I finished my PhD at the end of 2017. I'm an industrial Engineer and the topic was about developping participative design processes for social housing projects. I did my Post-doc before ending my PhD because I had a good opportunity at one of the biggest french universities with the biggest Construction company in France and possibly Europe. I needed 4.5 years to be able to complete my PhD during which a lot of things happened in my personal life (Death of my father, breaking up with a gf, falling in love with my current gf, moving between Biarritz, Bordeaux and Paris).
Completing the PhD was one of the most satisfying thing I had to live in my life due to the constant pressure I had on myself since day one.
Once I got to travel a bit for vacations and rest a bit from all that work I started to look for a job. Living in the South of France and not wanting to go back to Paris where I was born and raised (And where I feel I did everything I needed to do), it was really hard to find a job that would benefit from my learnings in my PhD. After searching for 6 months I ended finding a job as a project manager for the Rail Industry in the North of Spain. Appart from being paid poorly, the hardest thing was employees and bosses not valuing a PhD. In some countries, Engineers and industry think engineers with PhD are just Engineers who didn't want to work and wanted to stay at school studying and not really working, doing close to nothing.
I remember being asked if I would be able to endure the pressure of a real work in the real industry...which is a funcking joke comparing to what I lived during my PhD.
I've been working there for close to 7 months there, did some interviews for other jobs hoping to find something more fitting with my knowledge and objectives.
Yesterday at work, I was called by the Bordeaux Agglomeration telling me I was chosen to be in charge of the program for the energetic refurbishment program of the housing of the agglomeration. I'm so fucking hyped, it's one of the best day ever, and it feels like all the hard work finally paid.
TLDR
Doing a PhD is hard, a lot of things will happen in your life during that time, and once you end it, there's no warranty it will help you find a better job.
Nonetheless I learned so much things about different topics and myself that I think it worth it at a personnal level at least, and with that new job coming I hope it will worth it on a profesionnal level too.
If you do it, do it because you want to learn about that specific topic and about yourself, don't do it due to to profesionnal goals, unless you're totally sure a cool job is guaranteed at the end of the PhD.