The worthless feeling at work

fifrasco

Has anyone ever felt that feeling when you're new to a network job and couldn't resolve a problem which seems so simple to others who have a ton of experience in the field? That's been happening to me lately. I'm coming from an advance help desk position and starting a network eng job. It seems like projects\work isn't delegated to me. I'm just proactive and find things I can help with it.

I just hate the feeling when I feel so dumb when someone else just resolves the problem so quickly. Makes me feel so worthless but I know with experience I will get the hang of things and better my skills. Just new to the position.

Just curious if anyone else has felt the same when starting a new role and how they dealt with it.

AB.Calculus

You shouldn't be, because you're new to the networking side. One thing for sure is to lab aggressively, possibly with real equipment, which I hear it's strongly recommended here in TE. The knowledge will come out of nowhere when you do this.

networker050184

Ask questions. Get involved. Put yourself out there. Unless you lied on your resume/in your interview everyone there knows your knowledge level so don't worry about looking stupid. Worse thing you can do is sit on the side scared and not learn. Everyone has felt inferior at some point in their career.

bermovick

Absolutely. It really just takes time to get used to the new job. Even if you know the concepts it takes some time as each network is different and has its own quirks.

gorebrush

Agreed - when I started my role I got lumbered primarily with low priority easy tickets. Didn't take long to get my teeth into more difficult things - just takes time and experience. I've been told in my review by a number of people now that I am the "go to" telecoms guy. My shift partner has been here for 9 years, so I take that to mean that I'm doing more than OK.

Plantwiz

networker050184 wrote: »

Ask questions. Get involved. Put yourself out there. Unless you lied on your resume/in your interview everyone there knows your knowledge level so don't worry about looking stupid. Worse thing you can do is sit on the side scared and not learn. Everyone has felt inferior at some point in their career.

Agreed!

The only thing I will add is that while the resume may not have a lie on it, however, any certifications that are listed, are those based on experience? Or from merely reading a text and maybe some lab work? This may be where you are sensing a loss of connection.


I would expect a new employee (who was hired with some background) would be able to ask the type of questions that help clarify how their network is setup and managed.

Did they hire you because you had experience? Or were you hired to be groomed for the position?

Sounds like you may simply need more time.

ande0255

I started a similar thread last December 2 weeks after I started my current job:

http://www.techexams.net/forums/jobs-degrees/95820-feel-over-my-head-my-msp-job-really-need-some-good-resources-tap-into.html

No real experience aside from what I retained from my CCNA (no relevance in real world tshooting), felt like I was more of a burden than anything, and 6 months after my hire date this Sunday I have much more experienced people coming to me for assistance.

If you read my OP in that thread, I had just no idea, but I put myself in the line of fire and out of my comfort zone every chance I got. Just take every challenge head on, don't sweat it, like Networker's signature says - An expert is a person that has made every mistake that can possibly be made.

Trust me when I say, if a problem comes up you have no idea how to even begin troubleshooting it, begin troubleshooting it immediately and don't stop until you resolve the issue.

^ I forgot I called RouteMyPacket mom in that thread, bwahaha, I was so young

Doyen

ande0255 wrote: »

I started a similar thread last December 2 weeks after I started my current job:
http://www.techexams.net/forums/jobs-degrees/95820-feel-over-my-head-my-msp-job-really-need-some-good-resources-tap-into.html

That was a great read ande0255 and quite motivational. Now that is been over 5 months, do you feel your position has changed about yourself now that experienced people are coming to you? Have you had the opportunity to see others pop in as when you first started yet?

fifrasco

ande0255, that was a good reading and glad I'm not the only one that has felt like this before. I definitely didn't lie on my resume and they are aware on my level of experience. Its just no one ever wants to feel dumb, but we all start from somewhere right. Right now every time I'm task with something I always ask questions when I'm unsure some certain things. I rather ask than screw things up on a live production network. I also always go home that day and just search the commands I used and really find the reason it was used.

When you guys lab for practice, do you make up scenarios or do get scenarios from somewhere.

gorebrush

I like to make up my own scenarios where possible, but GNS3vault is a good source of scenarios specifically for Cisco labbing.

For things like MS labbing I can make up my own scenarios given that I've been using all those technologies for a very long time, and I'm an MCSE of 8 years now. (wow)

Although, I always like to look for scenarios written by other people as they may include left-field ideas that I may not have even considered, or even knew existed.

Expand your horizons.

petedude

Feeling less useful isn't just a thing of newer IT folks.

Once you've been in IT a while, you can walk into situations where you might see things differently than other staff or worse, not nail things quickly enough for some people given circumstances at the moment. Maybe you're overworked, stressed, or just haven't dealt with certain technical issues for a while and something gets past you.

All you can do is keep on keeping on. . .

xnx

ande0255 wrote: »

I started a similar thread last December 2 weeks after I started my current job:

http://www.techexams.net/forums/jobs-degrees/95820-feel-over-my-head-my-msp-job-really-need-some-good-resources-tap-into.html

No real experience aside from what I retained from my CCNA (no relevance in real world tshooting), felt like I was more of a burden than anything, and 6 months after my hire date this Sunday I have much more experienced people coming to me for assistance.

If you read my OP in that thread, I had just no idea, but I put myself in the line of fire and out of my comfort zone every chance I got. Just take every challenge head on, don't sweat it, like Networker's signature says - An expert is a person that has made every mistake that can possibly be made.

Trust me when I say, if a problem comes up you have no idea how to even begin troubleshooting it, begin troubleshooting it immediately and don't stop until you resolve the issue.

^ I forgot I called RouteMyPacket mom in that thread, bwahaha, I was so young

I think work might have taught you some respect!

ande0255

The people who have joined my UC team since I have started have both been pretty familiar with Unified Comm, and one of them is very good with ASA's and Route/Switch as well, they are really both a pleasure to work with and learn from.

Like I had told someone else, I would email myself the description of the tickets in my name along with any pertinent output from debugs or running configs, and find videos on youtube that explained the technologies after work and play with configs in a home lab to make it by.

The one vet who sort of knows everything doesn't hardly ask anyone questions, he is extremely sharp, however all the other people in my team will ask me for assistance with all the different voice / security / r&s issues they come across. However I hit them up for help too, that's definitely a two way street, but we have all helped eachother grow a lot as professionals in the last 3-6 months.

no!all!

I have definitely felt the same way when starting any new job. I've been doing desktop support for almost two years at my current job. Looking back when I first started I didn't know much but now I can take whatever the help desk throws at me. Give it some time and before you know it you'll probably be the "go to" guy

Snow.bros

I have had those kind of thoughts as well in fact I still do some of the time but not often as when I was starting. I can definitely see a bit of improvement now, it just goes to show that nothing happens overnight and that with patience you will go a long way.

daviddws

The other wierd senario is when you were the star performer at a previous job, but now you are the bottom feeder. This happened to me, and it was quite surreal. I was back at square one, and no one had any problems communicating that to me. What I did was fight my way back up the food chain. It was hard, but if you have the grit you can do it, and I'm better for it. Saying that, I wouldn't want to go through it again!

dubzer

I've had the same scenario. You'll get used to it. Take it as a challenge and learning experience.

certoi

Its hard not knowing, but thats where learning and practicing comes in.We are all humans and we all had to start some where.New technologies come out every day and we all have to learn new software and methodologies.This is apart of the IT world.