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How Many Job Changes Have You Had?


ChrisL

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@KrAzY post got me to thinking of the significant job changes I've had in my life. Not counting HS or college jobs, I've had 8 significant job changes in my life including 3 lay offs & one job in a completely different industry.

One thing I've learned is to be adaptable to change as it's gonna happen.

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I was in the US Air Force for 24 years; however, I did change jobs within it.

After the military, I've worked for over a dozen different employers plus was self-employed part time. I even had a full time job and 3 different part-time jobs at the same time!

In the last 12 months I've worked for 3 different companies and managed to get 24% in raises.

Now if you mean different careers after HS, I've been a cook; a gas station attendant/mechanic; an aircraft mechanic; an aircraft maintenance instructor; a database administrator; and an adjunct college instructor.

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11 minutes ago, JerrySTL said:

I was in the US Air Force for 24 years; however, I did change jobs within it.

After the military, I've worked for over a dozen different employers plus was self-employed part time. I even had a full time job and 3 different part-time jobs at the same time!

In the last 12 months I've worked for 3 different companies and managed to get 24% in raises.

Now if you mean different careers after HS, I've been a cook; a gas station attendant/mechanic; an aircraft mechanic; an aircraft maintenance instructor; a database administrator; and an adjunct college instructor.

I was mainly referring to job changes as in a different company.  Good point tho as I moved around in the Army and in my 1st management job out of college I was with the same firm 11 years but had 4 significant assignment/location changes.

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23 minutes ago, Square Wheels said:

Close to none.  I went to a technical high school for carpentry.  We worked for a small company for a while, then went out on our own.  Then off to college.  While in college worked at a small hospital.  Then when I graduated almost 30 years ago I took my current job.  I hope to retire from it.

Your like my brother who has had 3 jobs ever in his life. Menial Labor job out of HS, Army, mechanic for a local school district 30 years.  

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Just now, ChrisL said:

Your like my brother who has had 3 jobs ever in his life. Menial Labor job out of HS, Army, mechanic for a local school district 30 years.  

It makes me feel safe.  Also, I've never worked minimum wage, never worked for McDonalds, bagging in s supermarket, waiting tables, washing dishes.  Not sure if this is a good or bad thing.

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I was the parts manager at a Chevy dealership, a factory that I had applied at called and it paid almost twice what the dealership paid. I worked there for nine years and would have stayed until I died or retired but they started closing the plant and I got laid off after nine years. I drove truck for about a year and then took a job as the maintenance supervisor at a very large summer camp and retreat center. After I sold my home and moved to the maintenance job I was told the job would only be for three years. I should have slapped them. After the three years I needed work, the camp/retreat center job was for a church denomination and they didn't pay into unemployment so I had no income. Times were tough in 1980 and I took what I could get, I was the head lifeguard/maintenance repairman/coolie supervisor/maid problem solver and whatever other job they could find for me at a private motel/swim club. Finally the economy picked up and I went back to truck driving for another seven years. Truck driving sucks for a family man so after much prayer I quit the truck driving job and did landscape work for seven months that included following blueprints from a landscape architect, reviving an inground swimming pool that had been abandoned for seven years, fencing some acreage for a herd of African cattle, feeding exotic animals including, Ostriches, buffalo, reindeer. I did some handyman work for some rather wealthy people, remodeled a women's clothing store, I cut firewood for a logging company and finally I got the job at the Forge where I worked the next 28 years.   

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Our of highschool I became a volunteer firefighter. I worked for my family's company for roughly 12 years. We moved to Wi where I picked up a job in hazmat, stuck it out 3 years until another hazmat company talked me into working with them. I was there for 2 years. I went back to school for a bit working on an associate degree and started working at WF and REI in WI, and transferred to a WF store here in Texas (been 3 years now.)

 

Not many changes in jobs.. I believe in being loyal to a boss, but not a company because the company will screw you faster then a boss will.

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1 minute ago, Square Wheels said:

It makes me feel safe.  Also, I've never worked minimum wage, never worked for McDonalds, bagging in s supermarket, waiting tables, washing dishes.  Not sure if this is a good or bad thing.

I learned to feel safe in my skill sets, tenacity and ability to adapt.  I was devistated after my first lay off but after surviving that one and 2 others learned to be more self reliant.

As some of you know I was miserable in a job that was causing me much stress so said F it and gave them 30 days notice and started looking.  No sense in sticking with a job you hate...

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The guy that hired me to do his landscaping promised me six weeks of work landscaping his clinic that he just had built. When he saw the finished project he was so impressed he hired me to do the landscaping at his farm. He was having his farmhouse remodeled and told the contractor that any time he needed an extra hand he could pull me from whatever I was doing to help. I was on salary. As he noticed some of my skills he kept coming up with other projects for me. His wife was wanting to get into body building so he had me remodel an old summer kitchen building into a private gym for her to work with her personal trainer. It turned out really nice. He also asked me if I would be able to turn their large garage into a health food store. It was the first time I worked with real plaster but I didn't tell him that, it also turned out well. Some of the animals he had I forgot to mention were lamas, camels, and alpacas. It was a fun place to work.

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Just three companies since college, but with a variety of roles in each of those companies.  I like to spend the first couple years establishing a reputation, then use that to move into new roles, and then roll with that for a while, and look for options that open up.  One for over 6 years, next for over 8 years, next for over 8 so far.

Tom

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More than 10.  A couple of those were contract jobs working for the same agency.  A couple more were less than a year to make ends meet. Three were consultant jobs working for me (and of course the company that hired me).  The high points though were 2 enlistments in the Navy, about 18 years at Pratt and Whitney Aircraft starting as an instrumentation technician and ending up designing software for the jet engine test cells followed by a number of years in the Laser Industry doing research for various DARPA projects and a few for industrial companies.  Along the way I sold automotive servicing equipment for Stewart Warner, Stereo's and major appliances for a big box superstore and even a year as a custodian at womaxx's school

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CPA apprentice, trucking, trucking dispatch, back to driver & construction

bunch more in there prior. A lot of part time driving jobs and one off stuff. My BFF was in charge of containers getting on the train. On occasion a can would miss and have to be driven up to Seattle terminal. I got first dibs. I was also a lawn water & mow boy the first couple years of my business. Contractors would put in grass in the front yard of homes for sale. I watered & mowed. 

I was this close to being a school bus driver during the recession. Our business dropped by 2/3rds. I was getting nervous. The hours were going to be a problem. Plus I was going to get push back on taking phone calls from contractors while driving a bunch of snowflakes  :dontknow:

 

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14 job changes.  It's kinda hard to distillate all this in a short resume.  I have 2 very different resume styles, each targeted for certain employers /job type.

After university, for first 3 years I held down at any given time, 2 part-time jobs for 3 different employers. Then 11 different full-time job changes for 10 different employers with 2 bouts of unemployment. Research librarian, library manager (several jobs with staff), document manager (major engineering construction project), business analyst, corporate e-records analyst.  In engineering, firefighting, law and government sectors.  I have also worked for national and global private firms in these sectors.

I recently applied for a job where the  online application process (in addition to attaching my resume) took me  3 frickin' hrs. (!), to detail online, proof of relevant work experiences for 10 skills areas. It took me so long because I had to draw from different jobs.  I couldn't find out the screening skills questions in advance  -- prior to logging-in so I could draft my responses to save time online.  ?

It made me realize about potpourri of experiences....as we age, sometimes we forget how much we know.... or not know??

 

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Two, three, or four, depending on how you count.  Started out here near Philly right oot of college, and had that job until the plant closed in 1996.  Worked at another nearby one for one year, then went back to the original location and the almost same job, but with a different company.  Worked that until the plant closed AGAIN in 2011, then transferred to another plant with the same company but 100 miles away.  Figured I could retire in maybe 5 years so could endure the commute for that long, but it is going to be more like 10 years (the initial guestimate was wishful thinking!), but thankfully I have always had carpool peeps to make the commute close to bareable.  I wanted to change fields the first time the plant closed, but by the second time was resigned to riding it oot to retirement.  It has been a good job, but sometimes I just want to chuck it and just bang on the drums all day. :D

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41 minutes ago, RalphWaldoMooseworth said:

With my current boss it is like I have died and one to occupational heaven.  After YEARS of asshole or mostly clueless bosses, I have one who is a great leader, team-builder, nice guy and just gets it. 

Isn't it great when this happens.  In all my years I only had one really great boss.  When I finally migrated into the Laser design end of life I worked for a small research department/company separated from the parent company by over a thousand miles.  The boss was as often as not the guy in jeans and a t shirt working on the next bench over as we developed new processes.  He was as comfortable there as he was travelling around the country to sit in at major design conferences with aerospace giants.  He was a teacher and my mentor and eventually learned from me the same way I was learning from him.  Ultimately he was responsible for me going on the road as a consultant.

The only problem.......he was a runner, and as such evil to the core.

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10 hours ago, JerrySTL said:

I was in the US Air Force for 24 years; however, I did change jobs within it.

After the military, I've worked for over a dozen different employers plus was self-employed part time. I even had a full time job and 3 different part-time jobs at the same time!

In the last 12 months I've worked for 3 different companies and managed to get 24% in raises.

Now if you mean different careers after HS, I've been a cook; a gas station attendant/mechanic; an aircraft mechanic; an aircraft maintenance instructor; a database administrator; and an adjunct college instructor.

It’s an impressive resume, Jer.

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As a schoolboy I did various jobs, all the usual stuff, paper rounds, office cleaning, retail, culminating in industrial cleaning in the summer factory shut downs. During college I did a Summer in a roofing felt manufactury, after college I did a month helping out on a farm, that was a lot of fun and lunch and dinner, home cooked every day by farmer wife, homemade cakes and biscuits twice a day between meals was a great perk. Over the next decade or so I worked in my chosen career of acting, a couple of steady theatre jobs but mostly short contract tv and film work, bit part stuff. I then became a full time child raiser and home maker, with part time work in two different whole food grocers. When sprog was of an age to leave home and I was 42 I started what I refer to as my first proper job, as an ITC tutor, through various restructurings I’ve ended up in my current role, which I shan’t specify, with the same employer.

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3 hours ago, RalphWaldoMooseworth said:

With my current boss it is like I have died and one to occupational heaven.  After YEARS of asshole or mostly clueless bosses, I have one who is a great leader, team-builder, nice guy and just gets it. 

Out of all the jobs, I've had, only 2 out 13 organizations, where I reported to jerks who managed people like pawns to only to save their own skin. 

And out of all these jobs, I've only retained 1 person who became a good, close friend from and outside of work. And she doesn't work at all in same dept.  For me work colleagiality, tends to remain at work....knowing how social grapevines work and how personal info. gets shaped like putty.  I like occasional business lunch, chat but that's all. 

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Chris:  One thing I've learned is to be adaptable to change as it's gonna happen.

Absolutely.  I don't regret such a wild career path..employer-wise.  I've become a different person than the person who finished university.....less afraid.  Right now, I work with people who want the big vision laid out in perfect plans.  My response:  ask for the big picture, action items and stop worrying so much about perfection along the way, if everyone on the team, believes in the same end result.

Does cycling help?  Like life it complements voluntary and forced decisions to bike far, in crappy, great weather and contend with some hills, traffic...by yourself.  

 

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I’ve worked pretty much since I was 13. In high school I worked full time nights at a local supermarket. Made it to Assistant Manager before I left. Worked for a year and a half building steel silos. Finally followed my dad in the trades. Installed commercial floor covering for about 12 years before deciding to go to forestry school. Since then I have worked for the Feds, private industry and NGO’s. One of the coolest jobs was doing some environmental assessment work in northern Quebec on a large hydro project. Lived four months in a Cree Indian village. Made some great friends there. Now I work for a State agency managing public lands. I supervise an office with some awesome folks which makes my job super easy.?

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15 minutes ago, Zackny said:

I’ve worked pretty much since I was 13.

14 YO here as that was the legal age in Kentucky. In the last 50 years there's only been 2 weeks where I didn't have a paycheck coming in and that was due to me taking a vacation before being inducted in the US Air Force.

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2 jobs.  I was at my first job for 6 months. Entry level working for a 3rd party engineering house who did CAD drawings for various companies and industries. I was on the architecture side. I interviewed with another company, and then went in for a second interview where they made me an offer. 22 years later I'm still here...damn time  flies. I've thought aboot looking elsewhere, and sometimes I would like a fresh start. But I work 5 miles from home and anything else I would find will definitely be a lot farther away.

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As a little snapper I started on a couple farms at 12 - bailing hay and evening feeding.  I had a job at 13 as a fill-in mud tender for a brick layer (hard work for a 13 yo but the pay was good $3/hr really good for '68).  I did the summer hay bailing for about 3 years.  At 15 I went to work for a home builder for the summer and at 16 I painted buildings for the same home builder. The summer before my senior year I worked for the brick layer again as a mud tender.  On the weekends starting my sophomore year in HS I cleaned the offices of a construction/concrete plan company (again good money $5/hr in '71).  That lasted until the week I graduated.  So outside of a well enjoyed summer of unemployment in about '75 I've worked continually for the past 51 years doing lots of different stuff in lots of different places with lots of different people...

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2 hours ago, JerrySTL said:

Any good stories?

It was the best job of my life.  I worked there 6 months and saw maybe 3 customers and I only saw my boss on Friday when I got my check.  My routine was to get home from school, put together a sandwich or something for dinner, take my bike to my little booth in the middle of  a parking lot to relieve the afternoon person, do my homework (this was the only time I was very good about doing my homework), smoke a joint, eat my dinner, browse through photos and Mrs. Silly would stop by (this was before she was Mrs. Silly, she was Little Miss Naughty then).  After she left, straighten the place up, often a couple friends would stop by and we'd smoke a joint.  They'd hang for a little bit then they'd leave and I'd lock up, count the cash (which was almost always what I started with) and close up.

The photos were usually pretty boring.  Mostly vacation, birthday and people I didn't know doing stuff type pics.  I don't remember seeing any nudes.  Maybe there were some bathing suit pics.  

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Fiveish.

Studied horticulture at A&M.  Worked in that industry for quite a while, maanaged a retail / wholesale nursery and greenhouse growing operation.
Managed a boat rental business and was in charge of inventory of parts dept of a boat dealership.  Maybe 10 years
Went to work for a friend who sold foam footballs, stayed there for 10 years, even after he sold the company.  Sales, logistics, vendor compliance, AR/AP
Same guy hired me to work for his Investors Relations / Public Relations firm, which morphed into reverse mergers, which morphed into our own public entity and platform.  

 

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2 minutes ago, jsharr said:

Fiveish.

Studied horticulture at A&M.  Worked in that industry for quite a while, maanaged a retail / wholesale nursery and greenhouse growing operation.
Managed a boat rental business and was in charge of inventory of parts dept of a boat dealership.  Maybe 10 years
Went to work for a friend who sold foam footballs, stayed there for 10 years, even after he sold the company.  Sales, logistics, vendor compliance, AR/AP
Same guy hired me to work for his Investors Relations / Public Relations firm, which morphed into reverse mergers, which morphed into our own public entity and platform.  

 

Vendor compliance for foam footballs?  Get real.

My foam football....

image.png.d265e4de1e3001f6f696c2094a3496f1.png

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25 minutes ago, 12string said:

85-90 PCB Design

 90-     PCB design

So you are the one who designed those? Do you want to pay my oncology bills?

Because of their longevity, PCBs are still widely in use, even though their manufacture has declined drastically since the 1960s, when a host of problems were identified.[3] With the discovery of PCBs' environmental toxicity, and classification as persistent organic pollutants, their production was banned by United States federal law in 1978, and by the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants in 2001.[4] The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), rendered PCBs as definite carcinogens in humans. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), PCBs cause cancer in animals and are probable human carcinogens.[5] Many rivers and buildings including schools, parks, and other sites are contaminated with PCBs, and there have been contaminations of food supplies with the substances.

Some PCBs share a structural similarity and toxic mode of action with dioxins.[6] Other toxic effects such as endocrine disruption (notably blocking of thyroid system functioning) and neurotoxicity are known.[7] The maximum allowable contaminant level in drinking water in the United States is set at zero, but because of the limitations of water treatment technologies, a level of 0.5 parts per billion is the de facto level.[8]

The bromine analogues of PCBs are polybrominated biphenyls (PBBs), which have analogous applications and environmental concerns.

 

 
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Three. Navy Federal Credit Union for 31 years. Early retirement at 52. Honored promise to Wo7 and moved to Ohio so she could be close to her Mom. General Electric Credit Union for four years. Made my escape back to the DC region and I'm currently at Apple Federal Credit Union ( 2 years). Plan to retire at age 65 (2024) when we qualify for Medicare ( hopefully). 

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1 hour ago, Longjohn said:

So you are the one who designed those? Do you want to pay my oncology bills?

Because of their longevity, PCBs are still widely in use, even though their manufacture has declined drastically since the 1960s, when a host of problems were identified.[3] With the discovery of PCBs' environmental toxicity, and classification as persistent organic pollutants, their production was banned by United States federal law in 1978, and by the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants in 2001.[4] The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), rendered PCBs as definite carcinogens in humans. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), PCBs cause cancer in animals and are probable human carcinogens.[5] Many rivers and buildings including schools, parks, and other sites are contaminated with PCBs, and there have been contaminations of food supplies with the substances.

Some PCBs share a structural similarity and toxic mode of action with dioxins.[6] Other toxic effects such as endocrine disruption (notably blocking of thyroid system functioning) and neurotoxicity are known.[7] The maximum allowable contaminant level in drinking water in the United States is set at zero, but because of the limitations of water treatment technologies, a level of 0.5 parts per billion is the de facto level.[8]

The bromine analogues of PCBs are polybrominated biphenyls (PBBs), which have analogous applications and environmental concerns.

 

 

My first design job, they were still phasing out the huge capacitors made with PCBs.  Occasionally, one would blow.  The guys were careful, they put on rubber gloves and boots before (mostly) cleaning it up.

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