Just my 2cents
 
Get into sales in the electrical industry.

Look for manufacturer reps or distribution. Hell if you know enough about the industry you could go to work for a mechanical rep. Consulting engineers are always looking for construction managers that could lead into sales/marketing.
 
I am not sure what the general salary is for an electrician up your way, but young graduates that want to work with their hands and do physical labor is hard to come by. The pay for skilled laborers is going to grow at a much faster pace than marketing. If a career change is a must, I would stay on the construction side.
 
I knew some guys that were product reps and it was always more of a part-time side job kind of thing for them. One guy was also a part-time paramedic and the other was a teacher I think. If you want to make any money I bet there is a lot of travel involved which may be nice for conferences and stuff but is probably just mostly driving from store to store dropping off catalogs and making sure products are displayed correctly.

As others have said you're going to be in competition with a lot of young people who are stilling living at home and are able to take a low salary to get a foot in the door. My wife works in marketing although she is not a sales rep. Her degree is in graphic design, but she now mostly focus' in digital marketing. She got her start working for a shady company that did various marketing for local restaurants and scam chiropractors running "medical laser weight loss" clinics, making barely enough to survive, and basically putting in like 12 hour days, working weekends/holidays, and basically being on call 24/7. She had no medical benefits, and got 5 vacation days a year that she was only allowed to use on days that the boss said it was ok (and never more than two consecutive days). If she got sick there was no calling off, you were expected to work the full day from home with your personal computer and phone. Luckily when I came into her life I was able to convince her that there was better jobs out there. I gotta give the crappy job credit though it gave her experience and forced her to teach herself things and learn things(mostly due to a very demanding boss) that she probably never would have received from school (even if she had a marketing degree) and she has since been able to turn that experience into a very promising career.

I too like the corrections teacher idea. They're always in demand. I doubt you'll make as much as you do owning your own business but its steady money and probably half the stress + good benefits.
 
JMG said:
I don't want to get preachy here, but . . . . I tell my son (who is a freshman in college and is not sure what exactly he wants to do ....) is I personally do not love my job. My job allows me to do the things I love.

I tell him if he wants to hunt, fish, hike, ski, take nice vacations, makes a comfortable living to provide for himself and his family, etc . . . . . He needs to pick a field that allows him to pay for all those things.

I've always been of the mind set that I don't live to work, but I work to live. Kudos to those folks that live their job and love their job. I think that finding a job where you truely love your job is rare. Don't get me wrong, I'm very thankful for the job I have and do enjoy the work. I remind myself that I don't have to go to work, but I get to go to work. Most folks that live their jobs sacrifice time spent doing what they love or time taken away from family and friends. Just my humble opinion.

Good luck in resolving this issue at this time in your life. Have you ever thought about moving to a different State that may allow you to make friends with the same ideology of the outdoors? Maybe a career changes is not the answer, but a move. As life happens and we all get older . . . . Priorities change along the way. Best of luck.
Click to expand...

+1 to this too. Sometimes doing what you love as a job makes you not love that thing anymore. I know personally my interests are always changing and its hard to pinpoint 1 thing that I really love to do. I am by no means advocating staying in a job that you really hate. I have been there and done that and It was so bad that I undoubtedly could tell you that it would have taken years off of my life if I had stayed. But like JMG said, there is a lot to be said for working a job that you can tolerate, which allows you to do the things you love. My step mother is a doctor and I don't think she has a great affinity and love for practicing medicine but she was interested in it enough and had the intelligence to do it. It affords her the great financial ability to buy things she wants and live the way she wants to live, she owns her own practice so she takes vacation whenever she wants. I know not everyone can be a Dr. but just saying.
 
What about forensic investigation... electrical fires? Work for the state fire investigator or maybe (gag) an insurance company?

I agree with JMG, good advice. I however like my job, most days... when looking for work, I look for time off, work schedule and lastly pay. Hard to spend all that money if you can't get time off.
 
I would agree with others regarding making enough money to do what you want. I went back to school in my late 30s. Things to consider, as well, is that college is designed for kids not adults with payments for vehicles, house and other things. When you have these school becomes much more complicated. I was “smart” (not really but sarcasm is hard to get across) and got divorced when I decided I was not a big fan of being self-employed and the fun that comes with it like payroll. The college will make promises they can’t keep and life gets busy. My days in school start at 2 am working for UPS and ended at 7 pm when I was done with clinicals. I also got to work 12 hours shifts at Wal-mart on the weekends just to make sure all my bills were paid even after the college promised I would have enough. All that made me appreciate where I am now but if you have no student loans I would work very hard to keep it that way.
 
JohnCushman said:
With your degree in criminal justice and electrician background, why not try to get into a state Department of Corrections as a trade teacher? When I worked for DOC in Indiana the prisons did trades training, as well as high school and college education. You might need a teaching certificate to be an instructor, but I bet you could start out as a corrections officer, at least. DOC pays good money and my prison we could trade overtime for comp days and get extra paid time off. Your CJ degree would be a definite shoe in to a prison job and possible quicker promotions. I know the teachers at my prison made really good money, plus it was a state job with the benefits and retirement.
Click to expand...

Excellent idea. I'm 52 and had to reinvent myself at 39. What I learned is take your existing skills and repurpose them to something you want to do more. You might also consider certification working with electronics in the health field. Seems like everything in the Dr office has a plug. Working in medical gives you ability to live where you want. When I left SkyWest in 2004 we had several avionics people who had electrical backgrounds.
 
I do not mean to get off topic here but since I see heart of a hunter in an electrician maybe you could help answer this question or anyone else out there.

A few days ago my dad asked me if I noticed the microwave was off. The GFCI tripped that it was plugged into so he tripped it and it worked. Last night I was using it and it worked fine. I went to use it again and it was dead. This time I could not reset it. Come to find out another outlet in the kitchen was not working but there was still another one that worked. the two that are not working are on separate breakers. All the lights work fine just these two outlets.

It is a pretty old house and the wiring is probably dated. hopefully my dad can get it going today may try and replace the outlets first.

Thanks for any tips

Jamen
 
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