| Topic Name: |
Career switch in my late 30's, Imperative that I get it right! |
| Message Name: |
Career Change |
| Date Posted: |
01/27/2000 |
| In Reply To: |
Hi john,
I admire the fact you had the courage to make a tough decision like that. The first thing I would do is try and get out of help desk and into network support (learning to configure routers, cabling, etc). You will deal with software (IP/IPX IOS typically). The problem with help desk is that you typically log tickets for the tech that actually does the work(that's how its percieved anyway). Get yourself familiar with Cisco. Companies want good Cisco people. Look at what's hot for contractors and learn that area. That's a great way of identifying where companies are lacking expertise. You think they like paying contractors 200 per hour to configure routers? Trust me, my client wants me to find people like this so they can get rid of the contractors. |
| Message: |
Hi Jonathan,
Bill's advice is right on the money - for the next couple of years. But then what?
Technology changes so fast - especially hardware - that you will find a point at which you won't keep up. Note that I said "won't" not "can't". At some point you want to concentrate on your family life and not struggle in the evenings and weekends getting up to speed with "Java" or "Kafene" or whatever comes next. "After all - you've paid your dues, havn't you? Didn't you set up the world's largest umpety-ump for GJE or IBP back in 'ought two?" Everybody remembers what you did then, don't they?
Meanwhile - at a time when you're deeply involved in getting your kid into the right college, or going through a divorce, or wrestling with your Wife's breast cancer - some little nerd right out of school with no social life will be eating your lunch on the job, devoting all his (empty) free time to studying "Kafene". He becomes a real resource to your boss, right under your nose!
At forty you're no kid! Sooner or later, whoever pays your salary will notice that "the new kid" is a lot better/quicker than you - and a whole lot cheaper! Then you, the fading techie hotshot, will be out, and the boss will reward the kid with your job. Especially since you really havn't done a whole lot of hands-on with the new-new-newest network equipment, which came in a few months ago, because you've been busy with your own life (for a change!).
Trust me - you'll be out on the street, generally at a time when jobs are scarce.
How do I know? I've been a working techie since 1956. It's happened to me several times; I've seen it time and time again.
Jonathan - take a job where your soon to be grey hair is respected, not snickered over. Where? Somewhere in "management" - even at the lowest supervisory levels, to begin with. Take a pay cut, if necessary. Because the Money guys on the Board of Directors always feel more comfortable with people nearer their own age - like you - managing the kids with the latest techie smarts. You can take that to the bank. "Dot-Com's" run by twenty year olds wearing their hats on backwards will be gobbled up by GE or Computer Associates et al at the next market slump. To prosper, you need to jump into a Supervisory position where you are doing more administration (shudder! Retch!) than tech. Somebody reliable has to validate people's time cards, purchase new equipment, check out new sites for stores, etc. Somebody trustworthy.
Once your in, you've got to politic your way up. Learn to talk some "Boardspeak" and the current MBA buzzwords even if you don't have the MBA degree. The guys with the money will be delighted to have somebody who sort of looks like them, dresses like them, and knows who the Beatles were, dealing with the kids doing the work.
Beware! The next generation of equipment will see "Helpdesk" become an automatic function, and those vaunted network "designs" - which are really just cookbook configurations with little real human skill involved. Companies simply won't continue to pay the bucks they are paying now to have guys essentially do the same work - out of the CISCO manuals - over and over. Somehow, some day soon, you are going to have computers and networks that set themselves up automatically, right out of the box.
Trust me - I started out designing vacuum tube equipment in the 'fifties, busted my head learning Boolean Algebra and programming in the 'sixties, new product development in the 'seventies, "Big Eight" consulting in the 'eighties, independent consultant in the 'nineties. I've gone through the entire cycle again and again.
Jonathan - you'll never be this young again!Get thee into "management", and prosper!
Doug
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