Career Advice

[psyquake]

Hi Guys,

So im looking for advice on where to go in my life. I studied the usual basic IT stuff (A+,N+, basic linux, windows server admin etc) about 4 years ago and have been working ever since.

The problem is, I have become sort of a jack of all trades. The usual techie. Get sent onsite and you need to know how to do pretty much everything, from server admin, to desktop support, to backups etc.

I dont want to sound ungrateful, as I know I am able to get a job relatively easy, but the amount of money you earn in this field is just terrible. You really have to work hard, and deal with many difficult people ( I know this comes with the territory), but the pay is shocking. It seems as though you will be lucky to earn 10k pm, and thats with 4 years exp.


I need to make a serious decision to either try and switch careers, or to carry on struggling. It seems the only way to make money in this industry is to either have your own company, or to specialize in a certain area, which also seems very hard, as company's don't seem to want to train you due to them wanting less people to be able to do the job with that level of expertise.


Please, if anyone has been in a similar situation as myself (in IT), and has any advice as to what I could possibly study further part time to make my situation better, or actually any advice relating to anything in my post, please comment!



PS : Sorry if this seems a little all over the place, I am suddenly in a bit of a flat panic about my future, It's not that I want to be incredibly loaded, I just don't want to get to 35 and still be earning pennies and struggle to survive.

 

[acidman1]

Are you thinking about moving into dev and is it purely the money that has you contemplating the change?

 

[psyquake]

To be honest, I know absolutely nothing about programming - this is more about money that is making me worry.

I recently returned from the UK, where the money was actually not so bad, even though I was in a pretty low end Support desk job (I took the first one I was offered as I needed money to stay in London).

So yeah, I have all of a sudden come to the realization that I am most likely going to struggle for the rest of my life if my situation doesn't change.

 

[TehStranger]

I'd suggest focusing on an aspect that you love and upskilling yourself in that area. Specialising will improve your value proposition, especially if you're got a broad range on knowledge to build on (as you seem to have).

A mate of mine was in your position three years ago and decided he loved Cisco networking. Did his CCNA and CCNP (think he's finished the "P" by now, will check) and got a job that allowed him to develop practical experience in the field. The money initially wasn't much better, but he has a solid career path in mind now with room for growth.

Good luck!

 

[OrbitalDawn]

I'd suggest focusing on an aspect that you love and upskilling yourself in that area. Specialising will improve your value proposition, especially if you're got a broad range on knowledge to build on (as you seem to have).

A mate of mine was in your position three years ago and decided he loved Cisco networking. Did his CCNA and CCNP (think he's finished the "P" by now, will check) and got a job that allowed him to develop practical experience in the field. The money initially wasn't much better, but he has a solid career path in mind now with room for growth.

Good luck!

This.

 

[syntax]

I'd suggest focusing on an aspect that you love and upskilling yourself in that area. Specialising will improve your value proposition, especially if you're got a broad range on knowledge to build on (as you seem to have).

A mate of mine was in your position three years ago and decided he loved Cisco networking. Did his CCNA and CCNP (think he's finished the "P" by now, will check) and got a job that allowed him to develop practical experience in the field. The money initially wasn't much better, but he has a solid career path in mind now with room for growth.

Good luck!

Have a look at this thread.

The cisco market is flooded unless you want to do voice. In which case, the market is pretty wide open and the salaries are high.
From a networking perspective, it couldnt be more saturated

 

[TehStranger]

Have a look at this thread.

The cisco market is flooded unless you want to do voice. In which case, the market is pretty wide open and the salaries are high.
From a networking perspective, it couldnt be more saturated

Thanks for the info. Cisco was just an example of what my mate is doing, there are other routes OP can take.

 

[psyquake]

Have a look at this thread.

The cisco market is flooded unless you want to do voice. In which case, the market is pretty wide open and the salaries are high.
From a networking perspective, it couldnt be more saturated

Yeah thanks for the info, if its completely saturated I wont even bother looking into it tbh.

I could be wrong here, but one I would assume the "next big thing" to go into in IT would be cloud computing. Again though, It seems as though it would be a vicious circle of trying to get someone to train you on how to get into it. I have installed basic VM's and done the usual server admin on them, but never been allowed to get into the nitty gritty of it.


Out of curiosity, has any1 got any experience in cloud services, or how to get your foot into the door in that industry?

 

[Jet-Fighter7700]

Yeah thanks for the info, if its completely saturated I wont even bother looking into it tbh.

I could be wrong here, but one I would assume the "next big thing" to go into in IT would be cloud computing. Again though, It seems as though it would be a vicious circle of trying to get someone to train you on how to get into it. I have installed basic VM's and done the usual server admin on them, but never been allowed to get into the nitty gritty of it.


Out of curiosity, has any1 got any experience in cloud services, or how to get your foot into the door in that industry?

Im the same as op, also did very similar to him, also same boat,

Just been offered a job that offer google cloud service level1 and 2 something called gsa 1and 2 and ubuntu training,

Worth anything? Salary wise better but not a lot, and 1 year contract not even sure if renawable, company is a big google partner in sa.

Should i go for this?,