29 just before my 30th birthday. Enjoy life, but keep your focus. 
What age were you when your career "took off"?
- Thread starter Tapp
- Start date
-
- Tags
- career help underemployed
You Win Perfect
bow down
i was 25. just do what you gotta do and you'll get there. stay at it and don't worry about your age. theres people out there 50 years old that just graduated college and gettin their shyt right, you ahead of the game man. I'd say around 30 is when most men get their shyt together.
thatrapsfan
Superstar
Took me till I was 27 to get to where I want to be (28 now). A lot of interning and sacrifices along the way, but if it fits in your future career trajectory it's sometimes worth it. Agree with people who say your mindset is key. Thats what you can control. Remain positive and keep grinding. Good luck breh.
26. I had to move to a new city and start from scratch, but I landed a job and have been getting promoted and increasing my income since then.
Main thing I learned was you have to be willing to take risks, and fight for what you want. These people would've still had me doing entry level shyt if I didn't fight.
Main thing I learned was you have to be willing to take risks, and fight for what you want. These people would've still had me doing entry level shyt if I didn't fight.
TheBlackSun
Pro
A lot of folks in our community put such a heavy emphasis on "having it all together" before the age of 25, and it's nonsense. Very few people out here have their shyt together by that age, or hell even have their shyt together period. Most young people, Im under 30 myself) are graduating school with massive debt, an extremely shytty job market; with many private industries that have left and will soon be rule out by automation), and for many; only to find out that their degrees are worthless. A lot of young your age and older are trying to take off, and get to where they want to be, and often it's due to a much bigger, massive situation that's of no fault of their own. As long as you have a strong sense of direction, ambition, drive, and the ability to persevere, you will make it to where you want to be. Nothing worth having comes easy as they say.
Peter Parker
Superstar
23 and I'm just starting my career, it's not some corporate shyt and the money is notoriously slow until you got some years in the game but I feel the same way OP
Railroadpaid
Rookie
20 for me. I had a shytty airport job and applied for the railroad. I went from 9 bucks a hour to 48 bucks a hr. If it wasnt for that job dont know what I would be doing at this point in my life. If you dont know what you want to do just find something you like doing until you figure it out.
Jean Jacket
NOPE
Income that occurs without you having to actively work for (i.e. 9-5). An example of passive income is rent collected, ad revenue or book/album royalties. Time is money. Let your money work for you and keep your time.
Bilz
Superstar
24. Honestly there is a lot of luck involved in being at the right place at the right time but working hard and staying motivated makes you available for those lucky breaks. And there's a huge difference between being a hard worker that everyone counts on and gets along with and a tryhard who is clearly just out for himself. Some people can fake it and pull it off but that's not the right path or a substitute for hard work for most people.
At my last job, I had to work with the warehouse guys on a lot of projects. It was horrible low pay work for them but I could tell within their first day or two if they'd move up or stagnate. The example the one dude shared of how the boss at his place changed jobs and then had his new job poach him, that shyt happens a lot. Making good impressions on the right people opens up a lot of opportunity. One of the bosses at my place would leave and then hire one of the low paid warehouse guys as an inventory manager at his new job. Even though there was no opportunity for the guys to move up at my old job, there was opportunity outside that they were unknowingly auditioning for.
Overall, you just have to look at people who are where you would like to be. I think a lot of people measure themselves against their peers and that's a dangerous formula if they aren't at the level you'd like to see yourself at. If you spend a lot of time around unmotivated people who fukk around, smoke weed, and barely get by, it's hard to ever get past that.
At my last job, I had to work with the warehouse guys on a lot of projects. It was horrible low pay work for them but I could tell within their first day or two if they'd move up or stagnate. The example the one dude shared of how the boss at his place changed jobs and then had his new job poach him, that shyt happens a lot. Making good impressions on the right people opens up a lot of opportunity. One of the bosses at my place would leave and then hire one of the low paid warehouse guys as an inventory manager at his new job. Even though there was no opportunity for the guys to move up at my old job, there was opportunity outside that they were unknowingly auditioning for.
Overall, you just have to look at people who are where you would like to be. I think a lot of people measure themselves against their peers and that's a dangerous formula if they aren't at the level you'd like to see yourself at. If you spend a lot of time around unmotivated people who fukk around, smoke weed, and barely get by, it's hard to ever get past that.
Reading this made me angry but in the end you found light at the tunnel so I Can't be mad. My mother wonders why i refuse to work a 9-5 this is the fukkin reason whyI was that dude that it took 10 years to get a bachelors. I worked in a hot ass warehouse for 7 of those years while going to school. I graduated when I was 29. Took me a year to land my first Accounting gig(shyt is hard to get your foot in the door). Brehs in the warehouse was clowning me for having a degree and couldn't get a job. Finally broke through and landed my first job in Finance. After 3 years of stagnation, no upward mobility whatsoever I was more depressed than I was at the warehouse. Everybody I started with got promoted to a bigger division but my black ass. Finance is on that. But what ended up happening is I became the go-to guy for the small division. I was training the new hires, shaping policy the way I saw fit and the boss gave me the freedom since they were focusing on much larger customers in the bigger division. This instantly made my job more enjoyable and I started liking coming to work again. We had a lot of turnover my small division because it didn't pay shyt. After a round of promotions they needed a supervisor in the small division still so they hired an old white guy. Yeah, I trained my supervisor. But we got along well. He ended up landing better job after like 6 months but he wanted to get a copy of my resume before he left. I emailed him a copy. A few weeks later I get a call from a hiring manager wanting to meet with me. Old guy had sent him my resume and I had the job before I walked into the interview. It was basically 15 minutes of small talk and an offer. 60% pay raise just like that.
Two things:
1) Your money doesn't grow linearly during your career. All it takes is the right opportunity and you can double your current salary overnight. It happens.
2) Your mind has to be in the right place for it to come. Be thankful for where you are. Never compare yourself to others who are on a different path.
TL;dr chill the fukk out. You're fine. Enjoy the process. Read The Alchemist
Mirin4rmfar
Superstar
23, start working as an Engineer for a telecommunications company. Now at 27, I am focusing on getting a combination of cissp and aws certification. I am hoping to at least make 120K by 30. That's the goal. A friend of mine is giving me the blue print. He is making close to 200K plus working in the tech field. I told him flat out, give me the blue print and I will learn it.
Hijo de luna
Superstar
I didn't even go into the details on how bad they treated a breh. But yeah they embarrassed the shyt out of me. From the jump I was given a shytty portfolio that nobody in corporate cared about essentially setting me up for failure. 23 year old cokeheads fresh out of college being promoted over me and here I am 33 having to show up every day. It was really bad. The old guy that connected me with my current gig picked up on it and was like "you have to get out of here". When I turned in my two weeks notice they did offer me a Supervisor position but you couldn't have paid me enough to stay there.
Dam breh, how did you persevere? What kept you going through all the abuse?
Cryptocurrency Scarface
Coinbased
26 and feel like more of a bum than you
lochead
All Star
Around 28 for me. I was a purchasing agent (Library of Congress) * Side racist ass agency* for like 3 years making 42K a year. My former supervisor left for GSA because of that agency. Her AKA sister asked her if she knew some purchasing people. She said this young guy I know would work well in your organization. They (DC Government) interview me for a contract specialist position. I get the position and the starting salary was 68k. At age 28 I made 42K, at age 29 I got a 26K raise. 
Because DC is changing so fast 
a lot of Blacks who own companies or are in very high positions are looking out for the next generation of Black folks who put the work in (education, malleable attitude)
Because DC is changing so fast a lot of Blacks who own companies or are in very high positions are looking out for the next generation of Black folks who put the work in (education, malleable attitude)