To Jump or Not To Jump

Hi guys, I have been reading all your posts for months and your insights helped me a lot. Before I make my decision, I want to hear about what you guys think.

I started working as a helpdesk/tech support in a high school four years ago. After relocating to Toronto, I found a customer tech support job last year in a small company to get me started here.

Now my daily responsibility is answering emails and calls from customers. No hand-ons, no training, no raise and no spare time, because I am the only support guy in the company and supposed to cover all support requests. It only left me about an hour every day on average free beside sleeping, eating etc. Don't say I shouldn't accept this job at the first place. I was new in Toronto and I have almost no savings to depend on. Now a year later, I feel I am stuck.

With an hour maximum per day for preparation, I got A+, Network+ and MCP 70-270 in last few months and thought I am ready to move on. My job search is just sending resumes on job postings found online since I have no time for other means. In the last two months I got a few calls from job agents, but all turned out to be nothing. Some agents said I am qualified but they need me right away, which is not possible since I must give two week notice to my current employer. Some said another guy has filled the position when I followed up. I know I need more job leads.

Here is my questions:

Question 1. Should I quit my current job to focus on job searching?

I know you will say "one bird in hand is more than two birds in woods", but I am wasting my time everyday just to cover my bills. I feel if I visit all major job agents, do cold calls and cold visits, attend workshops and coops, it will be much quicker to land me a new job.

Question 2. Should I go for a higher level job?

Currently I have been looking for helpdesk or tech support jobs since I enjoyed (somehow) the experience when working in the high school, where the teachers and students are all very kind and friendly. I did not apply for a higher level job because my past experience only covers the workstation part. For system or network administration, I only have conceptual knowledge. A friend said I should go for higher level jobs, beef up my resume and tell the interviewer that I know the stuff. Although I am quite confident I can do a lot more if given a little extra hours, I am just not confident to claim to be an expert in those things I had no extensive handon experience.

Is jumping between jobs with boasted experience the way it meant to be?

Question 3. Should I get more certs before moving on?

I have started reading on MCSA and CCNA, hoping it will get me more calls. Again, with an hour a day orless, it will took me more months. And during this time, I have to stop job seeking, as an hour per day is all I have. Is certification so important to land a job?

These three questions can be combined into following possible solutions for my current situation:

a. Keep the current job and search for a helpdesk position with current certs
b. Get CCNA and/or MCSA before looking for a higher level job
c. Search for a higher level job now before getting more certs
d. Quit current job and do full time job searching and cert study. I guess I can look for both level of jobs.

I am pretty confident that I have strong skills in workstation support and good understanding of network, as well as learning capability, which can be evidenced by my cert score. I got A+ with 805/795, Network+ with 750, MCP 70-270 with 925. If I could get a junior system administrator job now, it would be more than perfect. But now, I am stuck.

What do you think guys?

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Comments

bighornsheep

YES! I have found another person on this forum from Toronto. Cheers mate!

help desk jobs,and tech. support arent fun, and pay isnt always justified when compared to the amount of work you are responsible for. You wont get recogniztion when things work, but you definitely get it in the face and everywhere else when things doesnt. But they are good for one thing, experience, experience, and experience. You just cant get more familiar with hardware, software any other way. As you have found out, such experience will in turn help you to get knowledge/qualifications on certification/training because you are just working with various problems everyday coming up with solutions.

Toronto Job market currently isnt the best, lots of graduates coming out of school, and lots of people trying to switch to a better job. If you have a job that you are not totally unhappy with, you shouldnt quit. You have to make a decision for yourself on whether you can afford a few weeks, or maybe even few months without a job to search for your new one (which is a job in itself), this will be a good time for you to pick up more training via certification.

In terms of CCNA/MCSA, well they're equally hard, but in your situation, you might not want to (nor have the time to) take 2 more exams to get MCSA. Perhaps CCNA will be more suitable, furthermore, it will be a chance for you to make that jump into network admin since there're just SOOO many MCSA/MCSE here in Canada.

keenon

i would say keep current gig and start looking aggressively..for a better one

bump

bighornsheep, thanks for the input. I think you are right in pointing toward CCNA. Most of the calls I received are for network support. And I feel CCNA might be easier to get than 70-290 and 291. For MCSA, I can use A+ and Network+ as one elective.

keenon, probably this is what I will do. But I got to figure out how to search agreesively

Well, keep posting and networking.

12thlevelwarrior

stay up two hours late every night. that will give you three hours study, job preparation time. do not quit your current job, look aggressively for another job. it could take months for a company to get back with you on a resume submission. i personally have been called in the past two weeks on resumes i submitted over 1.5 months ago. one was atleast 2 months ago. it will take time either way, use vacation days or sick days to go on interviews or job fairs. good luck man, it sounds like your heart is in the right place, it will work out.

binarysoul

If you leave your job, the first question employers will ask you is "Why did you leave your last job?" You can't tell them because you didn't like the job or because you wanted advancment. While they are valid reasons, the employer will assume you will leave them too. Leaving jobs periodically puts an 'unstable' spin on your resume.

How's the job market in Toronto in IT compared to other cities? I can tell you the west is the best, thanks to energy sector, but maybe not in IT.

You have to contineously study for certs and look for other jobs. It's possible if you quit you will get a job the next day, but it's also possible you will be without a job for a year. Do you have a degree or diploma? You may have to consider one as some employers will want 'formal education'.

Finally, are you fan of Maple Leaf or Senators

blargoe

Touching on one of your questions, you should never claim experience on your resume if you don't honestly have it.

I'm still trying to figure out how you can have exactly 1 hour and no more. Is your work, commute, and family responsibility 23 hours? The idea about losing a hour of sleep was a good suggestion.

If you took an hour a day starting from scratch studying for the CCNA with no network experience it would take you a very long time in my opinion. If you're more familiar with Microsoft, I think you should stick to microsoft.

uke

For the offers you had where they need you immediately, not allowing two weeks notice: if it's a better job for you and waiting two weeks will make you lose it, than just let your current employer know that you have to take this job *right now* and just quit. Don't short yourself out of getting a better job if you current company is unable to staff their help desk properly. That's their problem, not yours.

blargoe

Unless he needs to use them for a reference later.

uke

blargoe wrote:

Unless he needs to use them for a reference later.

I'd rather have a better job at the moment than have to worry about getting a reference from an older employer later. Just my opinion.

blargoe

For me, that would apply since I have many business references, but he might not have any other reliable business references to use.

bump

Thanks for all the inputs. I feel much better now. Just felt so frustrated. I will keep my current job, go for certs and search for jobs at the same time.

My brain just stop functioning if I do not have eight hours sleep a day. My boss is checking my work online everyday, I need to be very consistant in my work quality.

Here is how I spend my 24 hours. Maybe I am not alone.

7am get up
8am go to work
9am to 7pm office working hour
8pm home from work
9pm finish supper
10pm finish work at home
10pm to 11pm job searching online, study for certs
11pm go to bed

On weekends, just save the two hours in commute. As I am the only one doing tech support in company, there is no backup.

blargoe wrote:

If you took an hour a day starting from scratch studying for the CCNA with no network experience it would take you a very long time in my opinion. If you're more familiar with Microsoft, I think you should stick to microsoft.

A+, Network+ and 70-270 are still in my comfort zone. I had a lot of hand-on experience in the past, so skiming through the study materials is sufficient for the test prep. I feel CCNA and MCSA will take me much longer time to prepare. This is why I am looking for a helpdesk job. With less working hour, I can prepare for cert test faster.

uke

On weekends, just save the two hours in commute. As I am the only one doing tech support in company, there is no backup.

Not even on weekends? Screw that. Sounds like management is doing a shoddy job keeping their help desk adequately staffed, expecting you to pay the price. First job offer you get, even if immediate, take it. Don't let management's inability to do their job make your life suffer, sounds like they need a quick wake up call when you leave.

Danman32

Let me get this straight. You can barely make ends meet with a salary, so you want to go with having no salary for a while? That doesn't make sense dude.

Prospective jobs should honor the 2 week notice. That's just professional courtesy, and I believe it should be followed. You can try and cut it down to one week though. I requested that I be able to give 2 weeks notice from Jan 2 so I could keep the Christmas bonus and 1 week paid vacation, which we compromised that I would give 1 week notice on Jan 2. Turned out I could have given 2 week notice, as they weren't really ready for me here.
But if this company would have said no, I wouldn't have given up 20% increase in pay over a couple of thousand dollars in benefits.

uke

Danman32 wrote:

Let me get this straight. You can barely make ends meet with a salary, so you want to go with having no salary for a while? That doesn't make sense dude.

Prospective jobs should honor the 2 week notice. That's just professional courtesy, and I believe it should be followed. You can try and cut it down to one week though. I requested that I be able to give 2 weeks notice from Jan 2 so I could keep the Christmas bonus and 1 week paid vacation, which we compromised that I would give 1 week notice on Jan 2. Turned out I could have given 2 week notice, as they weren't really ready for me here.
But if this company would have said no, I wouldn't have given up 20% increase in pay over a couple of thousand dollars in benefits.

I don't think he was thinking about qutting outright, but rather quitting without 2 weeks notice if a *better* job needed him right away, as has happened to him in the past.

Danman32

Question 1. Should I quit my current job to focus on job searching?

I know you will say "one bird in hand is more than two birds in woods", but I am wasting my time everyday just to cover my bills. I feel if I visit all major job agents, do cold calls and cold visits, attend workshops and coops, it will be much quicker to land me a new job.

Not how I interpreted that.

uke

Oh, nevermind then :P

I say spam your resume on Monster.com/careerbuilder, etc. If you do get another one of those "immediate" jobs, then I'd say go ahead and quit based on when the better place needs you.

As far as quitting w/o a new job, if you're barely making ends meet, that's going to be tough. Do you have someone that can support you until you find a new job (parents maybe?)

SRTMCSE

7am get up
8am go to work
9am to 7pm office working hour
8pm home from work
9pm finish supper
10pm finish work at home
10pm to 11pm job searching online, study for certs
11pm go to bed

So you work from 9pm-7pm in the office, then work an additional hour at home???? Holy crap, first thing I would do would be drop that hour of work at home and tell them that you cannot do it, that's just unbelievable. Second, I'd make a large amount of noise regarding staff and get someone else, even p/t. Third, take some vacation, if you don't have a backup they need to realize that they need someone else. If they don't allow some time off and you're really working 7 days a week, 11 hours a day, there has to be some kind of law against that, bring that into play. These steps should at least improve your current conditions, but like everyone else, RUN get out of there ASAP!!

jetdynamics

For my opinion on different questions you got:

1. If you know you can handle your financial stability for the next 3 months you can quit but thats a big gamble. For job searching you can send your resume to a lot of different employer that would take you at least 30mins/day or you can surf on the web while at work looking for a new employer and when your at home then you got a ready resume to submit.

2. On job level everyone of us is aiming for a higher level, Its up to you to negotiate with the company whos gonna hire you. Try to write in a paper the Pro's and Con's if you got any offer be sure that you will always gain at the end

3.More certificate the better because you became more flexible more chances of getting your ideal job in IT. In the field of IT we need to be updated all the time so i suggest keep on studying you got nothing to loose on that.

Always put yourself before the company your working right now.

bump

On the long working hours, I am sure I am not alone, especially in small companies. Boss will not tell you to work longer outright, but they will let you know to put in more hours "voluntarily". I have a friend working in a famous big IT company works even longer than me.

Fortunately I have some flexibility while working. I can do job related searching on Internet in office, including coming here

During weekend I can put off the work for some hours, but I have to catch up with 24 hours.

Life is hard, when you have nobody to depend on.

keenon

bump wrote:

On the long working hours, I am sure I am not alone, especially in small companies. Boss will not tell you to work longer outright, but they will let you know to put in more hours "voluntarily". I have a friend working in a famous big IT company works even longer than me.

Fortunately I have some flexibility while working. I can do job related searching on Internet in office, including coming here

During weekend I can put off the work for some hours, but I have to catch up with 24 hours.

Life is hard, when you have nobody to depend on.

look for another job seriously if u need more money, to advance yourself or stop yapping about it..

we all have hard decisions to make just commit to something and do it..

i'm not trying to fuss but you have to decide what is more important now and in the long run.. its worse to look at an exit turn away from it only to come back years later beat down.. and not going under your own power

bump

Sorry to bring this old post up. I would like to thank everyone who responded to my post and shared your insights. I would also like to share my experience on job search and cheer people up. Never give up trying!

Two months after my first post, I received an email from a recruiter out of the blue. He came across my resume in Monster. It did not meet my salary expectation however I sent my resume me anyway since I was kind of desperate after four months of fruitless searching. I went to first interview next week then the 2nd interview a week later. I received the offer the next morning. I started with this new job in November. Interestingly I got interview from another company in the same week, and these two were the only interviews for matching positions I got in the four months of job searching.

This job turned out to be the exact type I need. I am now the only IT Support Technician in this 100-employee company with whole set of systems to support: Windows Network, Domain, Terminal Service, Lotus Notes, MS Dynamics, Nortel PBX. Since 50% of employee work remotely, I have a 50% split between on-site and remote support using Remote Desktop, PC Anywhere and Citrix. And I have plenty of hand-ons with desktops, laptops and printers in the headquarter where I am positioned. I am constantly getting more responsibilities when the IT Director finds out I am capable of doing more. I single-handed configured and replaced aging wireless APs in office, built a virtualized server to run legacy call accounting program and even planned and implemented blocking of IE7 in domain.

With the content of the job, now I found study of 70-290 and 291 is much easier. I am planning to get MCSA in the first half of this year.

So if you were stuck like I used to be, don't give up, keep searching. It will come.

Treg

Good luck.

pbradish

That's great to hear, thank you for the update. Congrats and Good Luck in the future with your MCSE!

plettner

I just read through this post. Bump - you are one hardcore dude. That old company sounded like they worked you into the ground.

Congratulations you got out of there!

Good luck with your certs!