A mistake I made at the beginning of my career was not visualizing and executing a proper Exit Strategy. I would like to share my mistake with others, and hopefully they will not fall into the same boat! This is targeted to individuals currently serving entry-level Help Desk roles, DST, etc or who are trying to break into IT.
And of course, this is from my personal experience. This isn't the Bible of IT. You don't need to follow this to a T. These are just some things I wish I would have done when I first started, etc.
Your First IT JobCongratulations! You have landed your first IT job. That in itself is something of an accomplishment, especially (incoming cliche meme) in this economy. IT is not an easy field to break into, trust me I know. I started out in a computer warehouse shipping boxes out. You take what you can get, to get your foot in the door.
More than likely, you are doing some sort of Help Desk support. You are fielding incident calls, responding to user/customer requests. If you are lucky, you will wear multiple hats doing different things. You may simply answer phones all day, use remote assistance tools all day, you may do face-to-face user support for a corporation or government agency all day. The most important thing is... you are Entry Level. Which means, you will be doing the grunt work.
What Should I Be Doing?
During this time, you should be doing a few things. A couple are obvious, some are not so obvious. So hopefully, this will help give you a few ideas.
One of the first things you need to realize, is that not everyone knows everything in the IT world. And being new to the profession, no one expects you to know it all. So ask questions. If you have a question, ask. No one is going to bite your head off, and I have found that most seasoned vets will be happy to share their knowledge with you, even if it is to show off a little bit. Just make sure you aren't asking the same questions over and over
CYA. Cover Your Arse. Leave a paper trail. Save emails. Make sure there is something verifiable to prove anything you have done. Especially when dealing with customers/users. More often than not, they will bend/stretch the truth if it means getting themselves out of trouble. This is a practice you need to get in the habit of doing.
Develop your soft skills. For some people, this may be the first job you have in a professional/corporate environment. Being able to orally convey your thoughts/ideas/actions/plans/etc in an efficient, eloquent, and appropriate manner is integral to your success. Some people may brush this off, thinking all they need to know is the tech stuff and for some jobs... this is true. But for most, it is not. One of the easiest examples I can think of is this: Most of IT is working in a support environment, and your primary function will be to ensure productivity is up and downtime is down. Less congested network, properly configured domain controllers, etc. And all of this costs money. You will need to justify to someone why you need to spend x dollars on some drive/software/server/etc when they all look the same. And the person who controls the money is usually someone who is not technical. Thats why you are there. I can not stress this enough: Develop your soft skills.
While you are at it, you need to develop a network of contacts. Go to seminars, training events, lectures, etc. These are all great places to meet other IT professionals in your area. In my experience, you would be very surprised who knows who. Coworkers are the best place to start your contact list. It is true, turnover in IT can be a bit high. But this is an opportunity to grow your web. As people move around you, make sure you have their info. You never know when you may need another job, and staying in contact with these people may be the "who you know" that you need to get in the door.
Always keep your resume updated. I preach this in alot of my posts, only because it has helped so many people I know. Do not wait until you go job hunting to update your resume. You won't remember everything you have done. Add onto it as you learn a new technology, complete a project, anything. And then when you go to apply for jobs, trim individual resumes down to skills that pertain to the job you are applying for. Just make sure to keep this organized, so you know who has what resume. If looking for a new job, it may be wise to rename each copy to the company name you applied to.
But most importantly, you need an exit strategy.
Exit Strategy
You need to have a plan in order. If you do not, you will find yourself in a help desk role 10 years down the road. It is extremely easy to get complacent, especially if you have alot going on at work, with family, etc. The last thing you want to do after working all day is come home and, read a book. Watch an IT video, etc. But you need some sort of plan.
First, you need to decide what you want to do. There are alot of career paths in IT. Some you probably never thought of or heard of. But you should have a general idea about which direction you would like to take. Think of it as specializing. Do you want to be a network guy? A windows administrator? Unix admin? DBA? An exchange guru? Security? There is nothing wrong with becoming well rounded in a multitude of skills, however for that hop from entry-level, you will usually need something with a bit of focus.
Once you decide what interests you the most, you need to get certified. There are people who will swear that certifications mean nothing. They don't prove you know the material. And this can be true. However, people are usually prescreened by HR before their resume even touches an IT manager's desk. They look for key words, which usually come in the form of certifications. Certifications are a baseline that show you
should know the material and will very much help you get in for that interview. And once you are being interviewed, usually a good IT Manager/Member will be able tell if the person actually knows the material. In my experience, a certification will get you an interview. Thats it. Once you are there, it is up to you to show your potential employer that you have the knowledge. So regardless of what people say, how much they know and look down on certifications, you do need them.
Check job postings that reflect the position you which to move to. See what the prerequisites are. Do they ask for specific certs? Specific experience? Try and get them. This needs to be part of your plan. It is a basic road map on how to get where you want to be.
See if you can get experience with it at your current job. Want to get into networking? Ask your network engineer to let you help with basic tasks, or let you observe. You can use this as work-related experience, just don't lie about it. Buy some equipment to work with at home. That goes a long way to show you are serious. We hired a jr network admin at my old company who had no work experience, but setup his own network at home with a couple switches and routers. This gave him hands on experience above others who had a cert but no experience.
Set a time line. You need to set a time line in which you plan to have x certification completed, y certification completed, etc. Infact, a lot of people I know will purchase the vouchers ahead of time. This ensures they do not waste their money and put it off. As I said earlier, it is very easy to get complacent. Don't!
Entry level IT work is a bit unique in that there is a fine line of too long in your position, and not enough time. If you leave too quickly, it can come off as if you are job hopping, something didn't work out, etc. Can raise a few eyebrows. However, on the flip side, people are also going to wonder why you stayed in a Help Desk role for 7 years. Maybe you liked it, maybe you weren't motivated, maybe maybe maybe. You just don't know. It is a very fine line to cross. I would say the generally accepted time frame is 2 to 4 years. But you need to be able to map out some kind of growth.
So once you have been working in your entry position for a few years, completed a few certifications, received some experience etc... you need to apply for those jobs. You may not meet every qualification they are looking for, but don't be afraid to apply! The worst that could happen is that they don't call you.
I hadn't intended for my post to be this long, however... I just think it is important to have some kind of plan going forward, to at least guide you in a progressive motion. Don't expect anyone to come out of the wood works and says "Hey, I see you have been a Help Desk guy for 3 years. You automatically move up to be a System Admin." It won't happen unless you put in the work and effort. If you do not invest in yourself, a company will never invest in you.
