Interview with a NOC...man that place sucked.

So just an update with the two places I interviewed with. One place was awesome, the other place was crappy. After the interview with the crappy place, I immediately emailed their HR on my phone to remove me from the hiring process. During the interview they never asked me any technical questions, only if I can handle a high stress environment.

I asked the NOC manager what network monitoring tools they used and he said he doesn't know, the "SysOps" handled that. I mean seriously, you couldn't tell me if you used Nagios, Zenoss, or Solarwinds...you're a manager. Then I interviewed the NOC lead and all he told me was that they search logs all day, talk on the phone 70% of the job, and the only thing I needed to know was "green good, red bad." They certainly offered more (a lot more) than what I'm paid now at my NOC but I'm still young and I'm not in debt, so I was looking for something where I can get more experience.

Then when I got the tour of the NOC, it's literally 4 guys sitting next to each other with maybe 2 feet of breathing room between them and some a NOC lead breathing over their shoulders at all times. No privacy whatsoever and looks extremely stressful. I asked whether the guy always walks behind them looking at what they're doing the whole time and they said that's basically his job to load balance work between everyone.

I wanted opinions from the guys here. Am I crazy for declining the job, it pays like 25k more than I'm making but certainly not more than what I intend on making if I keep pursuing the networking path in a few years. Is this what most NOC's are like and does anyone work in a NOC like this?

Side note: the other place was freaken awesome. Arcades and free beers at work. Access to every device in the network. And I would sit next to the engineers so I think I would learn so much there.

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Comments

networker050184

drew726 wrote: »

Side note: the other place was freaken awesome. Arcades and free beers at work. Access to every device in the network. And I would sit next to the engineers so I think I would learn so much there.

Sounds like the place to be! Although network access and free beer could be dangerous.

I'd take a pass on the first place also. Doesn't sound like you will be gaining much experience and doesn't seem like a very good working environment.

CodeBlox

Can I ask what company this NOC job was for? It sounds A LOT like the one I've seen at my job. I'm just a tier 1, but they let us into the NOC one day and the way you describe it sounds exactly like this place. In the one here though, there was probably 8 people, and they had about 4 really large television monitors in the from of the room. One had the news on, and the other three seemed to have monitoring software displayed. The people were bunched up and had supervisors standing right behind them at all times. And, they were on phones a lot. Not a single piece of networking equipment was seen in there, aside from maybe the Cat5e connected to the computers :P

drew726

CodeBlox wrote: »

Can I ask what company this NOC job was for? It sounds A LOT like the one I've seen at my job. I'm just a tier 1, but they let us into the NOC one day and the way you describe it sounds exactly like this place. In the one here though, there was probably 8 people, and they had about 4 really large television monitors in the from of the room. One had the news on, and the other three seemed to have monitoring software displayed. The people were bunched up and had supervisors standing right behind them at all times. And, they were on phones a lot. Not a single piece of networking equipment was seen in there, aside from maybe the Cat5e connected to the computers :P

It's probably better I don't say, but its in the east bay in the bay area.

N2IT

Wow passing up on 25K more a year. I am speechless.

Mike-Mike

N2IT wrote: »

Wow passing up on 25K more a year. I am speechless.

yeah, I was like, whatever yo, for 25 g's more, I'd certainly consider it for a long time

CodeBlox

drew726 wrote: »

It's probably better I don't say, but its in the east bay in the bay area.

Check your private messages. I'm curious to know if we are talking about the same place haha.

drew726

Mike-Mike wrote: »

yeah, I was like, whatever yo, for 25 g's more, I'd certainly consider it for a long time

yeah, if I had financial dependents it would have been different. I pay off my credit cards every month and have 1k left on student loans.

jcole4lsu

Working at a job/place you hate isnt worth 25k if you dont NEED the extra cash. Something better will come your way.
just my .02

Sledge.

No amount of money in the world is worth going to a job you hate day in and day out for years on end. Not to me, at least. Been there, done that - and I will never do it again.

N2IT

This is just my person opinion

How would anyone know they would hate a work place if they never worked there for any period of time? I think that is very unwise to assume a job is not your place.

Your mental state is key to whether a place is good or bad, great or crappy.

Believe me I could very easily get negative on my job. I have to make a conscience effort to keep positive thoughts in my mind so I don't think that way. If you wanted to you could think of any job as crappy or negative.

With all that said you know yourself the best so do what you feel is right. Isn't that all we can do anyway?

swild

Sledge. wrote: »

No amount of money in the world is worth going to a job you hate day in and day out for years on end. Not to me, at least. Been there, done that - and I will never do it again.

+1. I even have debt and wouldn't consider that place. Anywhere I go, I want to gain knowledge and experience.

cyberguypr

Sledge. wrote: »

No amount of money in the world is worth going to a job you hate day in and day out for years on end. Not to me, at least. Been there, done that - and I will never do it again.

Luckily I've never been in this position but this is exactly how I see it. I rather be happy making $50k than miserable making $100k.

Smart move on the OP's end if you ask me.

Hypntick

I took a 10k pay cut to get more hands on experience in a much more laid back environment. Know exactly where you're coming from Drew, money isn't everything.

MentholMoose

N2IT wrote: »

How would anyone know they would hate a work place if they never worked there for any period of time? I think that is very unwise to assume a job is not your place.

Interviews are a two way street. If you have interviewing skills and want a job you enjoy, you can leave an interview knowing with high certainty if you will enjoy it there. The coworkers, managers, job responsibilities, culture, hours, facilities, commute and other potentially relevant factors can be identified and taken into account. From reading the OP, I don't get the impression that drew726 was making bad assumptions. He observed the working conditions and asked relevant questions, and from the information gathered made an informed assessment.

N2IT wrote: »

Your mental state is key to whether a place is good or bad, great or crappy.

You should know yourself and what affects your enjoyment of a job. There are things, not necessarily deal killers, but rather just considerations that you can identify during an interview. drew726 observed:

High stress
Uninvolved NOC manager
Uninteresting work responsibilities
Micromanagement by the lead
Cramped workspace
High workload

None of these are indicative of an enjoyable job/workplace. The high pay quite possibly means the working conditions truly are miserable... if the pay is well above market rate, it indicates they have high turnover and can only keep people there longer than a week by paying through the nose. If not, he may be currently making well below market rate and can find another position that is comparatively enjoyable and pays market rate.

UnixGuy

N2IT wrote: »

..Believe me I could very easily get negative on my job. I have to make a conscience effort to keep positive thoughts in my mind so I don't think that way. If you wanted to you could think of any job as crappy or negative.

...

me too !

deth1k

have a good think about this, next time you decide to go for a new job they will ask how much you are on now? Having that 25k raise will put you in a good perspective next time round. it will look good on your CV especially if you are quite young. think about the future now. you don't have to stick with the job for the rest of your life, think of it as the next step to a better one (+higher pay).

good luck with your decision.

ehnde

I couldn't handle the micromanagement...thanks for describing your interview so well man! Your description makes me feel even better about the NOC I work in. We had an OC48 go down on a (fortunately multi-homed) location a few days ago, and all I had to tell my supervisor was "btw, this OC-48 went down..carrier is working on it - fiber cut with techs en route, no ETA right now. Next update from carrier in 30 minutes."

Had enough micromanagement in the Army. %#$@ that!

It is the NOC manager's fault that the NOC is ran so poorly at the place you interviewed. The 25k+ may indeed not be worth it if it causes severe stagnation for you career wise. Glad you're doing what you feel is right.

Turgon

The job you passed up would be an extremely stressful environment as those boys will be holding everything together. You could gain a lot of experience in such an environment but it would be a very tough place to work. Be wary of 'cool' places to work with arcades, free beer, table tennis and all the trimmings. A couple of years can pass by in such places and you might not learn as much as you think. Should you then move into a less comfortable role with another organisation, you just wont be able to cope with it.

Devilry

cyberguypr wrote: »

Luckily I've never been in this position but this is exactly how I see it. I rather be happy making $50k than miserable making $100k. Smart move on the OP's end if you ask me.

I absolutely agree. Currently in a high salary position, but is never worth it: can't wait to get out.

networker050184

Turgon wrote: »

The job you passed up would be an extremely stressful environment as those boys will be holding everything together. You could gain a lot of experience in such an environment but it would be a very tough place to work. Be wary of 'cool' places to work with arcades, free beer, table tennis and all the trimmings. A couple of years can pass by in such places and you might not learn as much as you think. Should you then move into a less comfortable role with another organisation, you just wont be able to cope with it.

So don't take a job in a good environment because you might have a job that's not as cool in the future? That doesn't make much sense to me. Take a good job when you can find it and try to make a career out of it.

thenjduke

This place just sounds like a place to walk out before walking in.

CodeBlox

networker050184 wrote: »

So don't take a job in a good environment because you might have a job that's not as cool in the future? That doesn't make much sense to me. Take a good job when you can find it and try to make a career out of it.

I don't think that was his point... I think he was saying that if you try and stick with that relaxed environment, when it comes time to make moves and the next job comes along but is a lot more stressful, you wont know how to handle it.

Turgon

Exactly. If it's a choice between good and bad then take the obvious choice. But if a warzone job is all that is on the table, do it. Look elsewhere meantime but get your sleeves rolled up and get stuck in. Valuable experience being tested like that.

drew726

Well I wanted to say that the good place I interviewed at looked like it had some fun stuff to make up for the high stress environment. Any NOC job can turn into a high stress environment at any moment. He was talking about how he had 2 fiber cuts just yesterday, so it definitely isn't a place to just have "fun" and not learn anything. I interviewed with 1 NOC tech, 2 engineers, and their boss. They asked me to explain IOS commands, linux commands, what happens when I type an address on a web browser, explain datagram encapsulations down an OSI layer, explain why they would use TCP for a video streaming CDN (which is what they are). In other words, they looked like they wanted to see what I knew and what I didn't know. They gave me a tour of their lab environment and showed me most of the devices which I'll have access to. I just felt like the job would challenge me and that's all I want.

At the other place, they never bothered to ask me any technical questions. They didn't show me a data center and only showed me where people work. Frankly, I do less robotic work at my job, is less stressful, and learn more. I just don't feel searching for keywords in logs, escalating tickets without knowing why, while doing call center work as more experience. It's more work, but not necessary something I can add upon my resume. I've done call center work before and I've been escalating crap for 2-3 years already. I want to be in a situation where I'm not always a middleman. Combine that with a supervisor breathing down your neck 24/7, I just thought it wasn't worth the money. I'm not in a rush to make a ton of money. I just want to invest in myself and I know one day it'll pay off.

CodeBlox

drew726 wrote: »

explain why they would use TCP for a video streaming CDN (which is what they are).

I'm not sure what CDN is, but if I got this question I think I would have gotten it wrong. My rationale would have gone with UDP. I mean, the way I'm thinking about it, sequencing out of order datagrams wont be of much use for video. Nor would recalling for a dropped datagram. Once the data is loss, there's no use for it and video quality loss. This is just my way of thinking about it though and I could be thinking about it all wrong. This is keeping in mind that we are talking about LIVE video of some sort like a conference.

drew726

CodeBlox wrote: »

I'm not sure what CDN is, but if I got this question I think I would have gotten it wrong. My rationale would have gone with UDP. I mean, the way I'm thinking about it, sequencing out of order datagrams wont be of much use for video. Nor would recalling for a dropped datagram. Once the data is loss, there's no use for it and video quality loss. This is just my way of thinking about it though and I could be thinking about it all wrong. This is keeping in mind that we are talking about LIVE video of some sort like a conference.

For SSL. I was kind of surprised when they told me they only need a half a second buffer when using TCP. Very cool tech, which is part of why I like that company. CDN = Content Delivery Network.

Turgon

drew726 wrote: »

Well I wanted to say that the good place I interviewed at looked like it had some fun stuff to make up for the high stress environment. Any NOC job can turn into a high stress environment at any moment. He was talking about how he had 2 fiber cuts just yesterday, so it definitely isn't a place to just have "fun" and not learn anything. I interviewed with 1 NOC tech, 2 engineers, and their boss. They asked me to explain IOS commands, linux commands, what happens when I type an address on a web browser, explain datagram encapsulations down an OSI layer, explain why they would use TCP for a video streaming CDN (which is what they are). In other words, they looked like they wanted to see what I knew and what I didn't know. They gave me a tour of their lab environment and showed me most of the devices which I'll have access to. I just felt like the job would challenge me and that's all I want.

Sounds like a more technical environment to me and a no brainer. From the sounds of things the crappy place just push tickets around rather than do hands on work.

knownhero

I currently work in a NOC. They promised us they would get more technical work in so we can actually get some hands on experience with servers etc, I went out of my way to gain a MCSA and a certification in SharePoint as I was told by my line manager "We have SharePoint coming in and if you want to get involved with deployment so us you want it".

That was 2 years ago roughly and all I have seen technical wise is the server I have to move from one rack to another. That was the last straw, needless to say Im taking a 4k pay drop to be come a Software Engineer. Best thing I could have done. NOC's are great starting points but after 4 and a half years of shift work and boring same old tickets coming in, it really starts to drain your soul.

Id say ditch the first one and go with second one. The NOC I work in sounds like the one you mentioned but my line manager is in his own office.

snokerpoker

This sounds exactly like my first job in IT. I could not stand working there! The entire company was set up to have the NOC be blamed for everything. Luckily they outsourced just about everyone to India and I was able to get out. Believe it or not, it was the best thing that could have happened to me.