At the age of 29, he earned over $200,000 from DEP

At the age of 29, Etienne Barnett leads a seven-man sales team and earns more than $200,000. All thanks to a year’s worth of professional training that cost him…$250.

He laughs: “You could say it was a good investment.” Newspaper It will also publish on Saturday the ranking of 100 vocational training courses that lead to the highest paying jobs.

A person who dreamed of being a psychologist as a teenager, faced many failures before turning to professional training. He says his transition to college was very disastrous.

“It wasn’t really good at CEGEP. I ended up getting caught four times. In my head, I had to do it. I’ve never been forced to do anything other than go to CEGEP and university.

When Etienne gives up, Etienne doesn’t really know where to go. After being rejected in the army, the young man continued his research and discovered professional training in sales and representation consulting at the Samuel-De Champlain Training Center in Beauport, where he decided to enroll.

“When we think of DEP (Professional Studies Diploma), we often think of physical crafts, like construction. But there are a lot of other DEPs that we don’t know where there is a lot of contact with people,” he says.

Impress your loved ones

But Etienne had to convince those around him, since the apprenticeship was not respectable. The challenge will be great. “My parents reacted very badly,” he says. They refused to pay my tuition, they weren’t really happy.

A year later, after completing his training, he started working as a sales consultant in an electronics store. One thing leads to another, he was offered several opportunities that led him to the position of Team Manager at an IT company in Quebec, which he has held since 2021.

His salary now far exceeds what he imagined a few years ago. “Before doing DEP, I said to myself: If I had a job for $25 an hour, that’s fine, this would be my life and I would be happy. Now I look back and there isn’t much I could wish for more than now,” he says with a big smile.

His parents, for their part, completely changed their minds about vocational training. “They are now talking about DEPs for my little cousins ​​in my extended family, and they’re citing me as an example…it really changed their vision,” he says.

Etienne is now convinced that vocational training would benefit from being better known and above all, more valuable.

“Unlike CEGEP, in apprenticeships, we learn every day something that will serve us for the rest of our lives. When we do it, we know why we are doing it and it is motivating. We are not telling ourselves: I don’t need this course,” says the mentor at Academos, an organization It connects young people with professionals and workers who are passionate about their profession.

Although he deals with fellow university graduates every day, Etienne no longer feels the need to pass through the university gates to have the impression that he has “succeeded” in life.

“I am proud that I got to where I am, with what I have, and to show those around me that even if I don’t have many studies, I can succeed. I tell myself that if I can get here with this diploma, I can go further.”

Salary can increase quickly

Etienne Parent’s success is no exception, according to his former teacher, Carl Baribeau, who still teaches sales consulting at CFP Samuel-De Champlain.

“In commercial representation, ex-students with six-figure salaries, we have a lot,” he says.

However, according to Department of Education data, the sales consulting program is far from one of the most profitable: One year after the end of their studies, graduates earn an average of $37,000, while the paycheck can be twice that. High relative to other graduates.

However, salary progression can be very rapid in this field, especially for those with specialized training, Baribou says.

“I tell them: Don’t do this for money and you will do it,” he says.