People who work 'office jobs,' what are you actually doing every day, and what salary does that earn you?

I don't think there is one singular answer for this - every office job I have had has been very different. But I can tell you about mine. So ... Firstly what it earns me - 45k a year plus an annual bonus. I work as a sales engineer which means I work alongside the people you would traditionally think of as the "sales guy" providing the technical knowledge on the product. I have 20 years industry experience so this one isn't an entry level role - I definitely would not be able to do this job without the experience I am bringing along in my pocket! As to how my day looks - it can be pretty varied. I am usually supporting more than one of the sales people with multiple deals simultaneously and each deal is a bit different in terms of the amount of support I need to provide. Most of our conversations with a prospective customer are via a teams call, but I do sometimes go visit people in person. I also attend industry events from time to time (basically working on a stand in an exhibition hall talking to people about what we do and taking details of people who might actually want to talk to us again in the future.). Typically I will be involved in initial conversations with the prospective customer - basically to find out why they are talking to us. Why they are looking for a new vendor, what issues they are trying to fix by moving etc. We will almost certainly need to do a demo of the product, which is something I will lead, and if they are sensible they will want to have various other workshops to cover different topics (the rules in one specific country they are worried about, or data protection or whatever). And I will be involved in some of these too. If they go ahead and sign a contract with us, I spend a bit of time passing on all the info I have to the implementation team who will get them started as customers :) Whenever we have a call i probably spend the same amount of time prepping for the call as the call lasts on average (because everything we do is very tailored to the specific prospect). Some of this prep time will be spent on an internal call with the other attendees, working out who is going to talk about what topics, anything we need to focus on, or avoid talking about etc. But most of it is on my own, getting my own talk track ready as well as technical set up for the demo. Outside of "formal scheduled calls" I answer lots of questions in writing. Lots of these are quick ones flying at me via an instant message / email but I also help put words together for pets of the formal written tender (I don't write these in full but my input is usually required on some specific topics). Of course I don't (can't!) know everything, so where I don't know the answer it's down to me to go find out from the right person - half the battle is understanding the question well enough to know where to go with it. The other side of my work is learning - in order to wear my "expert hat" in a field which changes very quickly, it is down to me to make sure I know all about the changes that are coming up. There will be new things added to the product we are selling which we need to know about - we normally have some sort of formal introduction to those, then work out between the team how we are going to talk about them. But also new legal rules to keep on top of, as well as news about what our competitors are doing. We share our knowledge between us as we find out useful info, but I need to take an active, proactive part in this process! Being a "tenured professional", I am very much in charge of my own calendar - as long as I turn up and perform at my scheduled calls and reply to written communications in a prompt manner, noone really cares when I did the legwork in the background. There are definitely peaks and troughs to how busy I am. Some days it's crazy and I am working long hours, some days by weird fluke, I have next to nothing to do, and can get my housework done. It probably works out slightly in my favor but I have done so many hours of unpaid overtime in previous roles that I refuse to feel guilty about it 🤣.