Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Fun with Polls What do we do at work?

There seem to be a higher than average number of IT people on these boards, but just to prove me wrong, here's a poll. If you're a student, a full-time Mum, a retiree, or just currently unemployed for whatever reason, pick the category that fits you best anyway. Or pick 'other' and tell us more.

To an extent, the category list is based on what I already know of people's jobs. I'm sure I'll have missed out lots of professions, though, so apologies in advance if I've missed yours.

Yvonne

Cool poll!

I'm an artist and a student, but officially I checked artist. My Bachelor's is in Fine Arts, and I spent the first six months of '06 in the printing business and in some public relations, but it was...boring. I found the printing career to be a black hole, and I also wanted a more collaborative environment. So now I'm back in school working on my Masters in Graphic Design.

JD
who indirectly gave a short synopsis of 2006 lol

Officially, I'm IT, but I'd rather have a different job altogether--audio book narrator.

I'm a full-time student and part time waitress/hostess at a restaurant.

Sara

I think you forgot the most all-inclusive catagory of job. That of the wage-slave. I imagine you felt that you covered all the non-technical jobs with your 'tradesperson' category, but your examples belied that. A plumber, electrician, or builder is actually a skilled profession that takes a lot of training to become proficient at.

What you don't have are those of us who work the 'unskilled' blue-collar jobs. Even though the current administration has been trying to send all the manufacturing and basic production jobs overseas there are still some assembly line type jobs out there as well as service and manual labor jobs.

Myself, I spend long hours unloading furniture parts from trucks, checking them in, putting them away, then pulling them off racks and loading them on different trucks.

I was a mathematics major at the University of Minnesota's Insitute of Technology but due to financial pressures had to leave before I completed my senior year. I never made it back and have spent my life in 'jobs for a paycheck' rather than an acutal profession. Just a cautionary note to those who are currently in school. Do what you have to do... but finish.

Tank (who has made some money as a musician, but nowhere near enough to even pay for the equipment and expenses incurred by a gig)

It's not too late to go back to school, Tank! Although I have two degrees - one in nursing and one in liberal arts, I'm thinking of going back myself.

I picked "other". While I partially fit in a couple categories, neither of them really encompass the totality of what I do. I'm special like that.

I'm a grad student. So I'm a teacher, researcher, writer, and even an occasional public speaker, as necessity dictates. I'm a jack of many trades--and possibly master of none .

I picked other - but now I'm wondering just what you're including in IT... To me, IT is the guys that fix the computers and manage the servers, databases and websites. At least, if I look at the people in the IT group at work, *that* is what they do.

Cause if it's meant to include other computer oriented jobs, then I guess I would fit into that as well...?

Officially, I'm a "Software Test Engineer". Sounds nice, huh? But I'm actually at the very bottom of the food chain. LOL! I don't even really test the software myself - I mostly write test scripts for the automated test systems to run on the software. Meaning I sit there and program the test engine to do my work for me.

I sometimes wish I still had my little announcer's job for a radio station. I loved that. I miss it... Hell, these days I even miss the job I had recording messages for phone systems ("For service in English, please press One. To reach Customer Service, please press Two.").

My life is just a long list of bad career decisions.

I'm in my first year of studying Pharmacy, which, according to all of our professors, is the link that connects Science with Medicine. So I guess you could say I'm (going to be) a health-oriented scientist

I placed my vote on Medicine/Health, though. I think that's one's first thought when they hear 'Pharmacy', so I went with it.

See ya,
AnnaBtG.

I know this very well, Tank, and have nothing but respect for those who choose one of these professions. My only regret is that governments don't seem to value these professions as highly as I do - ie, in the UK, all the government's energies and funds are directed towards getting as many people as possible into university. I wish that as much money was invested in training skilled workers and wonder where the next generation of plumbers, electricians, etc, will come from. These are valuable and essential skills, and personally, I think we need more electricians than we need graduates of media studies.

Yvonne

Well, I checked other because I really didn't know what to check. A few months ago, I was student (history - to become a teacher, but I forgot the inscription to the competitive examination, and I don't want to do it again this year because I already did 7 years in university and I'm fed up with it!) and working at the same time as a waitress in a restaurant. Now, I still have my job as a waitress (10 hours per week), and the rest of the time, I'm looking for another job. The problem is nobody wants history diplomas (I am specialised in Aegyptology - there is really no job in this branch!), so I did a bilan (personality tests,etc...) and my counselor told me I made for working in the administration as a "secrétaire bureautique" or "assistante de direction" (sorry, I don't know how to say that in english - that's kind of a secretary personal assistant for directors). So, in a few months, I should begin a formation for that.

Well, I checked IT, though it's not an exact fit. I work in digital forensics. Basically I read all the stuff you thought you deleted :p

Well I retired (early, thank you! <g>) years ago, but I ticked law because before that I worked as a legal court clerk for a firm of solicitors in Glasgow.

It was a great job; basically I was left to work on my own. Even better when, as time went on, I became the only one who really understood what I was doing - even my bosses would just leave me to it, rather than try and figure it out. Which makes for terrific job security. Although, the downside is you don't get a decent vacation break in ten years.

I had a junior assistant to do the 'scut work' and the boring bits, like binding writs and typing out litigation forms, while I did the complicated stuff, drafting the legal documents and liasing with the courts.

The only downside was that it was mostly litigation cases. Chasing debts for large companies, utilities like BT and electric/gas companies, banks etc. And so, since our clients interests came first, I could never be as sympathic to the debtors as I was instinctively inclined to be. :p True there were a lot of chancers, who'd give you a sob story over the phone as to why they hadn't paid up, but there were genuine hardship cases, too. I spent a lot more of my time than I was supposed to surreptitiously working things to ease the pressure on the debtors as much as I could without damaging our clients' interests. Which was a bit of a juggling act!

Before that, I worked for ten years as an assistant librarian in local libraries. Now that would have been the perfect job (an endless supply of free books to read! <g>) - if it hadn't been for them being mean and letting the public in. Messing up my nice neat and tidy alphabetical rows of books. Tsk.

All of which is a far cry from what I actually planned my life to be. All through school I was adamant that I was never going to spend nine to five in a stuffy office, typing. I refused to take the secretarial courses that 99% of my female colleagues took, back then. (We were in the days when it seemed natural that most females leaving school would take secretarial positions).

Nope. Nothing boring like that for me. I was going to work outdoors. Preferably 'with animals'.

Ah, well. The best laid plans of rats and women, as they say... :rolleyes: I guess it didn't work out too badly, all the same. I was lucky with both positions to work with a great bunch of people and have some fond memories of the fun we had.

LabRat

I'm a student and when I'm finished some unknown day in the future I'll be a physician. But the way is still long. Two years of university and one year of at-least-eigth-hours-a-day slavery.

*sigh*

But this is so very interesting that I'm already addicted. No matter what. And writing or reading fanfics really helps in the dark hours.

I checked Finance. It's not exact, but close enough. I am a treasury analyst for a Fortune 500 company, managing company cash. My degree is in history, but I started work as a bank teller in high school and my career kind of just propelled itself from there. I have never actually held a job in the history field. And all my employers have cared more about my work experience and the fact that I have degree than what field the degree was in. I have been lucky.

Day job is educational lab technician - basically, I keep the technical services of a school science department running, build and repair equipment, order materials from various suppliers, prepare chemicals, etc.

I'm also a semi-pro role playing game designer and writer, but that's more of a hobby than a serious job - I get paid for what I do, but I couldn't earn a living that way.

Hey there

Interesting poll, I often wondered what you guys did all day long.

I'm a student of psychology and will be for at least the next 3.5 years (depending on whether I'll do my PhD and stuff).

Apart from that (well, not really apart) I work as a Research Assistant at a research institute.
We cover many fields of human evolution but I actually work in the ChildLab, doing studies on/with children from 6 months to 5 years.

I absolutely love my job cause it connects both the work with children and their development and my enthusiasm in IT work.

The other thing I gain a wee bit money is videographing, normally everything from filming up to burning the final disc but the hardest work is cutting as some of you might know by your own experience with the FoLC Productions

So, I chose scientist since that's what I am most of the day

Best,

Jana

I was an Ethics major in college but am currently working at an Insurance Adjusting company as the lead Biller and Reports I/C. Woo, really exciting stuff. It is mind numblingly boring and I hope to get out of it soon.

However, it does give me a lot of time to slack off at work and has given me the chance to read through the archive two times. >_<

I checked IT as I'm a computer science major, but I'm hoping not to work in computer science for the rest of my life At the very least, I'd like to get into the "softer" side of CS: graphics, gaming, etc vs. math and business applications.

Kaylle

Well, if we're going to start confessing degrees as well as what we do at work, I'm a music graduate that also did first-year maths, statistics and computing. Oh, and for computing, read Fortran, Basic and mainframes. In other words, I did my degree a long time ago.

Yvonne