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InbetweenDreams · 10-01-2016, 04:38 AM

SilverBullet Wrote:O_O O_O SLUUUUUT!!

I didn't mention that I interviewed with these people twice.... I guess I did better the 2nd time Frog

lmao

...and no in reality nothing like that actually happened.

InbetweenDreams · 10-02-2016, 11:07 PM

[MENTION=19889]Radbot42[/MENTION] In all seriousness, do feel free to reach out to me with any questions or anything I can help out with...

10-02-2016, 11:15 PM

axle2152 Wrote:That is true, just depends. A lot of places like experience.

I got a CompTIA A+ years ago, it is good for some things, but probably won't help you get in a system admin position. Ironically I am a system admin and I do have an A+

What helped me get into my position was experience, demonstration of knowledge and knowing influential people. Now I'm making it sound like I was a shoe in, but I wasn't... took me 3 different times over a couple of years to get in.

So likewise you want to have all those things... education, experience, certifications and having friends in high places.

Trust me, I had that and an MCSA and I still couldn't get into IT when I had the interest in the area. But it is an employers market these days (at least for the UK) so most of the time they had so much choice. I had to get the lowest IT job I could find and then the company worked out after 2 months they needed to get rid of 2 IT personnel and that was me gone again.

InbetweenDreams · 10-02-2016, 11:40 PM

CorsacReborn Wrote:Trust me, I had that and an MCSA and I still couldn't get into IT when I had the interest in the area. But it is an employers market these days (at least for the UK) so most of the time they had so much choice. I had to get the lowest IT job I could find and then the company worked out after 2 months they needed to get rid of 2 IT personnel and that was me gone again.

That can be true, there are very competitive markets in some areas. The problem with the institutions I work for is the opposite, they have a hard time recruiting good employees, it's hard to find and many of the institutions can't offer a high enough salary. It just depends on the area, the area I live in it is a employee's market, assuming you do possess the required skills.

Interestingly enough sometimes NOT having the degree works in your favor because the employer can offer you less because of it while they figure you're probably just as good as the guy with the 4 year degree, even if it takes you a few months longer to be trained on something.

I do vouch of anything tied to government, may not always pay more but if you like having holidays off, sick leave, better benefits, etc they're not bad. I'm sure there are companies that offer better in some instances, but my experience some employers you're doing well to be treated fairly.

Radbot42 · 10-04-2016, 09:44 AM

Thanks for the tips and discussion on the field. I'm definitely going to look into it my next night off, and I might take you up on that offer axel

Radbot42 · 10-06-2016, 10:21 AM

Okay so after looking at a bunch of jobs in the field and what they do these 3 seem like the most likely I would enjoy doing:

Tech Support
IT Consultant
Software Tester

what would be the best way to get into these? Like certificates I should look for, or maybe even an associates degree. I'm not against taking a little extra time to get a good career. I think 2 years would be the longest I'd want to put in for education. Give or take a little if needed.

Again you guys are awesome for helping me out

InbetweenDreams · 10-06-2016, 11:55 AM

Well tech support might not require any background at all. A good example is this tax software company here. Unless you really like talking to cranky people about problems you might want to give that a second thought. People often are very ill when they call tech support. It doesn't matter what the tech support is for, whether it is for software, ISP, etc. Now having a technical background becomes required in many other cases, so I guess it really depends. We have a system office that help support our CMS, it does everything from payroll, records, transcripts, it is absolutely huge. So the system office have SME (Subject Matter Experts) so it becomes required to know a lot about technology, databases, etc. It is also government based which I recommend to a lot of people, pay is decent, benefits are great and you have retirement, etc.

IT Consultant for me it was like a jack of all trades, someone would often need to be versatile. I was self employed when I considered myself a consultant. You might be asked to do all sorts of odd jobs, it might be building servers, it might be a wiring closet or giving advice. You might also be trying to help solve a problem with their software, it might be something simple, or very difficult like mapping bank information to EFT. If you're targeting small business, probably not so complicated, but beware this is a saturated market, even around here and a lot of companies who have a long standing history will make it hard to get your foot in the door with customers and being self employed you have to be good at marketing, managing money, mentally stable lol -- I say that because it is tough in the beginning, not fun being broke and easy to get depressed.

Software tester is probably not bad, not sure how popular that position is. I would venture to say you would want a BS in Computer Science perhaps, but then you could do other things. The reason why you would want a BS is because it might not be what you think. It isn't just going through the program clicking things and seeing what happens. You're often testing the program with many different situations, different AV's, Operating Systems, low memory, lots of memory, different hardware configurations, etc to simulate a customer's computer. At least that's my assumption, probably a lot more. Might be good to know some programming language.

Don't be fooled that you can't do much with a 2 year degree...I have a 2 year degree and well I should have had a 4 year degree but I didn't always make good choices. My advice is get started at a 2 year college, if there's a chance you might want to do a 4 year college, do dual enrollment. Not sure about Michigan but down here in NC the community college system allows you to take most all of your liberal arts and get an Associates in your field of study. The next thing is just getting hands on experience. I got my hands on experience by helping out at a local computer shop, the shop later then hired me. Then I moved on to bigger and better things.

10-06-2016, 04:46 PM

I know for me, Music was my career predestined, but overtime, I grew into other fields, such as Veterinary Science and now Hospitality and Linguistics/Translation.

Also basically a "what the fuck" scenario lol. A Gay Bitch who can play Bach Concertos, Dissect and Treat both Reptilian and Avian species and can probably say all of that in about 8 languages, with a hospitable Smile.

All I can say is, is never limit yourself to what you can do or what you think you can't do, because life is literally a pond full of fish.

Many opportunities hunny.

Just never lay lax and idle.

Radbot42 · 10-26-2016, 01:38 PM

I officially have a meeting on Tuesday with an advisor at Baker about their IT Associates Degree. I'm excited and nervous all at the same time.

Is there anything I can do (free online) to get a general aspect about of what I'd be doing in the long term. Kinda like a free beginners trial, is this for your kinda thing? I've been thinking about maybe the engineering side of things for the past week now too btw.

InbetweenDreams · 10-26-2016, 02:55 PM

Radbot42 Wrote:I officially have a meeting on Tuesday with an advisor at Baker about their IT Associates Degree. I'm excited and nervous all at the same time.

Is there anything I can do (free online) to get a general aspect about of what I'd be doing in the long term. Kinda like a free beginners trial, is this for your kinda thing? I've been thinking about maybe the engineering side of things for the past week now too btw.

Ask them about dual enrollment. The reason is so that you can do two things. One you get your A.A.S in Information Technology (Usually will be an Associate in Applied Science) and do what is called college transfer, which will allow you to enter as a Junior in a 4 year college. It is more work but you will have two degrees and actually be halfway towards a BS.

The other thing is if you're not really sure about IT, take a couple classes and see how it goes that way you're not married to it and still earn credits.

I'm basically doing the same thing myself except I'm going to try to do a BS in Computer Science and there's a lot of math involved. You don't have to worry much about the math for the Associates however.

If you want to look at some online stuff. I looked at Professor Messer on YouTube, lots of good stuff on a lot of the popular certifications like A+, Network+, Microsoft Certs and so on. Pretty dry though. There's tons and tons of tutorials, but he's a good place to start and covers a lot of good material.