TL;DR my advice for young professionals. Don’t get comfortable and always push yourself to grow and learn. Switch jobs every 1-2 years when you’re first starting out and know how to brand yourself. If you learn interviewing skills and learn how to perfect your resume you will be rewarded.
Earning a decent salary after getting your bachelors is a lot tougher than they’d ever make it seem.
I graduated in 2018 with a bachelors in polysci and English, I was dead set on going to law school or becoming an English teacher.
Went abroad for a year in France to work an expat job (paid very little, but amazing experience)
Still had like 30k of undergrad debt. This made me incredibly anxious and fearful that I’d never be able to support myself.
I spent months trying to apply to jobs that related to my major. I really wanted to do something writing related but didn’t have much luck.
The first “job” I could find was at a call center making $15/hour.
Worked for 6 months. Exaggerated the skills at the call center and marketed myself in a business-y way.
Reality: receiving hundreds of annoying ass customer calls per day, trying to sell where I could and get them on their way.
How I stated my call center experience: “Active listening” “problem solving” “empathy” “emotional intelligence” “upwelling”
Somehow landed a job in a client facing business setting as an account manager. Salaried at $40k.
Worked for 10 months.
Reality: Overworked and underpaid main point of contact for a business client. Handled and tunneled their requests and BS as best as I could.
How I marketed myself: “client facing account manager, channeling all client inquiries and developing business ... upselling and referring additional services to suit their needs” continued with highlighting emotional intelligence, active listening, resolution mindet etc.
Got contacted by a recruiter to work in business development for a small startup. Nailed the interview and beat out a lot of competition for the role.
Salary bump of 20k plus commission. Places me @ 60k. OTE could look like 70-80 which would be amazing!!
I never thought I’d make much money but due to pushing myself and keeping my personal brand on point, I made a decent raise for myself.
I finally feel like I can hone on my skills and stop worrying so much about my debt.
Next I plan to use this money to get a dual JD/MBA and do another career switch.
Thanks for listening to my ted talk
Submitted September 20, 2020 at 08:35PM by lumberjackjeanpaul https://ift.tt/2FLwLjr
