Career advice

[Tetsuo365]

Been working retail for 10 years and now looking to get into IT.. ..been told that cloud computing is an emerging career so decided to do Microsoft's azure az900 & az 104 which I have completed.
I guess what I wanna know is.. are these certs enough to get me a job on their own ? Do I need something like an A+ or N+ to consolidate my chances of finding a job ?

 

[Foxhound5366]

Been working retail for 10 years and now looking to get into IT.. ..been told that cloud computing is an emerging career so decided to do Microsoft's azure az900 & az 104 which I have completed.
I guess what I wanna know is.. are these certs enough to get me a job on their own ? Do I need something like an A+ or N+ to consolidate my chances of finding a job ?

Well done on the initiative, buddy. Don’t let naysayers get to you (previous post). Eventually some of the skilled IT professionals on here should give you the answers you seek.

 

[Pho3nix]

Don’t think you need A+, maybe N+ but you’ll need to start knocking on doors to do some free labour to plot on your CV

 

[GrootVoet]

Most of theses cloud courses relates to managing environments. What AWS, Azure, etc. services you need, how to configure and look after them.

If you want to develop you need to learn programming languages and frameworks like Python, JS, C#, Java, React, Angular the list goes on.

So do you want to develop or manage environments or do both?

 

[ronz91]

Most of theses cloud courses relates to managing environments. What AWS, Azure, etc. services you need, how to configure and look after them.

If you want to develop you need to learn programming languages and frameworks like Python, JS, C#, Java, React, Angular the list goes on.

So do you want to develop or manage environments or do both?

side note, is there a certification exam for python?

 

[slimeball]

I guess what I wanna know is.. are these certs enough to get me a job on their own ? Do I need something like an A+ or N+ to consolidate my chances of finding a job ?

It's probably going to be difficult finding something with those certs alone. Even with A+ or N+... it's not a walk in the park, the job market in sa is brutal. Software devs on the other hand are currently in demand and coding bootcamps have produced many graduates that are now working at large companies so it's possible...

Don't sell your soul and become a support tech is all i can say..

 

[Dylan_G]

Been working retail for 10 years and now looking to get into IT.. ..been told that cloud computing is an emerging career so decided to do Microsoft's azure az900 & az 104 which I have completed.
I guess what I wanna know is.. are these certs enough to get me a job on their own ? Do I need something like an A+ or N+ to consolidate my chances of finding a job ?

I feel like A+ is if you want to be a desktop/hardware technician and N+ is if you want to be a Network Engineer. I don't personally know any devs with those certs (and I know quite a few devs).

When you say "get into IT"... what is it you are wanting to do?

To me, "IT" is an industry, not a job or career path. It's like saying I want to get into the "Automotive industry". But what in the automotive industry? Mechanic? Technician? Electrician? Sales? Test driver?

Same with IT. Developer? QA/Tester? Network Engineer? System Admin? DevOps specialist?

EDIT: Well done on doing the cloud cert. It's definitely a positive step. I know many "IT" positions where it could come in valuable, as well as non-IT positions. For reference, a friend of mine is a consultant at PwC in a non-IT-related role, but he was assigned to do a cloud cert. Cloud is big right now, whether you use it fully or not.

 

[Bliksis]

Stay away from IT, unless you want to constantly study and write exams to stay relevant.

 

[RedViking]

Stay away from IT, unless you want to constantly study and write exams to stay relevant.

Which career doesn't require constant studying in today's fast pase and online world? Unless you are a house wife?

 

[Bliksis]

Which career doesn't require constant studying in today's fast pase and online world? Unless you are a house wife?

Ok

 

[RedViking]

Ok

Good. Remember the milk

 

[Bliksis]

Good. Remember the milk

Infrastructure engineering manager in the company I work for: civil engineer, studies completed 1997. MBA 2003. That's it.

One example, and don't tell me it's an anomaly and a bad example

 

[cguy]

Stay away from IT, unless you want to constantly study and write exams to stay relevant.

Also stay away unless you want massive paychecks and a fascinating career that can take you anywhere in the world. You’ve been warned!

 

[RedViking]

Infrastructure engineering manager in the company I work for: civil engineer, studies completed 1997. MBA 2003. That's it.

One example, and don't tell me it's an anomaly and a bad example

With implementation of BIM and more companies moving towards BIM the future of engineering is going to change, is busy chanfing, as well. Those who do not adapt, widen their field of knowledge and move towards information management is going to stay behind. Or course if you on your way to retirement, or not planning to grow in scale of what you do, similar with "IT" you can just carry on and eventually become background noise while the rest of the world moves "forward".

So yes, it is a good example, but again IT, the IT of engineering and architecture becomes a lot more important. As rules becomes strictor and engineers start do a lot more and work closer with other industries, working only with the knowledge you qualified with 93/97 you will quickly become a dinosour.

Of course if that is what you want, then that is okay, but your comment "stay away from IT unless you want to continue study" or something, says more about what you as a person want for yourself and not the ever changing world and move towards information technology and management in almost every industry.

With the advancement in software technologies and information management, Soon Architects and BIM modelers will take over most of what engineers do and just use them for signatures, unless they conform and want to do more than just scrap booking and site inspections.

Yes, I don't have a degree, but I continue to study and grow my knowledge.

Have not even touched on AI and algorithmic design.

 

[_kabal_]

Stay away from IT, unless you want to constantly study and write exams to stay relevant.

If by “constantly study” you mean “constantly leaning and improving”, then sure. I’ve personally however never written exams and am extremely relevant

 

[_kabal_]

Been working retail for 10 years and now looking to get into IT.. ..been told that cloud computing is an emerging career so decided to do Microsoft's azure az900 & az 104 which I have completed.
I guess what I wanna know is.. are these certs enough to get me a job on their own ? Do I need something like an A+ or N+ to consolidate my chances of finding a job ?

What you could do is extend your cloud knowledge/skills with learning Infrastructure as Code.

You can use https://pulumi.com/ai

Ask it to build Azure infrastructure for services you know about.
You can then see how these things are defined, because cloud management is not done via the web portals

 

[RiaX]

Infrastructure engineering manager in the company I work for: civil engineer, studies completed 1997. MBA 2003. That's it.

One example, and don't tell me it's an anomaly and a bad example

So you've never had new training for anything since 1997 ?

I call BS.

 

[Dylan_G]

Stay away from IT, unless you want to constantly study and write exams to stay relevant.

Quite the generalization there. As with all generalizations, it means you're both correct and incorrect, depending on what you're looking at.

Relevance is the most important word in that sentence.

I worked at a company that serviced multiple huge clients providing development work. Most senior developers and team leads did not continuously study and write exams, but that was the nature of the niche we were in (Oracle development). You didn't need to do that kind of thing. On-the-job learning was more than enough.

Compare that to someone who wants to be at the forefront of their field and be able to dive into many different kinds of systems/clients/projects, and you will find you need to upskill.

Speaking of:

Infrastructure engineering manager in the company I work for: civil engineer, studies completed 1997. MBA 2003. That's it.

One example, and don't tell me it's an anomaly and a bad example

Like @RiaX said... are you seriously telling me this engineering manager did no training/upskilling/certifications since completing formal education in 2003? Do you think he would be "relevant" if he were to leave that company now and say, go for work at a Civil Eng firm in the UK for example?

 

[Barbarian Conan]

Stay away from IT, unless you want to constantly study and write exams to stay relevant.

Study, sometimes.
Exams? Nah.
Exams are there to prove that you know something, and mainly relevant if you want to do work for someone new, like getting a new job.

Take the cloud for example - It's new, you don't know anything, you learn some stuff (properly structured course if you want, or just reading the docs or doing tutorials) and then deliver a cloud based project. Why write an exam?

You can also easily just stagnate if you want and still earn a decent salary. Instead of driving progress you will then just react to the decisions the architects / principal devs decide on. Maybe do a linkedin learning course on the new JS framework when the architect says that's what we're using.

 

[Scary_Turtle]

Been working retail for 10 years and now looking to get into IT.. ..been told that cloud computing is an emerging career so decided to do Microsoft's azure az900 & az 104 which I have completed.
I guess what I wanna know is.. are these certs enough to get me a job on their own ? Do I need something like an A+ or N+ to consolidate my chances of finding a job ?

I think the problem will be that you can find a job but will be earning peanuts compared to your current salary. A+ and N+ earn like 10-15k and I wouldn't look at them on a cv.

In cyber security the az 900, 204 and 400 are normally a good to have requirement for certain jobs. I saw a job not too long ago that needed a CEH, 900, 204 and 400 with a year experience.

If you want to go the cybersecurity route my advice is get an oscp (pen-200) it's expensive and more difficult than most honors but it pays for itself over and over through your career.

Considering you are upskilling yourself and have some work experience I would over look other certs with the expectation you get them in the future. Keep applying and keep studying (it won't be a waste) until you land a job.