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Where to from here? (Career advice)
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Where to from here? (Career advice)

jeromezajeromeza Member
edited August 2015 in General

My time in IT (10 years) has been varied. I've always been the Swiss army knife (read: not the specialist) that company needed. Anything that needed doing I did and any fires that needed to be put out, well I became the fireman.

Anything from MS-DOS, Windows, Linux, DevOps, Firewalls, Networking, Virtualization, Email etc.

I've typically worked for either outsourced IT companies handling the SME market, 1 or 2 corporates (non IT related businesses) and dev houses.

Now i'm getting older and thinking of specializing. So I guess i'm here to ask for advice and see where I should slot in. I'm interested in Telecoms / internet driven platforms / virtualization and Linux. I don't see myself going further down the Windows path.

So far I've qualified as:

OSX 10.6 Apple Support Engineer (Mac OSX Support Essentials v10.6)
OSX 10.7 Apple Support Engineer (Mac OSX Support Essentials v10.7)
LPIC-1 (Linux Professional Institute)
NCLA (Novell Certified Linux Admin)
Comptia Linux+
DCTS (Novell Data Centre Technical Specialist)
Novell SUSE 11 Tech Specialist

My company have now indicated that they're willing to pay for studies. To this end i've gotten them to pay for RCHSA (starting Monday) and RHCE (next 6 months), as well as CCNA (no timeline set yet). I'm thinking I should also get a VMWare cert like VCP thrown in as these are all technologies I work with on a day to day basis.

I should mention i'm based in South Africa but that I hold British passport - so I would be able to work in Europe (in the future) - although I don't know the job market or what technologies / certs in demand.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Comments

  • vfusevfuse Member, Host Rep

    Just take the opportunity to study while working at your current job. If you really don't like your current job start looking for something else.

  • Hmmmm the job market is tough right now everywhere. No one is hiring really.

    I would suggest you milk your current employer for as many courses as you can.

    I would grab a few CISCO certs as well as a Juniper cert. Maybe a Microsoft cert as well.

    But if I was you I would focus on security. It's a huge growing market with potential.

    There is a lot of investment going on right now in security and lots of people are hiring.

    You may need to grab a CISSP certificate to get your foot in the door.

    Other certs you should focus on include CEH, CISM, and GIAC.

    I think if you focus on security it will pay off down the road. That's what I'm doing atm.

    Thanked by 2ehab doghouch
  • Your username @heartbleed sure matches your career :)

  • NyrNyr Community Contributor, Veteran

    @heartbleed said:
    Hmmmm the job market is tough right now everywhere. No one is hiring really.

    Not correct at all. Even here in Spain after the economical crisis there are plenty of business hiring qualified people. More than that: in IT many of them don't really want certificates or titles, at least they are not a requirement as long as you have real experience.

    Thanked by 1outime
  • http://www.reed.co.uk/jobs/it-telecoms

    heartbleed said: Hmmmm the job market is tough right now everywhere. No one is hiring really.

  • jhjh Member

    I would just scoop up a few of the useful qualifications they'll pay for, for now. There are plenty of jobs available. Consider moving to London.

  • @heartbleed said:
    Hmmmm the job market is tough right now everywhere. No one is hiring really.

    No.

  • pcanpcan Member

    This reminds me of http://www.readbookonline.net/readOnLine/17648/ (old british humor, still funny).

    Networking, security and database technologies are on the rising now, but there will be a lot of competition soon on those fields. The best way is to pick a technology you like and try to gain the most experience on it; this should ideally feed a positive loop. Don't put too much weight on certifications alone.

    By the way, there is nothing wrong on be the "Swiss army knife" of IT. This may be a good start for a career path geared toward acquiring a management position. If you have this goal, you need to develop soft skills.

  • Your EU passport - if with the ride to abode and NOT british overseas - plus your nearly native english (hopefully, if not from rural ZA) should make it easy to grab a job in EU if you are willing to move. I know people from Serbia with CCNA plus some local university education that now make like 50kEUR/yr+ (net, so like for basic network admin work 4KEUR+ per month).

  • jeromezajeromeza Member
    edited August 2015

    @William said:
    Your EU passport - if with the ride to abode and NOT british overseas - plus your nearly native english (hopefully, if not from rural ZA) should make it easy to grab a job in EU if you are willing to move. I know people from Serbia with CCNA plus some local university education that now make like 50kEUR/yr+ (net, so like for basic network admin work 4KEUR+ per month).

    Hi,

    Yes I have right to abode. My passport is a normal UK passport. My father is English and my mother South African so I'm a dual citizen with 2 passports (SA and UK). I'm a native english speaker (although years at the keyboard have warped my spelling and grammar some!).

    So a good start for me would be RHCSA / RHCE / CCNA and VCP then?. That would give me a strong basis for EU employment?

  • So, lets hope that the UK will not exit the EU.

    You still need to learn the language of the country you go.

  • I married up to the next class bracket. Has worked well so far. I advise everyone to do the same!

    Thanked by 1heartbleed
  • Sure you could get a job as a lowly network admin but I would aim higher.

    Security is a growing field with huge boundaries for growth in the next 25+ years.

    If you focus on security it will pay off in the end. Your also looking at higher pay too.

    I would try and get your employer to pay for a CISSP certificate and onward you go.

    Trust me you will do better finacially and have better career prospects in security.

  • Which IT fields are based on experience? – also to have less risk to be exchanged by youngsters.

    Someone told me that some skript kiddie can always crash you on the security field but not in the safety field.

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