IT - Career Guidance?

[ComixZone]

Hey CP gurus,

I finish SAIT's Network Tech. program in April, and was just wondering if anyone had any pointers going for me going forward. I'll be grabbing my CCNA shortly, as well as my A+ and a few Microsoft certifications.

What other skill sets should I be looking to grab before finishing the program (I'm doing very well, and have time for some night classes etc. to better build my cv) or shortly thereafter?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

[Envitro]

If you're serious about being a network guy I wouldn't even bother with A+. Stick with CCNA and then get a CCIE (way more lucrative and hard to get, but very sought after).

Getting Microsoft certs in a not a bad idea ever, just to get more breadth to your knowledge and skil lset

[Rathji]

A+ is highly over rated if you already have some other skills. A+ is the kind of thing you would need to be desktop support or a bench tech. Neither of which are what would be considered good positions to get into to take advantage of the bulk of the rest of your education. The only thing it might do is get you past a HR slug who doesn't know their disk from a hole in the wall.

[daredevil]

Good advice above.
If you're going to supplement with any complementary skills, I'd suggest going down the virtualization road, or maybe with some other semi related tech (BES or NetQos)

[psicodude]

In addition to what was already posted, I would suggest some basic networking security courses as well. Experience with things like firewalls and VPN will never hurt, and often get dumped on the network dude in smaller companies. I assume your course covered wireless extensively?

[ComixZone]

Originally Posted by psicodude

In addition to what was already posted, I would suggest some basic networking security courses as well. Experience with things like firewalls and VPN will never hurt, and often get dumped on the network dude in smaller companies. I assume your course covered wireless extensively?

I've got a CCNA Security class upcoming as well, and yeah, wireless has been covered (and wireless security). Also covered Windows Servers 2008 edition for various things (security being amongst them).

Thanks guys. So far, I've really enjoyed the CCNA aspects of my class, so I think I'll pursuing a wide breadth of CCNA certifications as I go along (aiming for my CCIE of course). Right now I'm pegged to have my CCNA and CCNA Security certifications by April, CCNA Wireless shortly thereafter.

alongside some Microsoft ones (haven't really looked into which ones I'll write - so if you guys have any recommendations, it'd be great) as well a Information Storage Management foundations certification.

[daredevil]

I little old, but I remembered this thread when I read this article (somewhat relevant):
http://images.globalknowledge.com/ww...Skills2011.pdf

[MickMcGeough]

This advice is probably 5 yrs old but I don't believe it's changed a whole lot. A lot of places don't view MS certs as worth much of anything, because of the number of tech courses out there that teach you how to pass MS certs, as opposed to teaching you the theory and material and passing the certs because you actually have some knowledge on the subject.

My advice for IT careers is the same for most any tech career:

If you want a high salary ceiling, find a high value niche you can be passionate about.
If you want to have fun at work - work at a startup.
If you want to be miserable, work in O&G or Real Estate.

[OldDutch]

Originally Posted by MickMcGeough

My advice for IT careers is the same for most any tech career:

If you want a high salary ceiling, find a high value niche you can be passionate about.
If you want to have fun at work - work at a startup.
If you want to be miserable, work in O&G or Real Estate.

Awesome. I worked for start ups for 5 years, then oil and gas for the last 5.

Loved start ups but it was very stressful. Be ready for late hours, and having to do a ton of things you never have done before. The boss probably told the client that you were an expert in something you never saw before. Also the money was garbage. Was it fun? Yes, in the fact it made me really good at what I did (App Dev).

Now I am a fat cat BA at a Gas company. Yes the pay is good, I work way less, but Mick is right it is super boring and frustrating. I miss those over worked under payed start up days a lot. I used to love the satisfaction of working at a startup.