How to get past the minimum years of experience requirements?

Simple question. You find a job, you meet the education and certification requirements, match the skill set, but lack the years of experience. Common problem I would imagine, and I've seen it overcome. Does it depend on the company? For example, I was called by HR today for a role I applied for that requirement X credentials, with Y skill set, but requiring a number of years of experience I do not have, despite fulfilling X and Y. She mentioned that they do want someone with 5 years experience (but she knew I did not have that before calling), and I really doubt this gains any traction. I explained how my experience can make up for it, but whatever.

So, what do you do here? I'm not urgently looking or anything, but I know I will be within a year probably if not promoted at my current place of work. I still won't meet the 5 year mark at that time, so let's stir up a conversation now. I applied to another role tonight which my skill set aligns perfectly with the job description, but I don't expect it to go anywhere again. You can't fake time, but what can you do?

I want to get this out there - experience matters. Anyone that says otherwise is wrong. I've seen things happen that you do not read about in books, and you aren't going to realize happen until you experience it. Example - I configured and replaced 2 edge MPLS routers last year. First one went smooth. Second one did not. Could not figure out for the life of me what was wrong when the configuration was fine, but the circuit would not come up. Took multiple late nights, and multiple times reverting back to the old router. The reason was that the fiber signal was slightly degraded, and the new router did not like that but the old one did. No interface errors or anything on the old router, nothing that would make you think this could be the problem. Like, who honestly would expect that? We have multiple intermediate patch panels, and it was a cable between two of them that was causing the problem. So when I replaced the cable between the router and the patch panel it plugged in to, it did not fix the issue. We did not figure it out until we got someone out here with the appropriate equipment that could read the signal. That's a real life doozy right there lol, and only comes with experience.

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Comments

NetworkNewb

You apply to positions and hope the manager is willing to overlook the years for other qualities. Completely up to the manager's discretion on whether he is going be strict on it or not. Really not much else to it. Maybe they didn't get people applying for that position with the years exp they were asking for and they have to look at someone with less years of experience, or maybe the people that did apply didn't have other qualities they were looking for. Just gotta find the right situation. Just gotta apply to them to find out.

Favorite video on this topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6G3kQyqMFpQ

hurricane1091

NetworkNewb wrote: »

You apply to positions and hope the manager is willing to overlook the years for other qualities. Completely up to the manager's discretion on whether he is going be strict on it or not. Really not much else to it. Maybe they didn't get people applying for that position with the years exp they were asking for and they have to look at someone with less years of experience, or maybe the people that did apply didn't have other qualities they were looking for. Just gotta find the right situation. Just gotta apply to them to find out.

Favorite video on this topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6G3kQyqMFpQ

Excellent response, and kind of what I expected in this thread. Thank you.

tmtex

This is just like the "MUST have a Bachelors degree", just because they say that doesn't mean they aren't going to take a look/Interview

Lexluethar

Agreed it's just a tactic to ensure unqualified people don't apply. Most experience requirements are unrealistic and silly. I've seen 5 years experience required for desktop support and jobs that are less technical than the work I do now yet require more experience in said technology than I have in IT.

Take it with a grain of salt and if someone during the interview process asks I'd just replay honestly "sure I don't meet the exact requirement but the skillsets I have along with my drive and quality experience I've gained along the way I feel I meet the requirements, what I lack in experience I make up for in work ethic, drive and desire to grow."

devils_haircut

My current job wanted 5-7 years of experience, I had 2. I got the job.

You'll never know unless you apply.

Danielm7

Requirements are a wish list, but usually a general idea of what they are looking for. If I was close I'd ignore the years required and just go for it. Obviously, try to be realistic with it though. If someone lists a Sr Network Engineer for a large company with 8+ years required and you feel that your CCNP qualifies you, but you only have 6 months of experience, that's probably not going to work out.

hurricane1091

Good replies folks, basically what I had in my mind. I agree that it needs to be within reason. Daniel's example is something that will never work out if a person is in that situation.

TLeTourneau

On at large number of postings I've seen a degree counts towards years of experience. They often say something like 7 years of experience required, 5 years with X degree. So having a degree can be helpful that way.

pevangel

I'm starting a new job soon where I had to fight to get an interview. They were looking for 10-12 years of network engineering experience and I had 3.5 years. I kept telling HR that it was the quality of the experience and not always the quantity that mattered. But he kept arguing that the quantity matters a lot, and that they wouldn't be able to give me the salary I was asking for anyway because of my lack of experience. I asked him to at least get me a phone interview with one of their technical guys, and he said he'll try. A week later I was in front of a panel doing an in-person interview. A week after that they sent me an offer letter for exactly what I asked for.

Number of years of experience doesn't tell the whole story. Somebody doing the same thing over and over again for 10 years does not make a good engineer. You can never really tell how good a person is based on some arbitrary number. You have to look at the overall picture. What exactly did they do in their previous jobs? Were they network engineers who mostly configured and deployed networking gear, or were they network engineers who worked on multiple projects designing networking solutions?

Try to convince HR to get you in front of technical people if you're really confident that you have the skills to do the job.

hurricane1091

pevangel wrote: »

I'm starting a new job soon where I had to fight to get an interview. They were looking for 10-12 years of network engineering experience and I had 3.5 years. I kept telling HR that it was the quality of the experience and not always the quantity that mattered. But he kept arguing that the quantity matters a lot, and that they wouldn't be able to give me the salary I was asking for anyway because of my lack of experience. I asked him to at least get me a phone interview with one of their technical guys, and he said he'll try. A week later I was in front of a panel doing an in-person interview. A week after that they sent me an offer letter for exactly what I asked for.

Number of years of experience doesn't tell the whole story. Somebody doing the same thing over and over again for 10 years does not make a good engineer. You can never really tell how good a person is based on some arbitrary number. You have to look at the overall picture. What exactly did they do in their previous jobs? Were they network engineers who mostly configured and deployed networking gear, or were they network engineers who worked on multiple projects designing networking solutions?

Try to convince HR to get you in front of technical people if you're really confident that you have the skills to do the job.

Very good story! Similar to what I am going through as well.

EANx

Any set of qualifications are simply a way to quantify the quantifiable so don't be afraid to push if you think you're close to what the job would actually require. That said, I'd willing to be more flexible when I have a full crew then I am when one person left and took two people with him. Unfortunately, you really don't know which situation it is unless you're called in.

How do you get around it? Stress reliability and resilience. You don't need to have been in a war zone, with the "incoming" alarms going off while a Colonel yells in your ear to show you can operate under pressure but people with stories of operating under pressure get hired more often than those that don't.

hurricane1091

HR called and said manager is firm on the experience thing.

Honestly not worried at this point because the experiences keep piling up. I worked to consolidate switch stacks tonight to repurpose some of these switches needed elsewhere. Had a nice spreadsheet listing out the available ports, vlans configured, etc. Made config changes and headed to the IDFs. Was getting stack power error light on the master after removing the last switch from the stack. Had me all kinds of freaked out but a standalone/no standalone command fixed it. Appears to have been a bug.

skswitch

Job descriptions are what they hope to get not what they are going to get. Its more of a guideline. I say as long as you meet 50%+ or more, apply. Worse they can say is no.

Think about it. If you already can do everything they want, wouldn't you be bored?

hurricane1091

I honestly am better off just asking for a promotion. I started 20 months ago as an entry level network engineer with no experience, and got my BS, a few certs (CCDA and CCNP notably) while here, and am working on the CCIE. I was working with the switch stacks today in the middle of the day today, and was a bit nervous adding switches to existing and operating stacks lol. Freaking taking off stack cables from a live stack to add another switch, straight up have never done something like that. I know I need more experiences to keep feeling comfortable, so I should stay where I am. It just sucks because I want more money and could probably do so if I went for more of a middle-tier role (even though if you want to be technical, I'm already in a middle-upper tier role), but I get the best experience in the world where I am. My boss told me today "It's really cool to see you becoming a senior network engineer" which to me hints that it is coming or I need to ask for it.