Today I quit my job working as a Secondary School teacher in a Lancashire high school. The job was well paid, with a good pension and a good salary. I am leaving to work as a freelance WordPress developer and consultant with no guaranteed salary or benefits. Why am I doing this I wondered?
I have been teaching for over a decade now. I have taught a number of different subjects but finally settled into teaching ICT and in fact was Subject Leader (Head of Department in old money!) for over 4 years. It was during my teaching career that I developed a passion for working with the web and particularly WordPress, making blogs for students to access as well as websites for students to use in distance learning.
Why Leave the Teaching Profession?
For the majority of the last 10 years I have enjoyed teaching. It is such a varied job with different things happening every day that, on the whole it has been fun. However over the last 12 months I have seen a sharp rise in the work that I have been getting in terms of freelance WordPress jobs and I have had the privilege of working with a number of top WordPress agencies and people during this time. It has become more and more obvious to me that my future did not lie in teaching.
It was at this point I then spoke to the management of my school with the view of dropping down to part-time, perhaps 3 or 4 days work before winding down completely perhaps a year later. However I became apparent that circumstances at the school meant this was not an option and therefore I was left with a decision to make.
Working Two Jobs for Over 5 Years
I have been a freelance WordPress developer for over 5 years, starting out working on small business sites and now working on larger sites including eCommerce sites. Throughout this time I have been working two jobs, teaching full time which as been getting harder and harder. Having two young children means I can no longer do this and be successful at both. Therefore I had to make a decision as to which path to go down. The decision was quite easy really when I thought of it like this.
I have really got to the point whereby I cannot get any better and progress in either job as one was pulling back the other.
Hire Me
With all that I am now available for hire as a full-time WordPress developer. I am taking on work now, but I will be fully available come the end of April.
This post reads very similar to Kimb Jones post after he did very much the same thing previously, helping me make the same decision. Inspiration for this post came from Kimbs post.
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