How do you list lab experience on resume?

Guys,
I have a lab. It consists of about 11 servers running various OS's and applications.
How do I list the things that I do in a lab on my resume.
To get an idea of what I have I am posting a few links.

http://blacksintechnology.wordpress.com/2008/11/04/whats-in-my-lab/

http://blacksintechnology.wordpress.com/2008/11/15/whats-in-my-lab-part-ii/

http://blacksintechnology.wordpress.com/2008/10/19/lab-photos/

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Comments

bighornsheep

I think this has been talked about quite abit already. Home lab experience should not be counted as "experience", although your lab doesn't look like it's in a home environment, are those raised floor tiles?

Anyway, mentioning what you do with IT equipment at home can be hit and miss, certain managers will see that as a playful mentality towards work while others see it as good energy and enjoying what you do. In any case, lab experience be it for school or for home should not be mentioned verbally or in writing beyond a 2-3 liner. Anything more, it will just come off as you don't have any substantial experience with the tech, that's why you're playing around with it at home.

GT-Rob

Yeah I wouldn't count it as 'experience', but I wouldn't leave it off your resume (depending on how it looks so far).

I agree with Mr. Sheep though, leave it short and sweet if you do put it on.

remyforbes777

BigHorn:
Yes those are raised tiled floor. Me and a friend have been privileged enough to have a lab inside a datacenter. The datacenter is housed inside a business that my friends father owns. He is an accountant and he bought a building. Along with his business he has several other businesses housed in the same building. He rents space out to them and he has been generous enough to let us use some of the datacenter space. We also have a small office in the same building. I am also a Systems Administrator for a datacenter in Cincinnati so I try things in the lab that I can't do at my job and do some things that had already been set up at my job before I started. I am a Linux guy so I have gotten cacti, nagios, nedi and a syslog server implemented at the lab from scratch.

Mmartin_47

During interview I'm asked about projects I have done. I mention building my lab setup and other projects I've done such as having a PDC, DNS, DHCP, RRAS server, and Ghost imaging.

empc4000xl

remyforbes777 wrote:

BigHorn:
Yes those are raised tiled floor. Me and a friend have been privileged enough to have a lab inside a datacenter. The datacenter is housed inside a business that my friends father owns. He is an accountant and he bought a building. Along with his business he has several other businesses housed in the same building. He rents space out to them and he has been generous enough to let us use some of the datacenter space. We also have a small office in the same building. I am also a Systems Administrator for a datacenter in Cincinnati so I try things in the lab that I can't do at my job and do some things that had already been set up at my job before I started. I am a Linux guy so I have gotten cacti, nagios, nedi and a syslog server implemented at the lab from scratch.

Since you have that lab at a actual work place, you have a great conversation piece for a interview. I know its the resume that gets you called, but know you have something for later, so you can hit them with a 1-2 punch.

remyforbes777

Thanks guys for the info.

famosbrown

I didn't list it at all. My education and certifications got me the interview and my work in the lab was displayed during the interview. Whenever I answered a question or performed something in a hands-on interview test/session, the knowledge came from labbing. Before the third interview, which was followed by a job offer, I was asked if I'd left anything off of my resume that would indicate I've actually done this type of work before. I said no...just home labs while studying and that I loved the work. The response I got was, "Impressive."

Sometimes it isn't whats on paper on behind your name, but what you can actually do...labbing will help with the "what you can do" aspect.

blargoe

How do you list lab experience on resume?

You don't. But in your case, I might consider listing your blog on your resume if you have an interests section or something similar. I usually would think that type of thing would detract from a resume, but I think in your case it could be a positive since it's technical, it demonstrates what you've been working on in the lab, and shows your passion for IT. Some might disagree with me.

jbaello

I don't think you should mention your home lab in your resume, you can mention that you are a very pro-active person and tell the hiring manager about your wonderful lab.

Kasor

If it is not a job, then you do not have the experience. Be real..

remyforbes777

Kasor wrote:

If it is not a job, then you do not have the experience. Be real..

What?
How so? So say I studied and got my CCIE using nothing but lab equipment. How is that not experience. Say I got my MCSE strictly from using a lab environment, how is that not experience? Or my RHCE for that matter?

royal

I consider lab work to be experience in a sense. For example, in our Chicago office, I deployed an entire UC lab which consists of Exchange 2003, Exchange 2007, Office Communications Server (including voice), Exchange Unified Messaging, etc... It's a lab, but its for work and demoing to clients. I consider this experience.

Since your lab is at the office in a sense, I'd give it a mention on the resume. I'd just say something like:
"Designed, Deployed, and Maintain an office lab environment which consists of the following technologies." Then just have a bulleted list of the most important technologies and just include an Etc. That way it won't take up too much room.

remyforbes777

royal wrote:

I consider lab work to be experience in a sense. For example, in our Chicago office, I deployed an entire UC lab which consists of Exchange 2003, Exchange 2007, Office Communications Server (including voice), Exchange Unified Messaging, etc... It's a lab, but its for work and demoing to clients. I consider this experience.

Since your lab is at the office in a sense, I'd give it a mention on the resume. I'd just say something like:
"Designed, Deployed, and Maintain an office lab environment which consists of the following technologies." Then just have a bulleted list of the most important technologies and just include an Etc. That way it won't take up too much room.

That sounds like a good idea. I appreciate the insight.

oo_snoopy

remyforbes777 wrote:

Kasor wrote:

If it is not a job, then you do not have the experience. Be real..

What?
How so? So say I studied and got my CCIE using nothing but lab equipment. How is that not experience. Say I got my MCSE strictly from using a lab environment, how is that not experience? Or my RHCE for that matter?

If you got your CCIE without ever working a job you're going to have a hard time finding work

I think it's definitively experience, but just a tab bit different than work experience. I think royal had the right idea about how to write it down.

Slowhand

I'm going to agree with royal and say that mentioning your lab experience in a realistic way on your resume can help you. Regardless of whether it was for production or for a lab-environment, having stepped through the process of deploying a server or other technology is a heck of a lot better than having just read about it. Go ahead and list what you've got, how proficient you are with the pieces of your lab, and remember one very important term for your future career plans: "proof-of-concept".