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Because misery loves company, I decided to share my dilemma with you (asbestos underwear on...). Here's the problem: I've been offered a job with a small but dynamic, highly creative communications design firm. It's everything I could ask for in a job including a desk by the windows ;-), but this company, being small and new, offers next-to-nothing in benefits. There are no sick or personal days, minimal health insurance, and only one week of paid vacation after you've worked a full year. I understand their reasons for this--everyone there is "on the clock" doing outsourced work from some very big corporations, so taking time off cuts into the revenue in a big way.
My present job, on the other had, offers reasonably good benefits, BUT--It's beome a chore to drag myself into the place every morning and face the same old, same old. Not only has the work gotten boring, but the place is under such chaotic management (or lack of management) that I fear for its survival. It has been growing and seems to be doing well, but the constant uproar and lack of direction have gotten on my nerves.
So, what to do? Do I stay and grit my teeth on the present job and take solace in three weeks of vacation, plus some sick/personal days, a little life insurance, and modest tuition reimbursement, or do I strike out for the work I want to do, in an exciting, creative environment--and say the heck with the extras for now? (As this company grows, it does plan to add/increase those extras.) One more ingredient in this mixture--I'm not a just-starting-out 20-something. I'm 50-something and that's an extra consideration.
I'd love to hear some viewpoints on this and off-line replies are fine.
Visit the Last of the Red Hot Cybermamas at http://www.voicenet.com/~ldwalsh
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