I'm a tenure-track professor in the humanities. I'm quitting my toxic job and am overjoyed. But I'm not sure what I want to do next, and don't want it to have anything to do with what I currently do or, indeed, my professional life pre-grad school. Please help.
10+ years of education and 4+ years of abusive, cruel, underfunded employment in the humanities later, I have absolutely no interest in my income being linked to my "passions" (I taught a subject that falls into the category of "fine arts"). Before doing my PhD I worked in the nonprofit and educational sectors creating content in one form or another. I don't want to do that either, but will consider freelancing until I figure something else out.
What I want from my job, at this point, is work-life balance, a good salary, and--ideally--the ability to work remotely. I want to be able to afford upkeep on my house, for example. I want to be able to save for nice things. I want to drive a safe, road-worthy car. I want to have actual savings. I want the time and space to be able to continue to work on the creative projects that got me into the super-competitive PhD that got me the alluring-on-the-outside, abusive-on-the-inside academic job, in the first place.
Here are the three jobs I'm interested in, in no particular order: Salesforce Administrator (which I actually learned about on the green! Have been dabbling in Trailhead and am interested), U/X Designer (Google certificate any good?), and Real Estate Appraiser. All of these seem to be achievable through relatively short online certifications. All are vastly different from what I currently teach and focus on, and all seem to emphasize creating a tangible end product, which is very appealing to me after years of working in a world of theory and ambiguity. Friends and family have also encouraged me to explore design-related careers like Interior Design and Industrial Design, though I'm worried about the salaries in these fields and sense that working for clients in these industries would be almost as demanding as serving high-need students (however, maybe professional or medical applications would fit the bill). It's very important to me that my next career move is into an industry that is growing rather than shrinking--that it will offer me more opportunity rather than less.
If you have experience with any of these fields, I'd very much appreciate any insights you might have into whether my assessment of these careers as being more financially rewarding and allowing for more work-life balance is correct--plus anything you might be able to say about the future of your career or industry.
I'm also curious as to whether there's an entire field or career that fits my preferences that I might be missing, here. The rub is that I have dyscalculia, so math and science are significant barriers for me--this has always made me steer clear of most careers in tech.
Thanks for helping me figure my life out. |
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