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So I came into my first I.T. job with a wide background....left with an even wider background combining multiple fields because the CEO is....mentally a bit unhinged. Hired me as a 1 man development/I.T. team for many users/offices(70-100+) for what should have been 2-3 people so 0 mentors to work with:
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Web development(front/back end including art and security)
Some PHP skills but want to switch to python
Back-end web server configuration(lamp stacks and Amazon cloud services)
Pro-level SEO -he wanted #1; I got him there,
Google analytic, web marketing, social media, etc.
Impressive E-commerce performance...
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Windows server administration and new server configuration; Active directory, WDS, etc.
Some office help desk
Networking, troubleshooting network issues.
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Vmware....tons of it. New servers, trouble shooting, configuration....
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PBX: 3 call centers.....few issues and most of my experience comes from troubleshooting my own test labs. I actually like this alot but It was a "if it ain't broke don't fix policy" so I can't claim any major acomplishments on my resume other than up time and strong knowledge of asterisk and Elastix. I also get nailed for having 0 cisco equipment experience...almost considering lying at this point.
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Surveillance and physical security: Boss is schizophrenic and paranoid....got obsessed with this and had me go pro at one point. I was a camera man prior to I.T. so nailed this one fairly easily. I feel it's limited in terms of career options compared to being a linux admin.
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Because I did all this in one year.....it's really hard to nail down one singular career path. I got hired elsewhere and they let our team off within a few weeks. I'm a jack of all trades/master of none.
I get besieged by recruiters asking me for front end development but I lack the months of java-script exp + a wider web development portfolio. On the backend side, I'm competent but lack scaling experience or troubleshooting bigger issues with multiple domains. My PHP needs work and I prefer to switch to python. VMware, I know well but most of those jobs require a 3-5 years to start; I'm considering getting a cert in this but lack the years of exp. Cloud services like AWS is all the rage....same problem with Vmware: they expect years of experience.
Web analyst and SEO? Pretty well qualified but it seems to skew towards marketing statistics than I.T./development.
Ecommerce Specialist: Need a few month web stores to the portfolio.
Surveillance: I get tons of interest and was even hired for a big name city project: lower pay, always outside, and less technical than I'd prefer.
I'd be perfect for a junior system administrator role dealing with web servers or something dealing with video streaming but those jobs aren't common I think near Chicago. Most of the less exp jobs skew towards help desk which I'm warned to avoid.
You might try to specialize in the technologies that are likely to grow and also those that are popular. For example, those technologies have lots of jobs now and will continue to have a decent number of jobs over the next few years. This is because there will be more jobs to choose from when you have this expertise.
For example, I had experience in a couple competing software tools. One of them was best-in-class and many large companies had that software. The other tool I had experience in was not as popular and it wasn't growing in market share. I chose to hone my job search for jobs with the more popular/best-in-class technology. Though there were positions available for the other (lesser, IMO) technology, I didn't want to stick with that because it would reduce my future career opportunities.
Based on your background, IT security is a growing field. I think you might do well by crafting your resume with the focus on security..such as putting those bullets near the top of the resume and explaining more about what you did in that area. Then pick your secondary specialty that you have..such as PHP, server config, etc. And search for security related jobs that also ask for that secondary technology. Lastly, find a 3rd sub-specialty that you want to grow in...and maybe your ideal job will have a little of that 3rd specialty. This way you can get some experience in that 3rd specialty as well, but would most likely get hired for the primary and secondary specialties.
Last edited by sware2cod; 01-26-2014 at 06:30 PM..
For example, I had experience in a couple competing software tools. One of them was best-in-class and many large companies had that software. But it wasn't used my smaller companies. The other tool I had experience in was not as popular and it wasn't growing in market share. I chose to hone my job search for jobs with the more popular/best-in-class technology. Though there were positions available for the other (lesser, IMO) technology, I didn't want to stick with that because it would reduce my future career opportunities.
Based on your background, IT security is a growing field. I think you might do well by crafting your resume with the focus on security..such as putting those bullets near the top of the resume and explaining more about what you did in that area. Then pick your secondary specialty that you have..such as PHP, server config, etc. And search for security related jobs that also ask for that secondary technology. Lastly, find a 3rd sub-specialty that you want to grow in...and maybe your ideal job will have a little of that 3rd specialty. This way you can get some experience in that 3rd specialty as well, but would most likely get hired for the primary and secondary specialties.
On the security side, I'd say I'm far from pro or dealt with anything impressive to design a resume around it. My boss at my last place placed such a low priority on it project wise.....
Part of the problem is figuring what to study to get my next paycheck; I could easily just cram java-script for a few months and get a web development role......or get a sysadmin role sooner and just focus on backend.
Another thing is; I'm getting gigs for web development on the side now. I can have a day job as a sysadmin and do web development on the side. The reverse clearly wouldn't work well if I ever want to jump fully into I.T.
Judging by recruiters, demand is stupidly high for front-end developers in Chicago....but while I can learn more PHP & python to benefit both web backend and sysadmin, I can't get the same utility out of java-script.
If you like and are good at programming, I'd go for that. Those jobs pay well and the demand is very high for those who are good at it. Don't worry too much about what language you go into because programming skills generally transfer. It takes a while to get good though and you need to learn design patterns, algorithms, etc. But a talented programmer who knows python should be able to start coding javascript in a couple weeks or vice versa. Not saying you'll be an expert on a new language in a couple weeks but that a good programmer can start writing some code in a new language very quickly. Tech changes very quickly so you'll need to learn fast and the best developers know many languages anyway. But realistically, this is not a job most people can be good at.
Server admin jobs are going to become harder to get in the future because a lot of these cloud companies will do it for you cheap. You have these hosted deployment services like Google app engine or Heroku and while they're expensive now, they'll get cheaper in the future. It's dirt easy to deploy and you don't have to buy any servers or manage them much.
Security is a booming field. But the top security jobs generally require that you can program. If you are a good developer it's easy to go into security. Take some cryptography classes if you want to go into the field now. Better yet, learn to program first and you'll just have more choices in general.
Help desk support is the tech equivalent of flipping burgers. Avoid at all cost.
The Certs are bloody expensive since they require a class($$$). My experience comes from using it every other day rather than something Impressive.
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