Can you help me find my path in life/career?

Hi,

I thought this would be a good place to seek out information on what it is I truly want out of my career.

Since day one I've been looking for avenues within the vast world of I.T that allows for its employee to work from the comfort of their home. I was first taught that network engineers can potentially have this luxury. So I took the Cisco CCNA and passed, easily I might add with just a couple of books and software labs in a matter of two months. Following that, I worked several I.T jobs trying to work my way into the title of "network engineer" and hopefully be able to remote in and work from home. Unfortunately, all that effort was for nothing because little did I know you had to have friends on the inside to achieve such a title/job (at least here in Los Angeles). I was stuck writing excel spreadsheets and doing office clerical work as well as random I.T tasks as they popped up for various companies. All while dealing with condescending people and a socially awkward supervisor for a low $20/hr and not even the full 40 hours a week.

It was a failed attempt at my goal.

I'm back at square one and now considering studying cyber-security. I've been reading that programmers get to work from home frequently writing code. However, I'm new to this platform of knowledge and wanted some insight from other people that might be working in cyber-security or programming currently. Or maybe you have information that might be able to point me in the right direction for someone who is intelligent and can self-teach himself anything.

You might wonder why I wish to work from home so much, and the answer is simple. I don't like the repetitious monotony of walking into the office and dealing with the same people day in and day out. I want independence and time as much as possible while still making the money I need to live a sustainable life. It sounds far fetched, but I know I'll never live a happy life working normally as others do. Slamming breakfast down my throat, to go sit in traffic for an hour, to go sit in a cubicle around a bunch of idiots who talk about reality TV and sports.

Anyways....

If anyone has any knowledge or information to pass onto me I'd greatly appreciate it.

-Pheonyx

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Comments

TheFORCE

Ok I'll take a crack at this.

So you want to work from home by remoting into your office computer of which you don't even want to turn on while at the same time get paid gazillion of money without paying your dues like the rest of the people and in the mean time bash the people who currently do go into the office, some even travel 1-2 hours. Well, I'm extremely sorry you cant do such a thing.

People work year after year advancing their skills to be able to do what you want to do. Some paths, work environments and cultural norms are set and don't change easily. Work yout way up the ladder and one day you might be lucky enough to work from home

You can always learn programming or networking or DevOps but that doesn't guarantee you remote work.

markulous

How long were you at that position? You have to work up to that job and it can take a handful of years and you may have to bounce to several different companies.

I don't know you, so take what I say with a grain of salt, but it kind of sounds like you're a bit jaded with people in general which can cause a bit of an issue getting to where you want to go.

NetworkNewb

Yeaaaaa the reason you didn't get that first network engineer position wasn't because of you didn't have friends on the inside. It was because you didn't have the necessary experience, and you thought getting a single certification magically made up for that. It doesn't...

And now it sounds like you have read an article that said "cyber-security" is hot now and want to jump from trying to be network engineer to that. Again you don't have the experience though...

Also, working from home by yourself everyday sounds a lot more repetitious and boring then going into the office and actually talking with people. Unless you don't plan on actually working that much at home.

636-555-3226

If you're into security then given your state of mind I might recommend consulting re: pentesting or forensics.

That said, pretty much any consulting gig would be good for you since at least by me most consulting firms don't maintain a strong "office" presence other than administrative staff and even then only when necessary.

Other areas that are bumpin' by me include SharePoint and O365/Exchange Online admin. And by bumpin' I mean BUMPIN'

scaredoftests

Are you married? I am just curious since my husband works from home (going on 12 or more years). He is a high level systems engineer (pre and post sales). Sure, it is nice to work from home, but it will get to you after awhile. You do have to have contact with people. I can tell sometimes when he needs to get out 'in the world' and get out of his sweats. LOL My husband goes on support trips (day mostly to NYC) or has to fly to the main office (Mountain View). That helps with the human contact (besides yours truly, the dogs and our son). So, be careful what you wish for and you do have to deal with your co-workers. Also, make yourself useful or they forget about you, then bam, first person to be let go. Just my 2 cents.

Pheonyx

Thank you all for the information.

SoCalGuy858

NetworkNewb wrote: »

Also, working from home by yourself everyday sounds a lot more repetitious and boring then going into the office and actually talking with people. Unless you don't plan on actually working that much at home.

Very much this.

I work from home (same job, same company that I was in an office doing 6 months ago), and while it's got it's perks, it's still certainly monotonous and - as an "extrovert" - quite boring... more often than not. On the plus side, I'm not constantly bombarded by coworkers still asking for things relating to my past job (systems administrator), and the worst traffic jams I have to deal with are a sleeping cat and dog in the hallway.

YMMV though.

UnixGuy

OP I understand you completely...here's my thoughts...

First you need to build serious skills: this is a combination of high level certifications (think CCIE, not CCNA) and YEARS of experience.

If you want to accelerate this process, try to get a job with service provider or a business partner (like a cisco partner) where you get to support multiple customer bases, this way you can build experience. This way you will have something to offer. Right now you don't have the skills to get paid enough, and certainly don't have skills that can afford you the freedom you want.

[ I doesn't have to be cyber security, you can do that with system engineering work or network engineering.....get yourself a CCNP and fight to get a job doing actual network engineering, then your options will increase exponentially].

Also, don't listen to people! Yes you can get a work from home gig doing something like service desk, but I sense that that's not what you want (doesn't pay well). So work your way up, get serious skills (work hard, study hard), build your skills and then you will have a lot more options to choose from work-wise.

Sure having friends will help you get some interviews but trust me for technical jobs it's 99% what you know.....

and I hear you, I'm not a fan of office chatter, and I'm extremely extrovert...I do most of my socialising after work...

NOC-Ninja

I was first taught that network engineers can potentially have this luxury.

Can you explain to me what luxury?

Unfortunately, all that effort was for nothing because little did I know you had to have friends on the inside to achieve such a title/job (at least here in Los Angeles).

This is somewhat true but if you have the right qualifications then you will get hired. I have a lot of offers from LA when I was looking for a job. I actually had an 6 digit offer from a major hospital there. They had a chance to hook up their friends but they wanted me.

I was stuck writing excel spreadsheets and doing office clerical work as well as random I.T tasks as they popped up for various companies. All while dealing with condescending people and a socially awkward supervisor for a low $20/hr and not even the full 40 hours a week.

It seems to me that you dont have an full time and a networking job.First, you cant be picky with jobs (like working in a cubicle) if you dont have any experience in networking. You'll be surprise how many great network engineers/architects work in a cube. Also, the engineers that telework usually have years of exprience. It means they have proved themselves. I had an offer to telework. That offer only popped up after getting my CCIE and I refuse to be stuck at home.How do you expect to get hired in cyber security without any networking experience? You probably have to hack the company and show them that you have skills to break into their system to get eyes on you. Although, they will sue you for that.

1. You need to find a networking job.
2. It will take years to prove yourself.
3. Learn security while working. Get IT sec certs.

k31453

Pheonyx wrote: »

Slamming breakfast down my throat, to go sit in traffic for an hour, to go sit in a cubicle around a bunch of idiots who talk about reality TV and sports.

Its called Life mate you should try sometimes..

si20

Pheonyx wrote: »

but I know I'll never live a happy life working normally as others do. Slamming breakfast down my throat, to go sit in traffic for an hour, to go sit in a cubicle around a bunch of idiots who talk about reality TV and sports.
-Pheonyx

I think you've probably phrased the point a bit wrong which is why a few people have been a bit offended, but I see what you mean. You're basically describing my job. I wake up at 7:30am, spend 5 mins rushing breakfast before I rush upstairs, do teeth, get ready and out the door I go. I drive a minimum of 1 hour to get to work and then i'm surrounded by people with "mixed abilities" shall we say.

The problem is - most, if not all IT jobs are like this. Working from home would be fantastic but if there's nothing to do, you'll find you end up browsing youtube and in the long-term, you'll develop bad habits. I'm all for home working, you're right, it saves you masses of time, but IT jobs aren't always work from home because you know that server that needs fixing in the basement of your workplace? The one you can't remote to? That you need to plug your laptop in via a cable - yeah, that's not going to work from home.

I'm in the process of deciding whether I want to stay in IT long-term. IT was a hobby for me, but i've worked in IT for seven years now and it's no longer a hobby. I suggest you have a good, long thing about what you want because I think what you want and what I want in IT doesn't exist at this moment.