Frustrated

davidoff

I have limited I.T experience because my companies are so smalls and not very supporting, I am trying to get a job as jr. System Administrator Windows, How can I prepare for this? How can I prepare properly, because it seems that I cannot passed the exam or the technical interview. Am i doing the right thing to apply as Jr. System administrator despite of lack of experience, I have been in I.T industry quite some time, but not really good companies, that is why i have lack of experience, I always self studying, but if I dont apply it in a regular basis, it seems that most of the time, I forgot it, Please help

iBrokeIT

Reading it on a piece of paper once is certainly one thing, actually implementing and using the technology is another. If you want to be an IT professional I strongly recommend you build a home lab. Get a couple of cheap servers and switch off of ebay, download trials of Windows Server and setup your lab. Build it, break it and do it all over again many times until you have it down. After that get your MCSA to see if you really learned it.

amcmillantt

Hi Davidoff,

Sorry to here about your woes. Memorizing command line switches, variables, etc., happens by a lot of repetition and experience (using Ubuntu Server, Debian or CentOS on a VM and installing various servers via labs). This is all well and good, however I take it you are a more visual learner.

You can using a technique known as mind mapping, it takes a little patience, but the rewards are endless. You can use this in every endeavour, including learning a new language. The software I use is called Xmind, there are various others, but this one is well spoken of online. I picked up a kindle book on the topic on Amazon under $10.00 and various videos on youtube helped a lot.

Basically it is using your way of thinking and mapping it on a...well....map. Take for instance your situation, you can start with a command and choose to map every switch in a hierarchy or any other logic diagram. When you see your thought process in arriving to an answer or memorization on a map it becomes extremely easy to study as you will see the image rather than trying hard to remember pure text on what you read. This has helped me greatly in my studies. I hope this helps.

xenodamus

I went about it by first finding a desktop support position in an organization that appeared to have room for growth and advancement (60+ IT personnel). I spent 1 year as a destkop tech, 1 year as desktop supervisor, and by year 3 I was on the systems/network team.

The alternative may be looking in a much smaller shop where you won't have the official title of sys admin, but you'll have the opportunity to do everything from desktop support to server/network stuff. It's all about getting your hands on the technology so you have something to put on your resume. You should definitely be labbing at home during all of this, as stated.

tprice5

davidoff wrote: »

I have limited I.T experience because my companies are so smalls and not very supporting, I am trying to get a job as jr. System Administrator Windows, How can I prepare for this? How can I prepare properly, because it seems that I cannot passed the exam or the technical interview. Am i doing the right thing to apply as Jr. System administrator despite of lack of experience, I have been in I.T industry quite some time, but not really good companies, that is why i have lack of experience, I always self studying, but if I dont apply it in a regular basis, it seems that most of the time, I forgot it, Please help

Based on the question you asked HERE, you are not ready to be a systems administrator. I am not sure what experience you are claiming to have, nor do I know what companies you have worked for, but I think you should really consider some formal education. Self study is not working for you. A lot of regular users have a better handle of how Windows operates than you do. Not trying to put you down, but you really need to take a step back and re-examine what your next step needs to be. Spoiler alert: it's not a systems admin job.

Nemowolf

tprice5 wrote: »

Based on the question you asked HERE, you are not ready to be a systems administrator. I am not sure what experience you are claiming to have, nor do I know what companies you have worked for, but I think you should really consider some formal education. Self study is not working for you. A lot of regular users have a better handle of how Windows operates than you do. Not trying to put you down, but you really need to take a step back and re-examine what your next step needs to be. Spoiler alert: it's not a systems admin job.

Okay, so i think this is some tough love and an honest answer to the issue at large. reviewing that other thread, i noticed one thing that i didn't know right off the bat with this thread. Your grammar needs work. In order to elicit help, especially in a written form, you need to work on understanding that we are not in your head when you write these questions and as such don't have the rest of the information that is swirling around to make cohesion to your questions.

I think what your looking for is someone to hold your hand and walk you through to a job title that you assume will give you a bigger paycheck. Your real problem as noted by tprice5 is that you really lack a solid foundation and understanding of what your doing.

"it seems that I cannot passed the exam or the technical interview" this will never get fixed by asking questions on a forum.

If your looking for a road map, lets start with education. Do you have any formal education? Associates, Bachelors, or Certificates? Knowledge and a breadth of education is going to be your foundation to excelling in the job market. You want to know why you fail interviews, because like any test if you don't pass they don't care about why. You failed. You need to develop the business acumen and inter-personal skills to grow as a professional so you CAN pass the interview. This goes back to your education.

If you are not with companies that put time and effort into growing you it is for two reasons, they either don't care/want/need to put money and resources into growing you OR you don't put any care/want/need to show them that they should. No company is going to just throw money away at training someone so they can turn around and leave as much as we ALL would love to see that happen. It isn't smart business on their part. Its like the common misconception that you deserve a raise but when asked why there isn't a valid business reason that can be used to justify your raise. Give them a reason to put resources into you and you will get the training and experience you deserve. As this with thread, they are not in business to walk you through the adventure that is your career.

We don't know you or your situation so in general the path we can recommend is limited. Go to school, get moving along in your education. Where you go and what you study is entirely up to you though. Get that foundation though!

davidoff

Thank you for your honest answers. I Finished Bachelor Of Science In Computing & Mathematics in University of Portsmouth, this is an Open University Environment, but before that I finished Multimedia, I am good at Web Designing and other multimedia activities. But I really want to be on I.T, because I can see, that it is much stable, And It is more fun to me, Anyhow, How can I build a lab?My only computers here at home is PC Desktop which has core 2 duo processor and 1 GB of ram, and the other one is my Laptop, which has the same processor as the desktop and has 4gb ram, So far, I can install and practice the windows server in my virtual machines, so should I continue that? Or should I purchase another machine to practice all the things that I should