Findings from a New College of Humanities survey revealed that about 50% of graduates are working in a field related to their degree, while 96% of them claimed to have switched careers by the age of 24. The question of what to do after a degree is something many students ask themselves.
Some people change to jobs in other fields because of the high demand, enhanced paying value, and career growth, associated with these jobs, amongst other reasons.
All this shows is that you do not have to limit yourself to jobs in the field you studied.
Besides, there are several jobs you can do with any degree, useless or otherwise, and we will discuss a number of them in this article. We will also highlight their estimated annual pay range as curated from Payscale and Glassdoor.
So, keep reading if you need ideas on jobs you can do with your degree.
A personal trainer uses expertise and abilities to provide the necessary skills required by clients to achieve their goals by providing exercise programs and instructions. As a personal trainer, you can work online, in a gym, at a fitness club, or running a private venture.
Requirements: You should have a passion for health and fitness. You can also get qualifications from personal training courses.
Salary: With a starting wage of £20,000, you can earn an average of £27,000 and a maximum of up to £60,000.
A sports massage therapist is a person that provides advice, guidance and methods of exercise and physical activities on how to prevent sports injuries from occurring and how to heal from them.
Requirements: You do not need any prior degree or qualification to become a sports massage therapist. Training courses and a Level 3 sports massage therapy qualification will ensure you get the most out of a job.
Salary: You can earn as high as £41,000. The starting salary for this role is £18,000; on average, you can earn up to £25,000.
An air traffic controller, also known as Air Traffic Control Officer, is a ground-based personnel who guides, advises, and monitors the location of pilots and aircraft at take-off, during the flight, on approaching the airport, and at landing.
They are trained to ensure safe and efficient flights through the airspace by navigating an aircraft tracking system and using radar and radio communication equipment to inform and instruct the pilots.
Requirements: You need to possess a minimum of 5 GCSEs. You can apply for a trainee position at the National Air Traffic Services and qualify to work.
Salary: You can earn a starting salary of £25,000 while subsequently earning an average wage of £50,000 and a maximum salary of £100,000.
An estate agent is a middleman between sellers and intending buyers of property for commercial or residential purposes. They assist in negotiating the sale or rental between the buyers and sellers.
Estate agents can work as individual entities or collaborate with companies, businesses, or other estate agent bodies.
Requirements: This role does not require any specific degree, qualification, or license. However, an Estate Agent development training or Diploma is a great way to start.
Salary: You can earn an average wage of £21,500, a maximum of £49,000 while starting at £16,000.
A pharmacy technician works under the supervision of a pharmacist and assists in the preparation and supply of medication for prescription purposes. You can work in physical and online pharmacies as a pharmacy technician.
Requirements: You do not need any particular degree to work in this role. Although, you can complete pharmacy technician training courses online.
Salary: The average salary for this role is approximately £29,300, while the maximum earning can be up to £52,000.
A life coach is a trained professional who provides help, support, guidance, and encouragement to people from different works of life intending to make informed decisions resulting in meeting and surpassing their personal and professional goals.
Requirements: There needs to be a regulation regarding qualification in the UK. However, you can choose to take courses from professional coaching bodies that will accredit you to improve your chances.
Salary: On average, life coaches earn around £27,000. If you work as a life coach, you can make a starting salary of £16,000 while earning as much as £44,000.
As a Firefighter, you will be responsible for preventing and responding to calls to put out fires in the community and supporting in cases of car accidents, explosions, building collapses, and floods. You will also be tasked with educating the community to raise awareness about fire safety and how to prevent an outbreak.
Requirements: To be a firefighter, you don’t need any previous experience, knowledge, or degree. You can possess a vocational qualification and must be physically fit also.
However, you can find out the specific requirements from your local firefighter group.
Salary: If you work as a firefighter, you can earn an average wage of £30,027. The starting salary is about £23,000, and the maximum is £36,000.
A translator correctly converts written or spoken words and their meanings from one language to another. While you do not need any particular degree for this job, you must know how to write and speak multiple languages to be able to do this job.
Requirements: Translators can get the necessary knowledge and training from online courses. Excellent writing skills, knowledge, and fluency in different languages are required.
Salary: You can earn a starting wage of £18,000. You can make an average to a maximum salary of £23,565 – £39,000.
Being an entrepreneur is one of the fastest and surest ways to get income. Starting a business does not require any particular degree or formal education. As an entrepreneur, there is no limit to your earnings because the business’s success mainly depends on you.
Most entrepreneurs create a business venture out of their interests, ideas, imaginations, talents, preferences, and experience; others proffer solutions to gaps in everyday life. As an entrepreneur, you should keep up with trends and be dynamic in your creativity to stand out and attract the right market.
Requirements: Capital to start the business and bright ideas. Good business acumen is a plus.
Salary: An entrepreneur can earn an average wage of £101,000, starting with earnings as low as £18,000 to £181,000 and even several million.
A software developer is skilled in helping companies improve efficiency by designing and maintaining various computer software. Services range from building servers and databases for internal use to developing websites and applications from scratch to enhance the company’s operating systems.
Requirements: You do not need a degree to become a software developer, but attending boot camps and taking software development courses might help in learning programming languages like python.
Salary: As a software developer, you can earn a starting wage of £25,628 and an average salary of £31,095 as you advance in your career. The maximum compensation you can make is £45,667.
A computer games tester is a person required to play computer games in many different ways to check and ensure every possible area of the game works efficiently and effectively. The tester will also be required to find and report any game-breaking glitches or broken bugs and report to the game developers before it is put out for release.
Alternatively, a computer game tester can play games via a live stream platform like YouTube or Twitch to market them to the producers.
Requirements: You will be required to be computer literate, pay strong attention to details, and have excellent writing and communication skills.
Salary: You can earn as much as £20,000 up to a maximum of £40,000. The average computer games tester earns £31,090.
A marketing executive is a marketing team member responsible for exploring different sales strategies, contributing to projects, and promoting marketing campaigns, products and services; raising awareness of the brand, its new and existing products and services; meeting customer requirements, as well as maximising profit.
Requirements: You must keep up with market trends, be creative, and constantly learn new ways of improving the brand. Short courses online are also recommended.
Salary: As a marketing executive, you can earn a starting salary of £19,000, an average salary of £24,141, and a maximum salary of £30,000.
A recruitment consultant is a person who finds suitable job roles for people and also recommends the right people to be recruited for any form of employment; through tests, interviews and screenings. Most of these consultants work for recruitment agencies.
Requirements: A good recruitment consultant should possess administrative, effective management, and communication skills. Degrees are not required in this industry; however, having background knowledge of the field and job market is beneficial.
Salary: You can earn a starting wage of £18,000. On average, you can earn £23,000 and £30,000 at the maximum level.
A sales manager ensures the sales team meets all sales goals and targets. The role typically involves guiding the sales executives and representatives and assessing their sales activities to generate sales for the organisation. It also covers the management of customer satisfaction, service and experience.
Requirements: Almost anybody can be a sales manager with the proper training, tools, and experience as a sales representative. This role doesn’t require any prior degree.
Leadership, negotiation, verbal communication, and customer relationship skills are essential requirements for this role.
Salary: On average, you can earn between £21,000 and £32,455. The maximum amount a sales manager can make is £51,000.
A police officer is responsible for improving the quality of life for citizens by maintaining law and order, investigating, ensuring, and supporting crime prevention across different public areas.
Requirements: You need to possess A-levels or a level 3 qualification. Military experience is also tenable. Other requirements are good judgment, managing stressful situations, working under pressure, a passion for justice, and maintaining peace.
Salary: The minimum salary you can earn in this role is £21,000. The average to the maximum wage you can make is £29,310 to £41,000.
An online tutor provides virtual teaching services and engages students on different levels by covering various topics one-on-one. You can do this job if you have comprehensive knowledge of any topic or subject.
Requirements: To become an online tutor, you don’t need special qualifications, work experience, or course completion. You only need to be knowledgeable in various or specific areas, fluent in speech and writing, friendly, and passionate about ensuring people learn.
Salary: The average salary for this role is £36,107. Online tutors can earn a maximum wage of over £61,000 after a starting salary of £21,000.
A supply chain and logistics manager oversees products from the first point of production to the finishing stage and constantly liaises with suppliers, ensuring the organised storage and timely distribution of products to the correct location.
Other duties include and cover transportation, stock control, and warehousing. A great way to get into this sector is to apply for graduate schemes, internships, and part-time or full-time work placements in retail companies.
Requirements: People with different degrees can do supply chain jobs, although having a relevant degree in the field is a plus.
Salary: The starting salary for this role is around £28,500, while the average wage is £35,847. The most salary you can earn is well over £44,690.
A public relations officer manages and develops a positive public image and perception of a client or business. This role consists of coordinating and employing strategies such as public campaigns, organisation of conferences and public appearances to promote the reputation of people or brands.
Requirements: No specific degree is needed for this role. Professionalism, personal relationship skills, excellent oral and written skills, and good communication and organisation skills are outstanding for the position. Although, a degree in any of the marketing, public relations, communications, and business fields will give an added advantage.
Salary: Starting, you can earn over £20,000, but after gaining experience, you can make a maximum of £37,000 and above. The average salary for this role is £33,793.
A pilot is a professional trained to operate an aircraft. Being a pilot involves planning flights and modifying flight plans, conducting aircraft performance checks, pre-flight checks and working with the flight attendants to ensure all aircraft rules are followed.
Requirements: The skills required to be an effective pilot include; good coordination, excellent communication skills, a good sense of judgement, decisiveness, the ability to work under pressure and the ability to think quickly. If you want to become a pilot, you will be required to undergo a series of training and tests and possess a clean bill of health and fitness and a certificate to attest to that. Also, you will need a pilot’s license and a significant number of 1500 flying hours to fly commercially.
Salary: You can earn a salary of £50,000 to a maximum wage of £112,500. The average salary of a pilot is around £76,500.
A personal assistant is an administrative support working closely with senior management and directors, responsible for the organisation, time management and secretarial duties.
Usually, a personal assistant is tasked with setting up meetings, taking notes and minutes of meetings, handling queries and requests, screening and directing phone calls, distributing correspondence and managing the daily workload of their senior managers.
Requirements: You do not need any particular degree or qualification. Possessing excellent organisation skills, communication skills, and managerial skills is also essential.
Salary: You can earn a starting wage of £19,000 and an average to high pay of £26,410 – £38,000.
A youth worker is a person who is responsible for offering support to young people’s social, personal and educational development, so they attain their full potential. The role involves planning, organising, delivering and overseeing programmes with agencies/organisations to engage young people in the community.
Requirements: No particular degree is required to become a youth worker; however, getting an apprenticeship opportunity will enable you to reach level 2 or 3 qualifications in Youth practice.
Salary: The starting salary for this role is £18,000, while the maximum is £28,000. The average salary for this role is £22,068.
A prison officer is personnel with the duty of maintaining and ensuring the safety and management of prisoners.
Requirements: You do not need any qualifications to be a prison officer. On the other hand, personal qualities and skills are more critical prerequisites. Online tests and subsequent training are necessary for qualifying for this role.
Salary: The starting salary of a prison officer is £22,000, while the top pay is £38.000. An average prison officer earns £27,000.
A virtual assistant is a highly skilled individual that handles administrative tasks like appointment scheduling, sorting out payment issues and responding to emails, amongst other things, for people or companies.
Requirements: You need to be a quick thinker, reliable, and capable of multitasking. No specific qualification or training is necessary.
Salary: The average earning for this role is £26,813; you can start earning from £22,000 to as high as £50,000.
A writer provides different written materials to be distributed to readers, listeners and viewers over various media channels. It involves researching topics, proofreading and submitting writing projects to editors or clients.
Requirements: All you need is a personal computer, internet service, and good communication skills.
Salary: You can earn a starting wage of £17,000, while on average, you can earn £26,117. Writers can earn a salary of up to £40,000.
A hospitality manager is someone in charge of coordinating the different departments in a hotel, restaurant or relaxation centre. The manager must maintain hygiene, safety and quality service in the establishment.
Requirements: Graduates of all degrees can become hotel managers. However, qualification in hotel management is a bonus.
Salary: In this role, you can earn £31,118 on average. Starting pay is around £22,000, and the highest possible earning is £63,000.
A human resource assistant works with an organisation’s human resource department to provide clerical assistance and address employee issues, such as employment benefits, recruitment, policies, payroll, and general concerns.
Requirements: This role is open to graduates of all degrees. No special human resource qualifications are required. Although training, courses, and hands-on experience might be helpful.
Salary: You can earn a starting wage of £19,000 and a maximum of £34,000 in this role. The average salary for this role is £25,643.
A graphic designer is a person who creates art, logos, advertisements and visual elements of a company’s products and services using technological concepts and tools.
Requirements: You need to be creative and master design and graphics software.
Salary: The average salary of a graphic designer is £23,919. You can start earning from as low as £18,000 to £32,000 in this role.
A management consultant is an individual that provides companies with expert advice and implementation strategies.
Requirements: You must possess good problem-solving skills and a keen eye for details. You can begin this role by applying to a training programme in a management company.
Salary: The starting salary for this role is £30,000; you can earn an average wage of £49,047 and a maximum salary of £88,000.
A strength and conditioning coach is an individual in charge of programmes that helps clients with the required strength and conditioning activities.
Requirements: To work as a strength and conditioning coach, you do not need a degree to work in this role. Although holding a certification in sports and athletics is a sure way of being accredited.
Salary: In this role, you can earn a starting wage of £24,000. The average salary for this role is £27,898; however, once you build years of experience, you can make as high as £80,000.
A train driver is responsible for driving a train and ensuring the safe handling of the train.
Requirements: The minimum requirement for this role is GCSE. You will also be required to undergo training.
Salary: The starting salary for this role is £24,000, while the average wage is £27,898. In this role, you can earn a maximum salary of £70,000.