It’s easy to earn loads of money, apparently.
A quick look of the nijobfinder.co.uk site and some canny – at least in my technologically inept world – ‘advanced searching’ will bring up a plethora of jobs with a salary of over £100,000.
More precisely, the top paying role pays up to £490-a-day which works out at a cool £107,400-a-year (when you multiply by the 220 days-a-year the average person works, seeing as you asked).
That’s a nice little earner, particularly when you consider someone on that wage earns £61-an-hour and would only have to work for two hours a day to notch up the average UK salary of £26,000 a year.
It’s a galling statistic to hear but running the search is definitely worth doing if you fancy a career change, or even to help point career-confused school children on a lucrative path.
That’s because the top paying roles are nearly all in software engineering and come with abbreviated names which make no sense to us civilians but which are the hierarchy by which the tech world is built.
While most of these roles – as the day-rate fees suggest – are contract and don’t come with the benefits of paid holidays or pension which those in permanent employment enjoy, they still offer a hefty lump of pay and highlight a huge thirst for software talent.
That has been growing over the last few years – very few of these top-paying tech roles existed two decades ago – as Northern Ireland has become a global hub for technology companies both indigenous, such as First Derivatives and Kainos, and from further afield, such as Citi and Cayan.
Because the demand for talented labour in the sector is high, it has pushed up salaries, not just here in Northern Ireland but across the world (because average salaries in Northern Ireland are lower than the rest of the UK, the differential looks bigger here).
Anyway, the easy generic line is: train to become a software engineer if you want to have the biggest chance of making a chunky salary in Northern Ireland.
Of course, this is probably the least scientific piece of research around.
There are plenty of other careers, such as in life sciences, in financial services, in consulting and a plethora of others which offer a salary which you wouldn’t sniff at and would have the potential to make serious progress.
They tend to be a little more guarded about the salary they’re offering, as do the more senior roles which will pay a lot more than the magical £100,000.
You might think that little-old Northern Ireland wouldn’t be harbouring many executives on even more than that but in fact we have a healthy contingent in the £100kplus club.
You won’t know about it because we’re a nation of small business owners and even those in larger firms don’t have to reveal their salary unless they’re listed companies, and we don’t have many of those.
But really, if you want to earn £100,000 a year follow these simple rules:
1) Get a job
2) Work really hard
3) Do all your boss asks you and a little bit more
4) Carry out your role brilliantly
5) Work well with your colleagues
6) Jump at the chance for promotion
7) Don’t be tied to one location.
Tick those off and you’re bound to progress.
Granted it will be easier to add zeros to your salary if you become skilled in the technology world or any other of the fast-growing sectors but even then you’ll have to follow the seven golden rules to some extent if you’re to be worth £100,000 – it’s all about focus.
Now, there’s no time to waste; get on it.