Received Job Offer

eten

Hello,

Currently working at help desk for one of the biggest banks and recently received a job offer for network analyst position at a small company ~ 50 employees. I will be monitoring both Cisco and Juniper equipment, which seems really good experience. However, the job offer is only valid for 3 days, and the start date is 2 weeks from today which practically leaves no time for a 2 week notice. My main concern is that I never seen the NOC environment at that company. I was interviewed two times and both were conducted on another floor where there are only offices (VP & executive). First interview was with the President (my fault for not asking) and the second was with HR. Have any of you taken a job where you haven't seen the actual environment you would be working?

effekted

Before I got my break into IT I was at the company for 2 1/2 years so I knew the crazy environment/atmosphere I was getting into. If you can use a personal day at your current job and then see the equipment/environment at your prospect employer that would be ideal. Because you could go in and it be a complete nightmare which you could use to leverage a higher salary.

Everyone

First of all, congrats on the offer.

Moving from a large environment to such a small environment may not give you the challenges you seem to be looking for. You're probably used to have a lot of worked to do, and it being pretty faced pace. You may find yourself getting bored pretty quickly dropping down to a company with only 50 employees. However, if you get the experience you're after out of it, it shouldn't be that hard going back to a larger company if you ever decide to.

As far as seeing the environment before starting work, in my experience, that is the norm. The only environment I ever saw BEFORE accepting a position, was my 1st job out of the Air Force. I was working on that environment in uniform, and accepted a position as a contractor working on the same environment when I got out.

The next job I had after that, I accepted without ever having seen my boss, let alone the environment (only had phone interviews). However the environment was described to me. I didn't meet my boss, or see the datacenter until my 3rd day of working at the company (had to do orientation first).

The job I have now, I still haven't physically seen the environment. Like the last one, it was described to me during the interview process. I work remotely, I've seen Visio drawings of the environment, and I've remoted in to every system I'm responsible for, but I've never physically seen any of it.

Bottom line, I wouldn't be concerned about seeing the environment before accepting, as long as it was adequately described to you during the interview process.

VitalSign0

Being able to jump into a new environment should be a skill to develop. Even if it is a mess, there's your chance to make a difference. A small company is a lot more secure to work at than a large bank who will lay you off at any moment for any reason.

tpatt100

VitalSign0 wrote: »

Being able to jump into a new environment should be a skill to develop. Even if it is a mess, there's your chance to make a difference. A small company is a lot more secure to work at than a large bank who will lay you off at any moment for any reason.

I agree with you on this, when I left a large defense contractor to work for the City years ago it allowed me to develop professionaly very quickly because I went from "one of the techs" to "network support". I was one of five network personnel and was being allowed to plan, quote and recommend purchases for network upgrades, software licensing, etc etc.