Any network admins want to help me with one of my classes?

Long story short - I am currently going to a community college and one of my classes is asking me to do an interview with a person who does the job that I would like to have some day. This is for an explanatory paper and looks like it will involve roughly 15 questions. If there are any network administrators out there who would like to answer some or all of my questions, I would greatly appreciate your feedback.
Thanks (:

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SunnyRain

Also, I could post the interview questions in here for more than one person to respond to if that would be best...

earweed

Check your introductory email to get instructions on getting PMs enabled so they can PM you.

dynamik

SunnyRain wrote: »

Also, I could post the interview questions in here for more than one person to respond to if that would be best...

Post away.

Slowhand

By all means, post away. I'll be more than happy to answer any questions, as I'm sure most of the regulars on this board will. And we'll even try to keep it clean enough for you to actually use for your class project.

dynamik

Slowhand wrote: »

And we'll even try to keep it clean enough for you to actually use for your class project.

That's what your mom and sister said when I asked for assistance with my photography class.

SunnyRain

Thanks to anybody who can give me a hand here. I'm sort of heading into uncharted territory with this whole paper writing thing, but I think this is a great assignment to start out with. I've been sort of lurking around here for the past couple of months or so and think there is an amazing amount of skill and knowledge gathered together in this forum. The questions I came up with so far are:

1. What is a normal work day like as a network administrator?
2. What are some of the most stressful parts of the job?
3. What do you consider the most rewarding aspect of working in IT as a network administrator?
4. Do you ever take your work home with you (either to finish a task or just think about work related stuff)?
5. How much turnover do you typically see in your job?
6. What was the learning curve for you to learn your job?
7. How often should a network administrator re-certify or get additional training in order to stay current?
8. Are you glad you chose your profession? If not, what would be your idea job?
9. What is the most costly mistake you can make working as a network administrator?
10. Do you need to be versatile in knowing other aspects of the operation (either other aspects of IT or the workplace in general)?
11. Are there any parts of your job that you wish you could change or do differently?
12. What job duty do you like so much that you hope it never changes?
13. Do you have any fun at your job?
14. Do you plan to retire from this job, or is this just a stepping stone?
15. What advice would you offer to somebody who wants to get to where you're at? Any major do's or don'ts??

I checked and made sure my pms are working, so you can pm me info if you want. Feel free to answer or not answer whichever ones you want, or add any info I may have left out but probably shouldn't have. I'm pretty busy as I work full time (driving forklift) on top of taking classes, but I should be back on here tomorrow evening to check out thread and any pms.

erpadmin

By "network administrator", are you looking for guys dealing with router/firewall/net appliance gear? Or would you also want to hear from admins who deal primarily with servers/databases as well?

Xcluziv

dynamik wrote: »

That's what your mom and sister said when I asked for assistance with my photography class.

LOL...

earweed

#13 http://www.techexams.net/forums/off-topic/50671-office-pranks.html

Mojo_666

1. What is a normal work day like as a network administrator?
Quiet, if you get things working well things do not break, project time is busy but mostly I am monitoring stuff and tidying up.

2. What are some of the most stressful parts of the job?
Users and their unrealistic expectations.

3. What do you consider the most rewarding aspect of working in IT as a network administrator?
Learning

4. Do you ever take your work home with you (either to finish a task or just think about work related stuff)?
I do not take work home as such but I remote in from home to do out of hours work.

5. How much turnover do you typically see in your job?
In regards to staff or money?

6. What was the learning curve for you to learn your job?
Long and Slow, I worked my way up from the helpdesk, everything you do adds knowledge to your pool.

7. How often should a network administrator re-certify or get additional training in order to stay current?
Constantly...it never ends.

8. Are you glad you chose your profession? If not, what would be your idea job?
Yes

9. What is the most costly mistake you can make working as a network administrator?
Not having backups

10. Do you need to be versatile in knowing other aspects of the operation (either other aspects of IT or the workplace in general)?
Yes a good understanding of everything is useful

11. Are there any parts of your job that you wish you could change or do differently?
None I could think of.

12. What job duty do you like so much that you hope it never changes?
Hanging out on the internet when I have nothing to do.

13. Do you have any fun at your job?
Lots, I am a fun guy and I work with fun people.

14. Do you plan to retire from this job, or is this just a stepping stone?
I never stay anywhere for long really, I always seek something new and interesting.

15. What advice would you offer to somebody who wants to get to where you're at? Any major do's or don'ts??
You have to enjoy it or else do not bother (that applies to anything though not just IT) & don't forget your backups....ever

SunnyRain

erpadmin - right now I'm just trying to get a feel for networking jobs in general. I don't know for sure yet what part of the field I want to eventually delve into - so I guess you could say I am open to all input.

Thanks mojo. In terms of question 5, I was thinking more in terms of staff. Are people coming and going a lot? If so - is it typically due to them being asked to leave, or is it because they're moving on to other opportunities?