Which direction in Networking/Security careers are independent and hours flexible?

I'm closing in on finishing my IT degree not too far off, but I've just learned what is and isn't important these days with my time lately and could use some advice.

Just some background about me. For about the past year I've been going to school full time and trying to get my degree in IT with a focus in Networking. I already have a degree in Business Administration. I spent a couple years at a major healthcare organization doing call center support for representatives, before shortly switching to a different department before giving my two weeks. This department was in such bad shape they had people walking out daily, lied to me about the position, and ended up getting fined nearly $2 million for breaking HIPAA medicare I later found out.

Why is this relevant? Well, about a week before my last day, I had some serious health problems. One day my arms, hands, and different parts of my body felt like I was being stabbed with a hundred needles, they were on fire, numb, among other very bad symptoms. The doctors gave me various things saying it was stress, I didn't believe it, and it continued for a few months even after the medicine before it somehow just went away. I promised myself I wouldn't ever put myself in a working environment like that again.

So there it is, with that preface in mind, does anyone have any advice on what I could do? I love security and networking, I love reading about it (heck I've been keeping up with the outage all day on Mark Krebs site), so I would love to do it. I just don't know if I would love it so much with a forced 50-60 hour workweek of hating life, because I can't go through that again.

My ideal situation would be able to obtain a niche where I could fill a spot to either become independent on my own eventually, or have lots of flexibility in my time. Does anyone have any advice for me? Thanks, its really appreciated.

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koz24

I'm not a doctor so I can't say much about your symptoms but that sounds like an extreme case of stress. You got that from helpdesk? Dude, I've worked some shitty helpdesk jobs in the past with very low pay and I never got that, but to each his own I guess. I'm talking like 9-5 with a 1hour commute each way for 40k and you're on "night call" and get woken up in the middle of the night for bullshit all the time type of jobs. Don't mean to sound like an ass but it isn't going to get any easier in Networking and especially in Security my friend. Forget flex hours and all that jazz for now.

TheFORCE

Yeah security and networking expect to work long hours.

You should consider becoming an auditor. They have it easy and only ask questions.

infosec_switch

koz24 wrote: »

I'm not a doctor so I can't say much about your symptoms but that sounds like an extreme case of stress. You got that from helpdesk? Dude, I've worked some shitty helpdesk jobs in the past with very low pay and I never got that, but to each his own I guess. I'm talking like 9-5 with a 1hour commute each way for 40k and you're on "night call" and get woken up in the middle of the night for bullshit all the time type of jobs. Don't mean to sound like an ass but it isn't going to get any easier in Networking and especially in Security my friend. Forget flex hours and all that jazz for now.

Well the first year was just phone support, period. Angry people constantly who weren't happy with their insurance. The same thing with the tech side of it. This wasn't normal support for employees. I would have loved that. This was insurance agents trying to sign people up on the last day of open enrollment, and our POS one developer supported application with a SQL database not working to upload. Or the iPad app not uploading applications. On the LAST day. You know how pissed people are with that?

That isn't even mentioning we had an outdated lead system tied to a very old version of CRM. It wouldn't work on Chrome. It wouldn't work on Firefox. It wouldn't even work on Internet Explorer 11. The only browser it worked with was NINE. That's right. You had all these people who couldn't make money because they couldn't get leads because they didn't have IE 9 and they COULDN'T get it because Windows 8 would only go down to IE 10. And 8.1? IE 11.

I was less help desk and more firing squad. I used a lot of unofficial methods to try to help people, but in the end it was a bad, bad spot. It can get no worse than that.

infosec_switch

NVM, just disregard thread. I'll be better off asking a mentor or something about this I think. Not saying I'm going to jump into a dream job ASAP, but I'm sure there's someone, somewhere who can work on their own independently or in a flex position. I just can't handle any more negativity, it's why I barely post on the internet. Instead of constructive responses, it's just, everything is crap and criticize the person who started the discussion. Hardly ever any empathy. It's no wonder asking advice on the internet just makes me wish some self destructive things. Anyway .. thanks anyway, I'll just try somewhere else.

TheFORCE

Seems to me you are very sensitive person. You have to develop some thick skin. The work environment is not the play ground of 10 year olds where everyone gets a trophy for participating. In the work environment you are dealing with money and systems that cost companies money. Expect to be schooled some times. As they say, if you cant handle the heat dont go in the kitchen.

kellyjd83

Work in a bar for 6 months, you'll have thick skin pretty fast. Working in the technology sector, you gotta understand that the industry doesn't sleep. Even more so for networking & security. As a support person the job ends when the next shift comes on. When I worked as a network guy my phone was constantly going off at alerts. I doubt anyone here is going to put you in the wrong direction, the vast majority work the industry and have so for many years. When it comes to getting advice from the internet, you take it with a pinch of salt. You know damn well your mentor will say "look on the net", for advice on where to go. By the way there is no such thing as bad criticism, it comes down to whether your going to take it to heart or use it.

The fact is, you either can or you can't.
If you want to take it to heart and give up at the slightest bit of criticism your not made for this industry and that is a fact!
You'll either be ripped apart or taken advantage of!

Personally, I take everything....and I go out of my way to prove people wrong! I was told I would never have the intelligence to work in technology (Imagine hearing that off a teacher when your a kid), so I left school and went and worked in a different industry (construction), ye I can do a 40+ hour week hauling materials up and down like there's no tomorrow....but..it's not the workout that I want. I went back to tech, taught myself how to administer OS's and ended up working as a systems admin at 18 (I left school at 16). I then met the teacher that ripped me apart at the very same school to give a lecture on technology...suffice to say I hinted at her lack as an educator for 3 hours.

So you gotta research if you can work this industry, it's not all peaches and cream (or pizza and beer). And as TheFORCE has said:

TheFORCE wrote: »

..... In the work environment you are dealing with money and systems that cost companies money....

and thats in the millions of whatever currency!

Good luck!

Danielm7

Judging from all the networking people I've worked with, none of them work part time or flex hours. They also make big changes in off hours, like nights and weekends. I work in security now, it changes all the time, there is a fair bit of stress even when you love what you do, you just have to know how to handle it. For me? I learned how to deal with it when I was much younger working in a family commercial kitchen, it was total stress chaos, but you learned to deal with it, function through it and sometimes even feed off it to help set your pace. Some people just don't deal with stress well, I once saw my wife have what would be described as heart attack like conditions. We went to an ER, couple thousand dollars in tests later, all stress, it happens.

You could look at different industries, maybe education or government, for a different pace, but I don't think you're going to find full flex hours in the beginning of your career. Some people have them as consultants but you might also only see the work hours, not the tons of travel, crazy amounts of study to get there, etc.

Agree with the others too, you just want the answer you want, you shouldn't take your ball and go home when you don't get it right away. People here can be extremely helpful, but it might not always be the answer you want, but it's probably the correct answer. Learning to deal with a criticism here and there when someone isn't right in your face yelling might help dial down the stress responses in real life too.

nespower

This thread is kind of why I try to be a lurker on forums. From the responses, I see pretty much everyone blaming or lecturing. That's usually how it goes with life direction advice on the internet.

Call centers have some of the worst retention rate and spending two years is way above the average. Being there before, there are times you take 80+ calls a day, and I don't see how anyone keeps their sanity.

I think instead of people trashing the person sharing something and asking advice and just giving 'got mine, deal with it' - try to give something constructive. If you look on glassdoor.com or read the internet enough, you would eventually lock yourself in a dungeon and shake in a corner with how negative it is each time you ask advice.

Contract work seems to be the best bet - work a certain amount of time - no strings attached, and then afterwards evaluate and use the contacts and experience to go elsewhere. I'm not sure why anyone didn't suggest that, but I guess criticizing others is just the status quo.

koz24

Glassdoor can be good and bad. It's great for researching salaries to make sure you don't get lowballed. It's bad if you are trying to **** an interview, real bad. Because then you can get into a position you have no business being in.

And sorry, it's not all sunshine and rainbows out there you know. It's competitive and sometimes you need some tough love to develop some thick skin.

About contracts--well that's your opinion. Personally I hate contracts because a good amount of the time they are just using the person to do grunt work without any intention of ever hiring or extending the contract. Maybe if you are already an expert, contracts can be a good source of some quick cash. But not everyone wants to hop places every 12 months or so. I certainly don't. I want a position where I can instantly contribute with whatever expertise they hired me for AND have room for growth. Whether it's moving up as an individual contributor or eventually getting into management.

nespower

koz24 wrote: »

Glassdoor can be good and bad. It's great for researching salaries to make sure you don't get lowballed. It's bad if you are trying to **** an interview, real bad. Because then you can get into a position you have no business being in.

And sorry, it's not all sunshine and rainbows out there you know. It's competitive and sometimes you need some tough love to develop some thick skin.

About contracts--well that's your opinion. Personally I hate contracts because a good amount of the time they are just using the person to do grunt work without any intention of ever hiring or extending the contract. Maybe if you are already an expert, contracts can be a good source of some quick cash. But not everyone wants to hop places every 12 months or so. I certainly don't. I want a position where I can instantly contribute with whatever expertise they hired me for AND have room for growth. Whether it's moving up as an individual contributor or eventually getting into management.

Tough love? If someone shares they have stress, anxiety, or depression and have to goto the doctor for treatment it's a mental illness. I could only imagine telling a cancer patient they need some 'tough love.' It's sad how mental illness is viewed, as if everyone just needs to be told the way it is, and ta-da, everything is solved! Don't be stressed, don't have depression, there problem solved, why didn't they know that all along? Try empathy for a change.

koz24

nespower wrote: »

Tough love? If someone shares they have stress, anxiety, or depression and have to goto the doctor for treatment it's a mental illness. I could only imagine telling a cancer patient they need some 'tough love.' It's sad how mental illness is viewed, as if everyone just needs to be told the way it is, and ta-da, everything is solved! Don't be stressed, don't have depression, there problem solved, why didn't they know that all along? Try empathy for a change.

Are you trolling? Nice strawman on the cancer patient example. Sorry, but this is TechExams not WebMD. Most of us here are not doctors and neither are you. If you get so stressed out from call centers and basic helpdesk that you're shaking in a corner maybe you need to take a look at your chosen profession because it certainly isn't going to get any easier in Networking and ESPECIALLY in Security.

nespower

koz24 wrote: »

Are you trolling? Nice strawman on the cancer patient example. Sorry, but this is TechExams not WebMD. Most of us here are not doctors and neither are you. If you get so stressed out from call centers and basic helpdesk that you're shaking in a corner maybe you need to take a look at your chosen profession because it certainly isn't going to get any easier in Networking and ESPECIALLY in Security.

It’s not a strawman. Illness comes in all shapes and forms, just because someone has a mental illness doesn’t mean it’s any less suffering or debilitating than a physical one. But you wouldn’t tell someone with a chronic physical illness to deal with it and get thicker skin.

Also there are different types of stresses and different types of situations. Saying it ‘wont get easier’ is ridiculous, because you don’t know the person’s situation and you don’t know how they handle different situations. I don’t like people yelling, but at the same time live for a deadline or being able to do a presentation or explanation to teach a ton of people. What stresses you, doesn’t stress someone else. I would love to see how many egotistical people like yourself would last working at a fast food restaurant and could say it’s any easier stresswise than a much higher paying position.

To OP and anyone reading, just try here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/ITCareerQuestions/

It seems a lot more helpful with actual professionals who can advise and give encouragement, and you don’t have to deal with idiots like this guy. I’ll take an exit out too after lurking to see what kind of ‘help’ there is here.

Maybe you should take your own advice and learn some soft skills. Adios.

koz24

Yep I'm the idiot. You can continue on with your Strawman arguments and your Google degree in Psychology and Psychiatry. An obvious trolling attempt is obvious.

TheFORCE

nespower wrote: »

Tough love? If someone shares they have stress, anxiety, or depression and have to goto the doctor for treatment it's a mental illness. I could only imagine telling a cancer patient they need some 'tough love.' It's sad how mental illness is viewed, as if everyone just needs to be told the way it is, and ta-da, everything is solved! Don't be stressed, don't have depression, there problem solved, why didn't they know that all along? Try empathy for a change.

What do you want us to say? We are being honest based on our experiences and what we have seen out there. Many of us have done the call center and Helpdesk jobs but we didnt go crazy from it. I did Helpdesk for 2 years while studying full time and yes i was taking 100 calls a day. If you dont like that job, go do another job or learn some new skills to do another job it's that simple.

What do you want us to do? You want us put sugar on it and make it seem like networking or security or even desktop support is easy peasy? We do that and he will come back and say, networking is tough too i wasn't expecting that and start complaining again.

Wait until you have to do a change on the firewalls or get called because some high executives Iphone is not working. Then you will start feeling the stress, when just a minor misconfiguration can bring down production system, then come back and say if taking calls is stressful.

CE1028

As someone who has had some mental struggles, I can somewhat understand the concerns. I don't know the OP but stress can come from many factors, and maybe the job was just the icing on the cake. It's important to tackle that first and get it under control. A person's health and well-being must come before any "job".

I think people forget that every company is different. What is important is that you do what you have a passion for. Not every position as a server admin, network engineer, or whatever is going to require 50-60 hours. I'm working as a network engineer, and I work less hours than when I was a server admin. When you love what you do, it becomes real easy to find yourself putting in extra hours though.

Remedymp

You should try and update your linkedin and start talking to staffing firms immediately. They will get you into some kind of short term engagement for Data Center tech work or Manage security provider.

kellyjd83

Contract work is generally for people that have a specific skill that needs to be covered for maternity, holiday etc. Getting into contracting you would need to have experience / qualifications to fill a void for sys admin, database dev, security engineer and so on. Having x amount of time working a call centre for support is I'm afraid to say useless, its a dime a dozen. No company will contract that particular role.

nespower wrote: »

....I would love to see how many egotistical people like yourself would last working at a fast food restaurant and could say it’s any easier stresswise than a much higher paying position....

I have worked in fast food while I travelled around, the first day is stressful cos you don't know where anything is, what does what etc its like any other job, eventually it clicks and everything (most of the time) is right as rain. You can't compare stress levels between hospitality and IT. The stress in the hospitality industry comes from people being dicks cos they can and they treat people in hospitality as slaves (I threatened people with broken bones for being dickheads!). Stress in the IT industry vary's between assets breaking for no good reason, Junior / interns making the wrong configurations or writing dirty code, top of the corp food chain going banana's cos his smartphone went screwy after an update or more commonly the couple of millions worth of infrastructure isn't working as it should and multiple department leads are coming down on the IT dept as one massively loud voice.

nespower wrote: »

Tough love? If someone shares they have stress, anxiety, or depression and have to goto the doctor for treatment it's a mental illness. I could only imagine telling a cancer patient they need some 'tough love.' It's sad how mental illness is viewed, as if everyone just needs to be told the way it is, and ta-da, everything is solved! Don't be stressed, don't have depression, there problem solved, why didn't they know that all along? Try empathy for a change.

Depression kicks everyone's ass. there's two options eat medication like candy or talk about it with friends and family....unfortunately we are neither and as koz24 puts it:

koz24 wrote: »

....but this is TechExams not WebMD. Most of us here are not doctors and neither are you. If you get so stressed out from call centers and basic helpdesk that you're shaking in a corner maybe you need to take a look at your chosen profession because it certainly isn't going to get any easier in Networking and ESPECIALLY in Security.

The fact is if someone is sensitive, has debilitating depression or can't deal with stress properly he or she will not last in this profession. It's that simple. Coming here and pouring your inner most feelings to a forum that is here to advise on technology certifications and career possibilities what was he or she expecting? A beer and chat? That's what a bartender / therapist / group meetings / mental health forum is for. Sorry to lay it out but that's the way the cookie crumbles.

Working in IT the vast majority of us will have some sort of disorder (maybe not all of us, but most of us) that non IT pro's will label us as or have. Since the dawn of IT professionals as a community we have always been seen as being a tad strange. But then how could we not go slightly "strange" we stare into the vast space of programming and octets for countless hours, we get logical answers from our systems, ask logical questions and get illogical answers from non IT people or more times than most we get BS.

Fact! You need to look at this profession and ask yourself can you deal with stress, be on call 24/7, constantly reading, constantly working on systems, constantly learning. This is how this industry works, and it's going to be like this for a long long time.

What would you rather have? For us to lie to you and say:
It's an easy job, no stresses, everyone is nice, non IT don't shout they give you a cupcake every morning, a bj at lunch and a tug at dinner

or

DO we lay out the truth carpet and tell you that it is stressful, but because we have a passion for it we roll it all off and get on with it.

and fyi: I have social disorders and depression, I counter my madness with making people laugh in the office's that I contract at or when I get home I play COD for an hour and kill me some zombies. This is how I deal with stress, others will have other ways to deal with it. Whatever works for you.

CE1028

I don't know where you people work or what you do at work., but IT is not as stressful as some of you are making it out to be, to the point of extreme exaggeration.

Like I said earlier, the OP needs to take care of his depression/stress.

EANx

CE1028 wrote: »

I don't know where you people work or what you do at work., but IT is not as stressful as some of you are making it out to be, to the point of extreme exaggeration.

It really depends on the environment. Have you ever performed IT supporting people in a war zone? How about IT supporting medical infrastructure? In both of those, lives are at stake and yes, they're stressful. Wait until you're woken up at 3am because "this damn thing is down again and we know they start setting the mortars up around 0400", that's all you get for troubleshooting info and that if you fail, people really could die.

There are high-stress IT environments and low(er)-stress IT environments. Everyone has to pick what suits them based on personality and medical condition. I'm not going to bash anyone for depression, it happens but they need to be proactive in either getting it addressed or limiting their employment to low-stress jobs.

CE1028

EANx wrote: »

It really depends on the environment. Have you ever performed IT supporting people in a war zone? How about IT supporting medical infrastructure? In both of those, lives are at stake and yes, they're stressful. Wait until you're woken up at 3am because "this damn thing is down again and we know they start setting the mortars up around 0400", that's all you get for troubleshooting info and that if you fail, people really could die.

There are high-stress IT environments and low(er)-stress IT environments. Everyone has to pick what suits them based on personality and medical condition. I'm not going to bash anyone for depression, it happens but they need to be proactive in either getting it addressed or limiting their employment to low-stress jobs.

No, I have not worked in those environments. I have worked in IT on trade floor, which is stressful, but for very different reasons than the examples you mentioned.

That's exactly my point though, for the person who started this thread, they definitely wouldn't want to work in those environments. There are so many industries that require IT that are not stressful.

It's like saying you want to live in a low crime area and then you move to Detroit or Memphis. You wouldn't do that.

EANx

I can respect the stress of working in a trading environment, where millions can be lost because of a bit of latency.

My point was addressing your quote that "IT is not as stressful as some of you are making it out to be". The environment can be very stressful and add perfectionism on top of that...

CE1028

I respect your opinion, and agree that there are certain environments that are extremely stressful. In no way was I trying to down play that.

However, the reality is, there's plenty of industries that this person can work, so everyone that's telling him that he can forget working in IT, makes absolutely no sense to me. Maybe it would be better if people specified in the conditions that they are working in (such as war zone), and that would help the OP understand where he shouldn't be looking to work.

I had a teacher once, that had a nervous breakdown one day and they found him hiding in a closet in the classroom. That guy was an excellent teacher, he just had to get over some personal issues. Once he did that, he was once again an excellent teacher. Nobody told him, he needs to forget teaching. We all go through stuff, it's about finding the strength to beat it.

EANx

Total agreement that there are plenty of industries where someone skilled in IT, no matter their disability, can work. The person simply needs to recognize that a situation might not be for them and, importantly, not try to make it fit.

I do suspect though that many high-stress industries aren't that hard to identify. I'd put anything in a war-zone at the top, medical and trading 1/2 a step behind and then add in other organizations that gauge success on timeliness. Standard corporate is generally lower stress, except for the occasional manager who puts too much pressure on their people.

CE1028

I couldn't agree more. Unfortunately, I think the OP left the thread

What I do find amusing are people who want to get in IT, don't want to continue learning(improving) and then are surprised when they get left behind. IT is definitely not for everyone

koz24

Used to struggle with depression myself. The meds helped but I ballooned pretty quickly. Finally got off the meds and switched from coffee to tea and depression is gone. Getting off SSRIs is a nightmare and I'm never going back to them, I will use natural remedies and therapy. Here in Massachussetts we have the holistic medical marijuana option as well and Sativa strains took care of my depression a lot quicker than any chemical did. They are voting on Nov 8 to make it legal for everyone and I for one will be voting yes even though I have a medical MJ card anyway.

I also have ADD. My diagnosis is inattentive type with no hyperactivity component. I'm on Adderall and it's the only thing that allows me to function well. It would be very difficult without it. I've also tried Ritalin but it doesn't work as well.

Cyberscum

To the OP. I work in security and personally my job is not stressful at all and actually there are times when I wish it was lol.

My advice would be to get some certs in security and start the transition into it. There are so many angles of security that it can literally accommodate anyone.

Try looking at remote jobs for a start. I know a few people (including here on this forum) that work from home and do very well.

All in all keep your head up. Stay strong and you will succeed.

Just remember that most people that put you down or try and make you look bad have issues of their own and you can tell from their posts.

Good luck man and shoot me a PM if you have specific questions.

Remedymp

Contract work is generally for people that have a specific skill that needs to be covered for maternity, holiday etc. Getting into contracting you would need to have experience / qualifications to fill a void for sys admin, database dev, security engineer and so on. Having x amount of time working a call centre for support is I'm afraid to say useless, its a dime a dozen. No company will contract that particular role.

Most of our security analyst either started as contractors or are currently contractors. I have no idea what you're talking about.

Danielm7

They are probably thinking of consultants. I work with a ton of contractors who have been in the same role for years, 40 hrs a week, they are just like regular employees who skip the benefits for hiring billing rates.