where to begin?

plankowner361

Hello everyone, I am looking to change fields to the it tech world from my current job (walmart department manager) and I eventually want to be a network secturity analyst with for cloud based systems/networks. I am not in the tech field yet and I'll need to do this all from self study processes due to my time frame of work is constantly changing. if someone can give me a somewhat order to start on certificates. would be much appreciated of if you need any other information let me know I'll be happy to answer.
thank you for your time.

relegated

Do you have a college degree yet? On the certification side it may also depend on what you know already. You could start with the CompTIA A+, Network+ and Security+ to get the basics. Then if you want to focus on security/cloud then maybe start looking at AWS certifications. You may also want to start doing some moonlighting for people you know or a company that might need night/weekend help.

beads

That plan sounds both overly generic and too narrow at the same time. Can you tell what you think a security analyst in a cloud based environment do on a day to day basis? That will help us focus on the best preparation to your individual needs.

Outside of that I would seriously checkout any number of WGU threads dealing with security education and more importantly IT based education where security is nothing more than an overly broad focus of technologies and business acumen. You should still need some development, infrastructure and scripting/dba based education to learn where your interests and strengths really lie. You may find you have a real interest and the ability to develop some sophisticated code leading to a career, rather than just a job in DevOps rather than just a log monkey as you've indicated in your original post.

You may find troubleshooting networks and appliances to be your thing and go into networking and network engineering. Most successful security people I have meet over the years belong to this group.

Database people are a bit rare but generally go into the DevOps side of the house for even bigger money.

Just depends on what skills you bring to the table.

- b/eads