Getting the most out of your current role

I thought it would be good if more experienced people could post stories of how they were able to get the most out of their entry level role in terms of gaining tangible experience for their resume.

Any advice or experiences would be appreciated!

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Comments

cyberguypr

Years ago when I did desktop support tier 1/2 I would volunteer for the little mundane things no one wanted to do like rearranging wiring in closets. After that they would call me to help rack equipment or remove old stuff. I was able to learn a lot just shoulder surfing.

My advice would be that, offer to help out. A true IT professional will never be afraid of anyone trying to learn from them. Just be aware of the occasional douche who thinks you are on a mission to take his/her job.

Essendon

I concur with cyberguy about doing the boring things no one else wanted to do. I have been with my current company for over 3.5 years. When I first started here I was a desktop support guy doing 1/2 support issues. A few months into the gig the guy that did WSUS workstation updates loudly complained how boring, un-glorious and mundane WSUS patching was. Being the nice guy that I am, I offered to give him a hand with it. Seeing someone interested in doing something he considered boring, the guy handed over all of it to (gradually of course). I set up my own WSUS server at home, I'd work on my home lab after work. Apparently I did a good job with it, and at appraisal time it paid off dividends. I got moved into the Server team because 1). I was eager to learn 2). I was doing something server-related. And did I mention the bump in salary?

Offer to help the senior guys, dont overdo it though. You dont want to be too pushy either. Do not be afraid to do tasks that you may not have done before. If you are unsure of something, ASK. Never hurts to ask. You do not want to restart a production server accidentally.

N2IT

It can be challenging to be honest.

Be careful they don't take advantage of you, but by all means offer your services. The principal you should go for is proving you bring value to the company. Whether it's quantative or preception, you must get that point across.

For me personally I have sat over the shoulder of my boss and go over P&L statements, GPM, a lot of operational financials. I also sit in his office and discuss theory and best practices. We bounce a lot of different ideas off of each other and discuss ways to providing better services from a technicial and strategic overview. Another piece we picked up is going through the originizations road map and look at certains areas we can snap in process improvements and services.

kingslayer

Good posts, thanks guys.

I have a development background and am studying SQL so I would like to 'step up' and ask my bosses if I can help with report writing but I feel like they may not like the suggestion.

Anyone have any stories of where they offered to do things that were 'above' their role, how did your colleagues/bosses take it?

instant000

kingslayer wrote: »

Good posts, thanks guys.

I have a development background and am studying SQL so I would like to 'step up' and ask my bosses if I can help with report writing but I feel like they may not like the suggestion.

Anyone have any stories of where they offered to do things that were 'above' their role, how did your colleagues/bosses take it?

I'm not sure that you'd take anyone job by offering to write reports. (unless someone's there a report writer). But even considering that, there's always reports that need to be written.

also, you can take it from the point of view that if you know how the data is consumed, you can manage their databases better.

Besides, if you can produce a spreadsheet and show some fancy powerpoints, you'd be amazed how valuable that can make you all of a sudden! (kinda sarcastic, but true all the same

)

UnixGuy

1. Don't say "no" to any work, just accept the challenge and learn.

2. Be nice with experienced people, and try to stay with them and learn from them.

3. Remember, you are building experience so focus on that. Money comes later, just build your experience.

4. Try to certify on whatever technology you touch.

5. Always learn and do things in a lab environment (or on vm machines), this will make you stand out in the competition.