going into a senior position

happy420golucky · June 2011

What's up guys. Figured my experienced CCNP and above dawgs might be able to give some insight into this. I am up for a "Senior Position" at this new job. I never really had to be the go to guy before, although I do have experience and knowledge. I am trying to get ideas from others on what they do, and how things are, what to expect when you go from being the second man in charge to the man in charge. When I start thinking about things myself I feel a little overwhelmed. Thoughts?

redliviu · June 2011

1. Be calm and relaxed
2. Learn your infrastructure ( make diagrams, check the configs, learn from the colleagues, ask questions - a lot, know everything you need to know,and more)
3. When you know everything about your infrastructure, you'll feel what is the next thing that could go wrong.
4. Optimize it as much as you can, and are allowed (budget,experience and business needs)
5. Learn new stuff/certs and have fun.
6. Repeat steps 3, 4 and 5 or if you get bored move to a new job

Good luck on the new job

instant000 · June 2011

No need to feel overwhelmed at all.

If something goes wrong, and you have no idea of what the problem could be, start at Layer 1 first, and then work your way up.

If that fails, do a full audit, and the anomaly will turn up somewhere.

Make sure to have backups of configs, OS, and spare equipment, along with good SLA with EQ vendors for eq when it goes down.

This should allow the quickest resolution to any non-obvious problems.

I agree with the previous poster who mentioned the infrastructure map.

If you have the time to, start each day by doing a walk around the facility, so you can lay physical eyes on the eq, so if any issues spring up, you can get an idea on those, before it blows up.

Make sure that your change control process gets followed, this should minimize the "oh my gosh" moments, meaning that you have a good idea why the route to Chicago went down at 1:05, if the change was scheduled for 1:00.

Different people are motivated by different things. While consistency is important, it is also important to realize the differences between people.

Be as fair as possible.

Don't talk down to anyone. Everyone has something to contribute. Do not underestimate the ability of your people--give them opportunities to prove/improve themselves, within reason.

Lead by example. Don't let discouraging events get you down, and remain positive in the face of impending doom. Look at Layer 1 first, and go from there.

No one is perfect. Be able to admit your mistakes, and freely give credit to others when it is due to them.

Provide advice to others, as well as go to others for advice. People like feeling that they are contributing to the team.

EDIT: One more thing, if there is an outage, and a workaround is not available, then work on getting the vendor ticket opened from the beginning. If you happen to resolve the issue before the vendor gets support on line, big deal, but you're making it that much quicker to get the issue resolved. In some cases, the vendor may have seen this problem before, across their breadth of customers.

Hope this helps!

mikearama · June 2011

instant000 wrote: »

Be as fair as possible.

Don't talk down to anyone. Everyone has something to contribute. Do not underestimate the ability of your people--give them opportunities to prove/improve themselves, within reason.

Lead by example.

Socrates couldn't have said it better.

The lead man, from my experience, isn't separated from his peers by his knowledge (I have been a better technician than my superior for years... he's still lead), but by his ability to lead, motivate, inspire... and commend. Be an example of a great leader.

Panzer919 · June 2011

I had a similar feeling when I got in my current position. You just got to stay calm, learn the network from end to end, learn what does what, figure out what is not done correctly and adjust. Your going to make mistakes, we all do, just always try to create a back out plan and lab it up when ever you find yourself second guessing a decision.

Also, if your company offers to pay for any training take advantage of it.

Netstudent · June 2011

happy420golucky wrote: »

What's up guys. Figured my experienced CCNP and above dawgs might be able to give some insight into this. I am up for a "Senior Position" at this new job. I never really had to be the go to guy before, although I do have experience and knowledge. I am trying to get ideas from others on what they do, and how things are, what to expect when you go from being the second man in charge to the man in charge. When I start thinking about things myself I feel a little overwhelmed. Thoughts?

Heh, me and you both man. I just took a new job as Sr. Network Engineer myself for a large global enterprise after being a midlevel guy for several years. Now that I'm in, I can tell you what helped me. I took the time to talk to the Manager and Director behind closed doors, one on one, to get a feel for the other engineers, where they fit, what their backround is, and why they aren't hiring up from within. Then I found out who left the sr. position, and called the dude up just because I knew people where he went.

I got the skinny on some things, and went in well informed. Now I'm just taking time to learn the network inside and out, and working closely with the other engineers.

As others have stated, the Sr. guy isn;t necesarily about knowledge, its about dedication, being the leader, creativeness, and the guy that shows up no matter what, at any time of the day or night. Start off as a learning peer, and gradually position yourself to be the leader.

As long as you didn;t fudge your resume, the employers should know what you can do, and who you are. If you get hired, its for a reason, so go in with confidence, and knock it out.

happy420golucky · July 2011

Sorry for the late response back, but thank you to all the responses. I will say that I am definitely going to take a bit from each response and apply it. Right now I am awaiting to hear back from the PM about what's going on and get an official offer letter. I have already started talking with a few other friends that work in another department, that deal with the network engineers at this job. Also got a bit of a heads up what to expect as far as how complex this network is. (Which it seems more LAN focused than WAN.) So now I am playing the waiting game and brushing over things I have learned and lost, or just a bit rusty.

Cheers!

sides14 · July 2011

Boy....I really hope your PM has a networking background. I just got off of a project in which the PM had no clue what a network involves. Talk about painful.

going into a senior position

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