Is a better-Paying Job value further Stress?

it can be an unlucky balance that many people debate: a high paying job or one with a excellent work-life stability. In an ideal world you should have both, but which is now not the truth for most of the people.

career expert Alison green (aka Ask A manager) helps a reader weigh the pros and cons.

I’m an executive assistant for a medium-sized nonprofit group. I completely love my job, the organization, and my boss. Like most nonprofits, the cash is on the low aspect. at present i am at $40,000 a 12 months, however on a regular basis I obtain a number of enhancements, making my revenue nearer to $43,000 a yr.

I was once contacted by means of a company for an executive assistant position at $65,000 a 12 months. while the job obligations are very an identical, I did a little analysis on the organization, and there has been up to date management changeover, a number of key staff left, and one of the vital new executives had several sexual harassment allegations at a earlier company. The allegations have been settled privately. This would be the govt i’d report to.

On prime of this, i have some minor health concerns that a nerve-racking job may make worse. the idea of going from a laid-back organization to a large service provider with a possible for prime stress is concerning to me. In my present job, my boss lets me are available late if i have an appointment, go all over lunch, and so on. presently my job does no longer affect my health in any respect and my job performance just isn’t plagued by my well being. i want work-life balance, and i’m all the time worried a brand new corporation may just “talk the controversy but no longer walk the walk” relating to “family comes first.”

i’ve plenty of faculty loans and the money surely would be useful. Does the additional cash negate the negatives of fixing jobs?

I believe lovely firmly that only you could decide that. the answer is heavily dependent to your present finances, your financial responsibilities, your financial savings and saving targets, what you want out of your occupation, and what you care about most in lifestyles. It’s additionally dependent on the place you’re for your life presently; occasionally that roughly alternate-off is sensible at one stage of your life however wouldn’t passion you during another stage.

It’s certainly not unreasonable to decide that more money isn’t worth giving up a job you like and a piece surroundings you’re chuffed in, in the event you’d be trading it for stress, much less flexibility, and that you can imagine health concerns. alternatively, a fifty one% salary raise isn’t exactly minor. It also has more of an impression while you’re beginning at $40,000 than in the event you have been beginning at $100,000; the extra money is probably going to buy you an even bigger increase in high quality of life and more financial respiratory room. And numerous people do come to a decision that they’re keen to work lengthy hours with much less-than-first-rate individuals in exchange for the correct amount of cash.

It really just depends on what you value most presently.

I say go to the interview and keep an open thoughts. Do now not go along with the frame of mind of, “i need this job” or “I’m so serious about this cash.” go together with the way of thinking of, “I’m going to assemble as a lot data as i will so i will work out if this is one thing I’d even want.”

After speaking with them, chances are you’ll come away feeling like there’s no means you’d need to work with them (in which case, downside solved). Or you could really feel extra than you expected to. If that happens, take a brutally honest inventory of professionals and cons, and what you’d in reality be promoting them for the fee they’d be paying. if you happen to’d simply be selling just a few additional hours of your time per week, that could be price it. but in case you’d be selling your health or your high quality of life, it’s most certainly not. the true solution is more than likely someplace in between, and that’s the place we get into “simplest which you can come to a decision what want from a job” . . . but the key thing is to determine what the alternate would truly be, after which which you can decide if it’s a change that pursuits you.

this text originally appeared on Ask A manager and is reprinted with permission.

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