Disclaimer: In Real Life is a platform for everyday people to share their experiences and voices. All articles are personal stories and do not necessarily echo In Real Life’s sentiments.
Less stressful careers often mean lower pay, and it can be difficult to balance the stress that you feel at work with a healthy personal life. You may be so focused on earning enough money that you could find yourself not enjoying the rest of your life. Many people make it to top management positions only to realise that they do not enjoy where they are or what they are doing.
It’s an elusive balance that many of us debate: a high paying job or one with a good work-life balance? In an ideal world, you could have a higher paying job with less stress but that’s not likely to be reality…
We reached out to an employee of an SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) to share with us a specific situation that he found himself in the middle of.
This is his story:
I love my job, but…
I’m an executive assistant for a medium-sized nonprofit organisation. I absolutely love my job, the organisation, and my boss. Like most SMEs, the salary is kinda on the low side. Currently, I make about RM2,500 after my EPF and SOCSO deductions, but usually I receive a few enhancements, making my salary closer to RM3,000.
I was recently contacted by a corporation for an executive assistant position with a salary of RM5,000. While the job duties are very similar, I did some research on the corporation and there was a recent management changeover: several key employees left, and one of the new executives had several sexual harassment allegations at a previous company. The allegations were settled privately. This would be the executive I would report to.
On top of this, I have some minor health issues that a stressful job could make worse. The idea of going from a laid-back organisation to a large corporation with the potential for high stress levels is concerning to me. In my current job, my boss lets me come in late if I have an appointment and I’m allowed to go during lunch, etc.
My job right now does not affect my health in any way and my job performance is not affected by my health. I need work-life balance but I’m always worried a new employer may “talk the talk but not walk the walk” regarding “family comes first”.
Do I need the extra money?
Before you take a new position, you do need to evaluate how the extra money will affect your current lifestyle. If you have a family, you may need to make more money to cover your basic expenses. A working budget should give you an idea of the minimum amount you need to make to maintain a lifestyle that your family is comfortable with.
If you are married, you and your spouse need to determine together the financial goals for your family and how your career change will impact them. You both may be willing to make sacrifices for your long-term financial goals or to provide a less stressful lifestyle that is more family oriented. The key is to make the decision by being aware of your current financial needs and wants.
Until today, I still have unsettled PTPTN and car loans – the money certainly would be helpful.
Does the extra money counter the negatives of changing jobs?
I believe pretty firmly that only you can decide that. The answer is heavily dependent on your current finances, your financial obligations, your savings and saving goals, what you want out of your career, and what you care about most in life. It’s also dependent on where you are in your life right now; sometimes that kind of trade-off makes sense at one stage of your life but wouldn’t interest you during another stage.
It’s certainly reasonable to decide that extra money isn’t worth giving up a job you love and a work environment you’re happy in if you’d be trading it for stress, less flexibility, and possible health issues. On the other hand, a salary increase isn’t exactly the worst thing either.
The additional money is likely to buy you a bigger increase in quality of life and more financial breathing room. And plenty of people do decide that they’re willing to work long hours with less-than-pleasant people in exchange for the right amount of money.
It depends on what you value most right now
I say go to the interview and keep an open mind. Do not go with the mindset of “I want this job” or “I’m so excited about this salary”. Go with the mindset of “I’m going to gather as much information as I can so I can figure out if this is something I’d even want.”
After talking with them, you might come away feeling like there’s no way you’d want to work with them (in which case, problem solved). Or you might feel more interested than you expected. If that happens, take a brutally honest inventory of pros and cons, and what you’d really be selling them for the price they’d be paying.
If you’d just be selling a few extra hours of your time per week, that might be worth it. But if you’d be selling your health or your quality of life, it’s probably not. The real answer is probably somewhere in between, and that’s where we get into “only you can decide what you want from a job”.
But the key thing is to figure out what the trade would really be – only then can you decide if it’s a trade that interests you.
For more stories like this, read: How I Quit My Five-Figure Salary Job To Become A Travel Writer and Malaysian Employers Think Raising The Minimum Wage Is A Bad Idea – Here’s Why They’re Wrong.
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