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It used to be that if you wanted a six-figure salary, you needed a certain job. But the fact is that there are other ways to earn six figures. As the old saying goes, “there are many paths to the top of Mt. Fuji,” and not all those paths need go through medical school, law school, or business school. Recently, Forbes.com published a list of several occupations that were off the beaten path but which were potentially as lucrative as the traditional stand-bys. Included on their list were the following:

Court reporters Professional (life or career) coaches Mine managers Truck drivers Pressmen Technical writers Restaurant managers Air traffic controllers Elementary school principals Post-secondary school teachers Market research analysts Real estate salespersons Insurance salespersons Loan officers Film editors

Several other news services, including CNN/Money, have listed additional jobs that have the potential for six-figure salaries, including:

Casino manager Hotel managers Make-up artists Cargo pilots Broadcast TV captioners Fitting models

Granted, many of these occupations offer six-figure salaries only to a portion of their professionals — say, the top 10 or 20 percent — or to professionals in certain markets or specialties. Some occupations are relatively small, such a mine managers or film editors, which means they don’t offer a lot of jobs to begin with, and those they do offer are extremely competitive. Other occupations, such as loan officers and real estate salespersons, are contingent on market conditions and therefore fluctuate year to year.

The point is that there is at least the potential for six-figure compensation across a range of industries. I don’t know about you, but for me that’s a terribly comforting thought. What this means is that gifted and motivated professionals in industries other than law, business, and medicine can make a handsome living — and do so doing something they love.

Too often we’re prone to make career decisions based on desires for prestige or money rather than on our own interests or talents. But those factors don’t have to be mutually exclusive — not anymore. Recent studies from the Bureau of Labor indicate that ceilings for many industries, including those listed above, are now exceeding the six-figure benchmark. As such, more and more professionals in non-traditional careers are enjoying a level of compensation they might never have obtained a decade ago.

So before you make a decision based on traditional — and perhaps out-dated — notions of what careers pay the best, remember the old Japanese proverb about the many paths to the top of Mt. Fuji and at least consider donning your hiking boots and looking for trails that are less well-known but equally prosperous.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Benjamin Welch has been a college instructor in writing and composition for nearly six years. When he’s not teaching or playing golf, he offers advice for students seeking information about continuing education, online education and online degrees.

I thought we’d depart from education-based themes to examine what students are looking forward to — namely, work. Or to be more precise, the "vertical workstation." The vertical workstation was recently featured on a MSNBC.com segment entitled, appropriately, "What Were They Thinking?" Evidently, what some researchers at the Mayo Clinic were thinking was that American workers are a little too beefy, which is why they came up with a treadmill-mounted desk. Evidently, by walking while you work, you can burn about 100 calories an hour or about 66 pounds per year.

Now the associate editor at MSNBC.com poked some fun at the vertical workstation, which is probably well-deserved, but I happen to think the idea is genius. Here’s why.

First of all, it enables a new generation of legitimate excuses for getting out of work. Think about how many days-off you could secure with a high ankle sprain or a severe blister courtesy of your new workstation? Best of all, because these are work-related injuries you may be entitled to workers’ compensation.

Second, the vertical workstation could become a handy scapegoat for the usual work-a-day gaffes, like misspelling a co-worker’s name or forgetting to submit a weekly report. After all, it’s hard to walk and type at the same time, right?

Next, the vertical workstation will totally revamp the idea of business casual. Polo shirts and slacks will soon be replaced by dry-fit shirts, baggy shorts, running shoes, and iPods — all bearing the corporate logo, of course. Still, who wouldn’t want to dress down a little more for the sake of health and fitness in the workplace?

Finally, three words: "vertical workstation high." It is a common phenomenon for experienced runners to get a rush of endorphins about seven to ten miles into a strenuous run. And although I’ve never experienced this "runner’s high" myself, my calculations indicate that if I stepped onto a vertical workstation in the morning and slow-walked feverishly at a three-to-five-mile-an-hour clip, I could get several all-natural chemical fixes every day.

I don’t know about you, but that’s enough incentive to make me a vertical workstation junky? What about you?

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Benjamin Welch has been a college instructor in writing and composition for nearly six years. When he’s not teaching or playing golf, he offers advice for students seeking information about continuing education, online education and online degrees.