Tech job market (Austin: student loan, school, college)

[scottcc]

The wife and i are thinking about just moving to austin in the fall from Iowa and living off savings for awhile as the long distance job search is stressful.

What i'm curious if anyone can tell me is how the tech job market is for people without degrees. This is my 21st year in the computer/IT/support field and i have a TON of on the job experience that covers GIS, networking, SQL etc.

Just curious if the austin job market is snobbish against people without degrees or if they actually look at your resume to see what you've accomplished?

[Aquitaine]

I don't think it's possible to generalize about this. My neighbor hasn't got a degree and has a great IT job. I run a tech company and don't (necessarily) care if you haven't got one. But that doesn't tell you much.

I think on the development side it would be easier - having a portfolio can be a substitute.

[scottcc]

that's actually what i wanted to hear. Some places i know if you don't have a degree you can forget working pretty much anywhere in the town. I'm sure there are some companies that toss the resume the second they see no college but i was hoping that wasn't the norm.

Are most of the IT jobs in austin contract jobs or are there quite a few 'permanent' positions? When I left minneapolis 15 years ago most of the jobs were going contract for hire, but the 'hire' part never seemed to happen.

[vlan1]

I'm a Sysadmin at a manufacturing company here.

I have a HS Diploma, half a dozen or so training classes and almost 9 years of experience.

There are some companies who are inflexible about not having a BS, but if you don't its all about how you are able to interview and convey the fact that you actually know what you are doing.

One of the reasons I got into IT was knowing I didn't NEED to have a 4 year degree and 60-100K in student loan debt when I could barely legally drink.

[scottcc]

Originally Posted by vlan1

One of the reasons I got into IT was knowing I didn't NEED to have a 4 year degree and 60-100K in student loan debt when I could barely legally drink.

exactly!

i'm 43 years old, back when i was going to go to school my major would have been computer programming and it would have been in cobol and fortran as that was all they taught then. They didn't have a computer science degree then. I've thought about going back now just for the paper but i really don't want that debt at this point in my life.

[vlan1]

Originally Posted by scottcc

exactly!

i'm 43 years old, back when i was going to go to school my major would have been computer programming and it would have been in cobol and fortran as that was all they taught then. They didn't have a computer science degree then. I've thought about going back now just for the paper but i really don't want that debt at this point in my life.

I have thought about it myself. But the cheapest places I have found for a 2 year AA degree are in the 16-18K range for tuition, not including books.

I find that a a hard pill to swallow when I could spend Half that in getting VMWare , CompTIA and Microsoft certs and make just as much money. And not have to deal with extraneous classes like biology and such.

[ImOnFiya]

Here is my Austin advice for tech workers:

1. A degree doesn't matter.
2. Your resume with bolded technical skills (operating programs, programming languages) mean everything.
3. Your resume with an Austin address, even if its a PO BOX.
4. Open availability for a phone interview.
5. To maximize salary negotiations, understanding what are the standard salary rates for your technical position.

There is a growing number of people from Iowa here. They have been very nice to meet so far: full and cornfed! Please tell us how things go with your search. Good luck!

[Austin97]

degree is mildly helpful, but more important is that you can demonstrate that you are good.

[scm53]

Originally Posted by Austin97

degree is mildly helpful, but more important is that you can demonstrate that you are good.

Exactly.

[tstwahine]

Hi there. We moved from Iowa to Austin a couple of years ago. My significant other works in tech (hardware/Electrical engineer). I'll be honest, he found it incredibly tough to get a job initially. He had worked for the U of Iowa for about 7 years and had a B.S. in EE and finished all his coursework for his MS but just needed to write his thesis and he sent out applications everywhere and all we got was crickets... as soon as he tackled his thesis and got the M.S. all of sudden he had tons of offers (nothing in his skill set had changed... he had worked for NASA previously for crying out loud) and suddenly there were bidding wars for him and we chose to move here over Nor. California (we did not want to live in silicon valley).

Granted he's in the hardware design area of E.E.

I think if any of the other posters have suggestions of which companies are open to hire without degrees you should follow that line of inquiry. I'm of the mind that having a degree is pretty bogus, but it just seems to tick certain boxes that some companies require. My s/o said that he didnt feel like his B.S. had adequately given him any leg up when he started working on the project for nasa and he just taught himself as he went along.

The poster about the P.O. box is a great idea... also... what about linkedin? Just throwing things out there

Good luck and go HAWKEYES!!