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Originally Posted by Rudee
No guarantee you'll find work in IT here in Calgary. I know two people who have an IT background and they've been job hunting since early summer for suitable IT work. i.e. not low paying bottom rung tech support stuff.
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There's nothing wrong with that for someone who is just starting out a career. I know IT consultants who charge $200/hour who started out on help-desk. At my current company, a lot of systems analysts and even business analysts and developers started out at the help desk. It's also one of the most powerful ways to network if you're smart about it.
Doesn't your school help you with careers? Do they have a job board or anything? Having one or two field-related jobs on your resume before you get here will save your ass! Grab a couple of IT contractor jobs out of school or through their job system. Here in Calgary, a lot of the IT contracting companies actively post on school job boards because they have found students reliable in the past for rush/manpower jobs where expertise is not needed as much as energy and willingness to work for a short term (and low pay of course).
When I was in the middle of school I picked up a one day IT job from the school postings (show up at small O&G company, migrate a floor full of computers from their old domain to their new one, move network cables to new switch, eat pizza). This was literally my first paying IT job ever.
Having that single, one-day job on my resume let me B.S. errr... apply to another school job board posting and land a 1 weekend job with BP and they flew me out to a plant to decommission their systems (wipe computers, retrieve backups, pull systems, get Westjet vouchers for tons of food at airports).
I ended up working only about 15 hours (actually spent working, not including transit) total for both jobs combined but on my resume it looked like I had a whole IT career already as both an office and field guy and I hadn't even graduated yet which was a killer advantage when I started looking for real full-time work which I got 3 offers for a month before I even graduated. Then I worked service desk for 4 months before being given the opportunity to move into a systems or business analyst or developer role.
A lot of the time, IT companies or IT departments will put new grads into a help desk role in order to get you to learn the company. Because of that, I ended up talking on the phone to managers and VPs throughout the whole company every day and was on a first name basis with the CEO because I helped him a couple of times. Never underestimate the service desk role. It gets you in contact with people from every department, it teaches you the whole business, and gets you connections like you wouldn't believe if you know how to use it.
Doesn't hurt to write some certs before you leave home for a place with no guaranteed job though but the job experience of 1 or 2 small field related jobs on your resume is what will really make and save you in terms of having your resume picked out of a pile and to give you something to say regarding your experience in interviews.