This has sprung out of a recent blog post of mine:
[Baraka_Blog] It's my turn, my friends. I'm seriously evaluating my career, and I want some feedback.
For those of you who don't know, I'm a book editor. I work for a small trade book publisher as a managing editor, but I also do a lot of marketing. In addition to editing and running the editorial for the company, I also do such things as promotion and office admin. More specifically, I liaise with authors, book stores, distributors, and other industry people; I build websites and do SEO; I help authors figure out blogging; I do all kinds of research related to new technologies and how the book industry can take advantage of it; and more.
I've also started to do some freelance work, most of which includes editing unpublished authors who are self-publishing or wish to approach publishers with something that isn't a steaming pile of shit.
The bottom line is this: I'm not very satisfied with what I'm doing at the moment. Some of it is pay-based (I'm not paid very much for what I do), but it's also based on the work. You see, I'm not sure I even like being an editor. I'm always self-conscious of my work and I have a difficult time keeping motivated. I try to find other things to do and always put off the editorial aspect of things if I can. I actually have had a better time teaching myself how to build websites. I have more fun working with code and numbers, whether it is Internet stuff or finance things, and this is what I'm getting at.
I'm looking into whether I should change careers. Although I have a degree in English, which would explain my editor status, I first earned a diploma in Business Administration--Marketing. In hindsight, I loved reading for my English degree, but pulled my hair out writing for it.
In college, I was energetically doing the assignments and presentations. As an example, they would bring in actual accountants to teach accounting, but they couldn't teach themselves out of a wet paper bag, so I taught myself. I taught myself accounting out of a textbook and earned straight As. I earned the nickname "Data" after showing my proficiency with organizing business/finance information within the context of spreadsheets. I even earned a reputation for analysis and critique of business plans and solutions. It got to the point where people started to kindly request that I ask no questions during their presentations, and that if I did, would I "dumb them down a bit."
University was different. I could do the work, but I didn't thrive on it. I did things last minute, pretty much handing in first- or second-draft essays and wondering how I was getting B-pluses and As.
I'm now sitting here with an assignment and looking ahead to another workweek. I'm not looking forward to it. I'm indifferent. It shouldn't be that way. I think if I got another editor job, it wouldn't change much; it might actually get worse, because I'd have a more focused job, likely. I'd do more copy editing exclusively, and I don't know if I could handle that spiritually. Here's a big hint: I actually enjoy editing finance/investing titles, even when the writing is frustratingly messy. But I think this is more to do with the content than with the editing process.
So I ask you this: Let's say I wanted to explore breaking into the financial services industry. What would be the way to go about doing this? How do I compare that kind of work to what I do now? Do people actually enjoy it? Is it a myth that all finance jobs are soulless? If I thrive on organizing and analyzing information, would I get a lot out of working in this industry?
I know some of you work in finance. Tell me what you think about it, and what you think about my situation.
To everyone: Am I simply mad? Should I just shut up and do my job?
