Yet another career path question

Hi all. I'm now 31 years of age, did a six year stint in the security police field in the Air Force, and finally got my BS in Information Technology and Administrative Management last August. I am currently doing a technical support job for a debt collection software company (which I know probably isn't doing me much good for experience for the IT field). I've been here almost a year and finally decided for sure that I want to go the IT career field route.

I have my A+, got my Network+ last weekend, and will be testing and hopefully passing my Security+ weekend after this. I know I'm getting a late start with age for this career field, but I'm not certain which way to go from here would be given my situation. I also know I will have to start from the bottom and work my way up so I'll probably be looking for help desk type jobs here in a couple months.

I am just wondering if my next best cert to go for would be CCNA or go a different route? Preferably will be applying for an entry level DOD job but beggars can't be choosers, so we will see what comes up. Any input would be appreciated and thanks for even reading this.

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Comments

odysseyelite

31 is really not that late in this game. There is a poll on here with people and their ages and its about par for when people get into the field or start getting their certs.

If I was in your shoes, I would go into the cisco tracks. If you a leg above the rest of us if you have a clearence already. Since you already have the DoD required Net+ and Sec+ plus, CCNA and CCNA-S would work well for you.

Any particular area you like at the moment?

cdmcg

Well, firstly, thank you for serving, right now my wife is active duty in the AF. From what I have been told by people who work in SatCom here at Travis AFB is security+ is pretty much mandatory for IT work in the DoD. As for CCNA, I am sure this is the same at all bases, Cisco is the main product out here so. Good luck and God bless.

Turgon

descender421 wrote: »

Hi all. I'm now 31 years of age, did a six year stint in the security police field in the Air Force, and finally got my BS in Information Technology and Administrative Management last August. I am currently doing a technical support job for a debt collection software company (which I know probably isn't doing me much good for experience for the IT field). I've been here almost a year and finally decided for sure that I want to go the IT career field route.

I have my A+, got my Network+ last weekend, and will be testing and hopefully passing my Security+ weekend after this. I know I'm getting a late start with age for this career field, but I'm not certain which way to go from here would be given my situation. I also know I will have to start from the bottom and work my way up so I'll probably be looking for help desk type jobs here in a couple months.

I am just wondering if my next best cert to go for would be CCNA or go a different route? Preferably will be applying for an entry level DOD job but beggars can't be choosers, so we will see what comes up. Any input would be appreciated and thanks for even reading this.

What sort of work do you want to do?

descender421

odysseyelite wrote: »

31 is really not that late in this game. There is a poll on here with people and their ages and its about par for when people get into the field or start getting their certs.

If I was in your shoes, I would go into the cisco tracks. If you a leg above the rest of us if you have a clearence already. Since you already have the DoD required Net+ and Sec+ plus, CCNA and CCNA-S would work well for you.

Any particular area you like at the moment?

I separated back in 2005 so my Secret clearance isn't good anymore. I'm also not even quite sure what area I'm most interested in as weird as that sounds. I figure maybe once I get a helpdesk type job, I would get a better idea of which road to go down. I'm honestly just trying to figure out what to begin studying for after Security+ while I am looking for that said helpdesk job.

descender421

Turgon wrote: »

What sort of work do you want to do?

I'm not quite sure. I am interested in the networking field, however I'm not 100% sure that's what I want to do. That's why I wasn't quite sure if I should try other entry level type certifications to see if another specialization would interest me more; but I'm not really sure what other entry level type certs there even are out there.

cdmcg

descender421 wrote: »

I'm not quite sure. I am interested in the networking field, however I'm not 100% sure that's what I want to do. That's why I wasn't quite sure if I should try other entry level type certifications to see if another specialization would interest me more; but I'm not really sure what other entry level type certs there even are out there.

When you were earning your IT degree was there any class/block that you really enjoyed studying? From what I have been informed on, with A+, Network+ and Security+ you shouldn't have much of a problem getting into a help desk position. Maybe after finishing your Security+ cert just focus on finding work. Then once you get into work and get more hands on, then start working towards a desired cert. Now, I am not saying just don't study at all, but more so, just study what sounds interesting. If you want to get more into Windows then look over requirements for entry Microsoft certs and start studying that.

descender421

cdmcg wrote: »

When you were earning your IT degree was there any class/block that you really enjoyed studying? From what I have been informed on, with A+, Network+ and Security+ you shouldn't have much of a problem getting into a help desk position. Maybe after finishing your Security+ cert just focus on finding work. Then once you get into work and get more hands on, then start working towards a desired cert. Now, I am not saying just don't study at all, but more so, just study what sounds interesting. If you want to get more into Windows then look over requirements for entry Microsoft certs and start studying that.

I would say the two security classes that I took were the most interesting, but it basically only covered the things included on Security+ and nothing more. I think you're right in just focusing on finding work and then going from there, I just didn't want to have my studies lay dormant while I am actively looking for a different job. I may look into the requirements for entry level Microsoft certs as well, just seems like a lot of routes to go there. Thanks for the info!