Long story short, Ops is not where I want to be long-term. I have friends that really enjoy what they do (NY Metro and outside of it), but my experience hasn’t been the greatest. Everything seems extremely inefficient with what I’ve been a part of so far. Without going too far into it, there really aren’t any transferable skills outside of soft skills. I work with smart people but I also work with people who have been in the same position for a number of years and remain stagnant/content with where they are in life. While there’s nothing wrong with that, it doesn’t really promote a “growth” atmosphere. Additionally, the whole purpose of the program I’m in is to “train” you to essentially work in the same spot (location and LOB) and manage a team you’ve been directly placed into after X years. I’ve only been here for about a month (interned for about 7 in another group) but I’m already thinking about how to get out.
Pros:
Low-stress environment
Overtime eligible - not making terrible money per hour
Social life is great inside and out of the office
Team is cool
Cons:
Not a career path I’m too excited about
Feeling like I’m going to become “content” with where I'm at
Lateral movement internally is very difficult because of HR
I know a lot of this is on me with networking and finding an out, but I guess what would be your opinion? Right now I just see this as a job that provides me with an income to live and enjoy myself on weekends but ultimately I don’t really see this helping me with getting into a top 10 school. There are definitely some cool gigs within Ops (process improvement teams, some middle office functions) but again with my program it would be another X years before I’d even remotely be able to make a jump. Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful for having a job and I’m up for giving this a shot, but after 6 months I’d really like to be networking heavily looking for other opportunities and be out within a year.Thoughts/stories to share?
