A career with just A Levels?

yeahyeahyeahs

I remember there was a thread on this before with regards to the options available. But I was just wondering if there were any people here who actually went into a decent career with just A Levels?

Two options:

1. Join Tesco or MacDonalds and work hard for 20 years, suck up to people, play the office politics game successfully and hope like hell. They have senior managers who worked their way up from jobs stacking shelves.

2. Choose Mittal as a father and inherit Arcelor-Mittal.
http://www.arcelormittal.com/index.php?lang=en&page=0
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lakshmi_Mittal

Going to university is much more likely to work than those strategies.

Reply 3

Azzle

I work at tesco atm on a gap year. A friend of mine is doing something where he's being a team leader for 6 months and then will be a section manager. By the age of 19. And he's on 14k. He was going to go to uni, which would have left him with debt and not necessarily a job. There's no places on this scheme now, but there is the options scheme, which I'm thinking of doing, which is management training.

You can always work your way up tho, a lot of my managers just stacked shelves. My dad knows someone who knows someone who is now a store manager having been on the shop floor. He was the first person to turn over a million in a week...

Reply 4

Cortez

yeahyeahyeahs

I remember there was a thread on this before with regards to the options available. But I was just wondering if there were any people here who actually went into a decent career with just A Levels?

Depends whether you classify accountancy as 'decent'.

Reply 5

Terrafire

The obvious answer to what the thread name implies (e.g. career = long-term life occupation) is the armed forces. You can go in as an officer with only a couple of A-levels of grade B, and if you're not a complete idiot you're likely to have a fairly well-paid job after a few years, with the possibility of learning useful skills and gaining experience to serve you well in getting into whatever area of employment after uni.

Of course, they pay for degrees too. Worth looking at.

Although not in your case... for a gap year I'd suggest something differernt, probably abroad. Save money now, and just go! Early next year go to a country you've always liked the look of and work doing whatever, a holiday rep, sales assistant, labourer, whatever. With a bit of initiative you could do all this on-the-fly without excessive agonising and time-wasting.

Reply 6

yeahyeahyeahs

Terrafire

Wouldn't being in the Armed forces mean, I wouldn't be home most of the time, since there is alot of travelling involved.

Reply 7

You would be at home most of the time, but there can be a lot of travelling depending on what your job is at any particular time in your career. Unless you are posted overseas, which is increasingly unlikely nowdays, then there are limits to how long you can/should be away from home versus at home.

Reply 8

Terrafire

threeportdrift

Unless you are posted overseas, which is increasingly unlikely nowdays

I wouldn't be so sure... recently the likelihood has crept up again, courtesy of Iraq. Although if you're smart and specialise in a support/logistical role then you shouldn't exactly be staring death in the face. :biggrin:

And a lot of people see the armed forces as an opportunity for travel anyway.

Reply 9

I'm sure. A posting is a 2-3 year placement in a permanent overseas job, such as in Cyprus, in an Embassy, in Germany etc. Because the Armed Forces are moving out of many of these overseas locations, or at least significantly reducing their presence, the number of overseas postings is reducing.

Being sent to Iraq, Afghanistan etc is a deployment and lasts between 6 weeks and 6 months, depending on your job. There are rules called 'Harmony' that should determine the maximum amount of time you are deployed away from home. I think the current Harmony standard is something like 6 months in every 24. However, certain trades, particularly drivers, chefs and medics are having to break the Harmony rules because of trade shortages. I'm not sure which, if any, Branches regularly break Harmony. (Trades = Troops, Branches = Officers)

It's just a matter of research to find out which branches are prone to greater or lesser opportunites for travel eg RN seagoing branches, RAF Movements Officers, Aircrew, Educators (!)

Reply 10

Terrafire

The obvious answer to what the thread name implies (e.g. career = long-term life occupation) is the armed forces.

A relative of mine thought the same.
He has now spent over 12 months in Iraq and now has started to self-harm. :frown:

He should be out soon on a mental health discharge. :eek:

Reply 11

partoftheprocess

fundamentally

A relative of mine thought the same.
He has now spent over 12 months in Iraq and now has started to self-harm. :frown:

He should be out soon on a mental health discharge. :eek:

Thats a disgrace :mad:

. Enough to send anybody up the wall, I suspect.

Reply 12

Not wishing to diminsh the problems you relative is suffering, but presumably those 12 months have been made up from 2 x 6 month detachments or 3 x 4 month dets?

Reply 13

threeportdrift

Not wishing to diminsh the problems you relative is suffering, but presumably those 12 months have been made up from 2 x 6 month detachments or 3 x 4 month dets?

He has not been back for 12 months.
He was sent there for a 3-4 month period, but this was extended and extended and extended because of his "vital skills" (he deciphers Arabic radio messages. they use this information to kill the locals ). Apparently they can do this because of a loophole in the Harmony rules.

Personally, I think that he was an idiot for joining in the first place. But that is the price you pay when you dont bother to go study and instead end up joining the army.

Reply 14

fundamentally

But that is the price you pay when you dont bother to go study and instead end up joining the army.

The two are not necessarily causally linked. Sadly, circumstances can conspire to cr@p on you in all manner of walks of life, not just the Armed Forces*.

*speaking as someone who was cr@pped on by the Armed Forces and has a Masters degree!

Reply 15

robert1987

I'd hardly call choosing not to go to university lazy ("not bothering")

Reply 16