Hey Guys,
Well I've gotta say this past week has been probably one of the best of my life, read below for the short version
Back in July 2007 I was on vacation with my family at the ocean when I received a phone call from my work. I ignored it and let it go to voicemail. It was my supervising lead wanting me to call him back about an opportunity. I called him the next day and he said that our companies networking department needed help because they were short 1 guy because of a special project he was away doing. So I said sure why not. At that time I was a Desktop Tech doing mainly medium to large projects.
I worked with the networking department from the beginning of August 2007 to the middle of November 2007. In the beginning of November I started studying for the Network+ exam and passed on November 30th. Now there was someone else in my department who had their Network+ & CCNA certs. They allowed him to work in the networking department to see what he could do. Now while I was working with them everyone seemed to like the work I did and they were pressing for me to get hired. Well since no position was open or approved, I obviously couldn't get up there permanently. Well, in December they announced that a new position was approved and would be posted in the 1st quarter of 2008.
Now knowing very well that I had a good chance of getting the position it still did not guarantee anything because I had competition within my own Desktop group. So I set a goal to get my CCNA cert to even the playing field. After 2 months of intense studying which included a 2-1/2 week vacation that was used soley for preparation for the exam, I passed with flying colors, 1000/1000. The job was finally posted in March, and I just found out yesterday that I was offered the position. The pay increase was nice, but it was the fact that I have now broken out of desktop and into the networking field where I can now broaden my knowledge even further.
I've been working in IT for almost 3 years, mainly doing desktop work. Prior to that I had been trying to get into the IT field for about 5 years. I've always had family to feed and couldn't really break away from my good paying sales position to take an entry level IT job. I feel that these past 7 months I've sacrificed alot just to get to where I am today.
So for all you guys out there that think you'll never move up, make sure you have the right attitude and perseverance and gain those new skills you need to make the transition. I always felt like I would never do anything but desktop. But once the opportunity presented itself, I took the bull by the horns and forged ahead.
NEVER GIVE UP!
This too shall pass........
