CCNA Sec/Wireless/Voice

nb-

Hi

I've been lucky enough to land myself a trainee position at a small network consulting firm with around 10 other network technicians. They all work with different subjects within networking like security, wireless, voice, R&S etc. While i don't know much about them yet, i know that they are damn good at what they do. A lot of them has CCIE's in whatever subject they have decided to dig into, and i know that they are the guys that network admins/engineers from huge companies in my country go to when they can't find a solution.

They are basically giving me the opportunity to decide for myself which topic i wanna get into. Ive done 3/4 semesters of CCNA, so i expect to land my CCNA within the next two months. From then i'd really like to get into either Security, Wireless or Voice. The problem is that i have no clue which one of them it is going to be.
i'll be getting CCNP R&S later on in my studies at school, so i'm not really worried about that. But i wanna get into something different that everybody else, i don't want to be one of the millions that only knows about R&S.

If you were in my position. Which way would you go and why?

rom what i've heard Security is really really good, but also hard to get into cause it requires practical experience. From my point of view it could be interesting cause i'll be able to get that experience and work with CCIE Sec people.
Also heard really great things about voice. That there should be plenty of work, and high salary jobs cause apparently its in demand atm. Is that true?
The only thing i haven't really hard anything about is Wireless.. I mean while everyone wants to be more mobile with the office and implement tablets, phones etc. to the network there must be a increasing demand for wireless people right?

Please keep in mind that whilst choosing which route i want to go, i also need to take into consideration which topic that will last, and still be in demand in 10, 20 maybe even 30 years from now. This is my future, i don't wanna spend years working with, and gaining experience with a technology that nobody will be using in 5 years.

DCD

It sounds like wireless is your passion but I would go with security and voice. If you have the opportunity to gain security experience take it because it hard to break into the security realm.

SecurityThroughObscurity

Why not SP?

Master Of Puppets

Wireless technologies will get better and better. Voice and security are both in demand. But have you thought about design? Becoming a network architect has to be one of the coolest things ever. It is considered the highest class of networking as far as I am aware. Plus you don't care what's in demand because with that you can work anywhere, anytime. Not to mention the money is pretty solid, to say the least.

nb-

SP is also a possibility!

What exactly do you go in depth with in Design? I dident pick that one cause people advice me to get a CCNP R&S before CCDA, i really dont wan't to waste my time on getting a CCNP too quick as i will get one of the CCNP exams each half year starting once ive got my CCNA, so studying up on that beforehand would be a waste considering ill have to read it all again at school.

Master Of Puppets

Indeed, design comes later. It is a long road but very much worth it. The way to go is usually CCDA after CCNP. But you don't need to rush anything. Once you have some experience as a network engineer/admin, you can get into the design side.

NightShade1

Wireless!!!
Thats the future in the access layer

pert

There is an increasing demand for wireless, but its one of those fields where you can only work for a reseller honestly. You setup wireless, then its kind of done. The move/add/change portion doesnt require a guru.

swild

I was gungho about Security and it is still my passion. The great thing about Security is that you can't get away from it. The bad thing about Security is that the technology and threats are always changing. You have to keep up with trends and constantly study (not a bad thing in my opinion). My real problem with it is that of everyone in my IT Services company, the Security group gets out of the office the least.

My job in Voice is pretty awesome. In my short 6 weeks I have been able to configure routing, switching, firewalls, vpn, and wireless, in addition to all of the VoIP stuff: SIP, SCCP, RTP, UCCE, UCCX, CCM, CUE, CUC, etc. Also, I get out of the office quite frequently. One of my assigned projects is upgrading several state parks from Centrex phones to a small business VoIP solution. You need to know all of the basics of routing and switching because that all has to be functioning before you can start working on the VoIP side of things. The biggest downside of this job is having to work with all of the Telcos, but that may not be so bad in a different country.

pert

The bad thing about Security is that its super boring, you almost never get to build anything, 99% of your work doesn't generate new services or features (in fact it basically can only screw up existing ones if you mess up), and you spend your time digging through logs and reports. Not for me, at all.

This idea of security as a mental spar between technological warriors is from the movies.

Master Of Puppets

pert wrote: »

The bad thing about Security is that its super boring, you almost never get to build anything, 99% of your work doesn't generate new services or features (in fact it basically can only screw up existing ones if you mess up), and you spend your time digging through logs and reports. Not for me, at all.

This idea of security as a mental spar between technological warriors is from the movies.

Tell that to 90% of Earth's population who want do to security now without even knowing what it is On a side note, there are people who love everything about it and in that case there's nothing wrong with it. I even have fun with the logs

GarudaMin

pert wrote: »

The bad thing about Security is that its super boring, you almost never get to build anything, 99% of your work doesn't generate new services or features (in fact it basically can only screw up existing ones if you mess up), and you spend your time digging through logs and reports. Not for me, at all.

This idea of security as a mental spar between technological warriors is from the movies.

...really?...you are clearly not a subject matter expert on information security

Let's start with "you almost never get to build anything". What do you mean by "build"? If you mean design and develop devices, then you can take a look at Cisco ASA next generation firewalls (eg: ASA 5500-X). Since you have Cisco certs, I am just giving an example from Cisco products. It's not the only one. Cisco does firewalls, NACs, IDS/IPS, email, etc. All are security devices. If you mean "build" as in one does not get to setup or implement things in a company, then what about those that setup and configure such firewalls, NACs, email gateways, IDS/IPS, antivirus infrastructure, DLP, encryption, so on.

Let's move on to "99% of your work doesn't generate new services or features (in fact it basically can only screw up existing ones if you mess up)". What services and features are you talking about now? I see you have Cisco R&S and Wireless. Don't tell me you are leaving your wireless network open to all or still using WEP, or that you don't have ACL, anti spoofing, port security, etc. What about WIPS or Prime infrastructure? Those are services and features.
Take a look at this article: Infographic: The Biggest Data Security Breaches of All Time | News & Opinion | PCMag.com
An organization can lose up to $7 billion when it fails to secure itself. This does not even include intangible losses such as reputation and public trust. You can only screw up when you don't understand information security. I have not read any article or heard of news about how information security screws up a company or organization. News, however, are littered with how companies got screwed due to the lack of information security controls.

"Super boring". Well, it depends on what one does. If a chef is cooking nothing but rice day in and day out for eternity, I would imagine he/she would say it's super boring. On the otherhand, he/she may love cooking rice. But take penetration testing for example. I was sure it's a fun job to try to hack system or network or web application to determine vulnerabilities that can be exploited so that they can be remediated. Of course, if one also has to write 100 pages of report saying how that system/network/webapps can be exploited and how to remediate, that maybe boring, especially one does not like to write.

pert

Look, I was exaggerating a great deal for effect in order to shock people and hopefully make them actually look at what people in security actually do. People should be doing way more research about the field they are planning on going into. So many of these threads from people looking to go into Security with zero knowledge of what it actually entails. I hope shocking them will cause them to do some more research.

I do stand by my opinion that security is super boring, but obviously thats an opinion and not a fact. Yes, I've setup RADIUS authentication with EAP-TLS for wireless. It was critical to do so and obviously important to the business. Obviously there is need and demand for security work. I think as a whole most security work does not involve building new services, but in changing current services to be more secure. I find that sort of work much less interesting than doing new buildouts, but again thats an opinion.