How did you start in your job?

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Pew

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Bored at work, watching a learning video and was wondering how people get started in their jobs. What job/career are you guys in and how did you guys get started/pushed you in that direction?

I'll start: I'm in IT and I got started in this field because of some car buddies of mine that worked IT for the Veteran's Administration. It was entry-level helpdesk but at that time I had no formal IT training except tinkering with computers. Anything was better than being a waiter though and needed to start a career before I lose motivation.

What about you folks?
 

'How did you start in your job​

Stumbled into a recruiting office.

(what) pushed you in that direction?'

Selective service and That old crazy Asian war.

recruiting.jpg
 
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Just wanted some sort of degree in my early 20's so I acquired an associates degree in auto tech.

Worked my way thru a dealership doing all sorts of repairs and am now their used car tech. Now if a car needs extensive repair I just send it to wholesale instead of having to deal with the headache, and I get to take my pick out of the used car inventory as my ride home for the night so it's kind of a cool gig.
 
I started in a customer service role with a fintech company about 15 years ago and then moved into a fraud investigation role at the same company. I used that experience to land a job at a bank as an anti-money laundering investigator and then worked up to be the senior investigator on my team and also joined our training team so now I train new investigators. No degree. Just worked my way up over the years. Currently pursuing my CAMS certification and then I plan to start studying for my CFE. We are going through an acquisition right now so I'm keeping my eyes open for more opportunities to move up further.
 
I've changed careers 3 times and each time was about dissatisfaction with prospects of further self-actualization.
 
First kid in entire extended family to go to college. Knew nothing about college and careers at all, just wanted to get away... Figured studying anything in 'business' would be OK and realized that auditing/accounting would be the easiest way into some (any?) job after graduation. Realized I wasn't fit for accounting long term, I'd be called ADD now :), volunteered for a few challenging projects, was noticed and became one of the CFO's 'fixit' guys which led to ~7 advancing roles. Wound up leading a few global functions for a $22B company, left after an acquisition and now leadership at a startup.

Lessons learned along the way could be another thread....
 
What job/career are you guys in and how did you guys get started/pushed you in that direction?
I'm a cinematographer/DP.

What pushed me, was the first Star Wars, and the making of I saw after that.
I knew I wanted to be in this industry - which is not easy in Germany if you don't now the right folks.
Well - I didn't know anybody.

Also too poor to go to film school, so after my time in the army (paratrooper) I studied photography and clawed my way up over the years.

Frank
 
No lie, I went into the military partially to piss off my dad, partially because I didn't know how to say no to the recruiters (because of my dad too.)

What career field / speciality were you in ?


For me:
Medical equipment repair business for a manufacturer. I got started and worked in this career field in the Air Force and ANG.
 
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Paper route at 8yo. Retail working for my dad from 10 until 18 and then summers through college. Started in electrical engineering but got tired of doing Laplace transforms (this was before computers) and switched over to chemical engineering so I could design reactors and build big things.
 
When I was younger I was replacing spark plugs and just checking over things with my dad on a car and just using the ratchet and hearing a bunch of technical terms just sparked my interest. Never looked back since then. I originally when I was a kid said I wanted to be a cop but I’m so glad I chose this instead of that. I actually wanted to be a certain type of doctor at one point too when I was a kid but too much college and liability risk too haha. I won’t mention how that came about but it’s pretty easy to guess haha. But I’m happy with what I chose overall and what I do. I’ve made it a lot farther at my age than I expected. I’m 20 almost 21 and manage the lube techs while still doing actual work they don’t get to do. It’s nice. We just had to let go of a bunch of people for budget cuts and many of them were let go so fortunately I wasn’t in their spot. I hope to one day be able to do absolutely everything on a vehicle and I’m sure I can if I set my mind to it. Yeah changing spark plugs made me want to be a mechanic.
 
Went back for teaching degree, taught for a few years, got out of education, got back into education and at the post-secondary level.
 
I was out of High School , working in a grocery store owned by my brother in law . He wanted to teach me how to run the business but I wasn't interested . He told me to get my ass out and find something I liked because he wasn't going to let me turn out like his useless brother . I guess I needed to hear that . My girlfriend's brother worked for the local Electric Co-Op and he got me an interview and I was hired . That started a 40 year career in the electric utility business . Retired almost 6 years ago .
 
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After I graduated college, I had some trouble finding a job and worked for a temp agency doing all kinds of stuff from IT helpdesk to insurance work to making Jello pudding. One day I was sent to a new company that needed manufacturing tech to design manufacturing equipment and make tox batches of a novel drug formulation. It was a cool job with some cool people. I still work with a few of the same people 35 years later. I thought that I impressed them on the interview with my mechanical ability from working on cars combined with my college degree in math. Years later, over some beers, the told me that they hired me because I seemed ok and not on drugs. LOL. I didn't know it was such a low bar.
 
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