Leader of the opposition. I worked with the police service in Northern Ireland and then ran the Crown Prosecution Service. In each of those jobs, if something needed fixing, I could fix it. As leader of the opposition, you are not in power and it’s the most frustrating job I’ve ever had, and a job I hope I don’t have for much longer.
Craft & work
What is the worst job you have ever had?
230 answers answered between 2008 and 2026 one of 25 in The Q&A
Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
The Guardian's long-running Q&A repeatedly asks this standing question, with minor tense variation.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
On the record
Public figures who have answered a question like this elsewhere. Quoted from the source shown, not written for FLAPSS.
Read by field
Everyone
Arts and letters 205
Politics and public life 10
Business and finance 6
Technology 1
Sport 8
Read by age
Any age
Before thirty 3
In their thirties 48
In their forties 49
In their fifties 54
In their sixties 47
Seventy and beyond 27
A holiday job as a chambermaid at the Scratchwood Travelodge on the M1. The state some people leave their rooms in was a revelation.
Children’s underwear department at Marks & Spencer, Oxford Circus. I was 16 years old, earning money in my summer holidays.
0 answers from members
Nobody has answered this one yet.
More on craft & work
- What accomplishment matters most to you? 192 answers
- How do you tell when a piece of work is done? 67 answers
- What do you do when you feel creatively stuck? 63 answers
- How does a new piece of work usually begin for you? 60 answers
- How much rewriting or revision do you typically do? 46 answers
- What part of your job would surprise outsiders because it takes up so much of your time? 41 answers