ccnp with 6 months experience

Hello everyone,
I just started to work for a Cisco reseller as an cisco engineer basically testing every piece of enterprise level Cisco hardware you can think of along with cme. The commute is getting to expensive its a little over an hour away and gas is killing me. I know I can't do this commute long term. My question is do you think with 6 months experience and I earn my ccnp will it be enough to get a junior network engineer position somewhere else?

Thanks in advance

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Roguetadhg

that's not a lot of experience. However, working as a Cisco reseller, it might balance out.

networker050184

What do you mean by testing? Do you just turn it on and make sure it works, or are you actually doing functionality testing? I guess it would depend on what you have to put on your resume and how well you can sell it.

Legacy User

Yes I know 6 months isn't alot my original plan was to stay for 2 yrs but idk.. Testing as I set routers n switches on racks connect to PC and access server doing load tests checking stack ports all through cli.

With IP phones I'm just turning it on through Poe to see if they turn on. Then clear old configuration, I register it with call manager and see if I can make a call in my local lan. Ill be supporting his backbone router basically break fix when connectivity goes down but that's once in a blue.

I see you all have different time zones where you guys from.

networker050184

Not really sure if that experience alone will land you something engineering wise, but definitely some great experience and an excellent start. I'd start applying to jobs you like and let them be the judge.

I'm in Northern Virginia.

Legacy User

Yea I know ill know the hardware really Well and the ccnp will fill any ccna gaps I have. I won't be looking for a senior position more so a junior position.

I'm from Jersey.

nel

if i were you, and i worked for a reseller/partner, i would stick with them because you could have potential openings to move up and work with cisco gear at a decent level engineering wise. If not, i would stick it out to gain at least a years experience, it will look better that way.

Networker is right, your in a good starting position. If i were you indicate to your boss that you are going to study for your NP and ask if you could be exposed to more config/design/engineeering topics further up the chain to help your development etc. Put all this in a good stead so it comes across that you arent p'd off and you want to advance.

No offence, but one hours commute is the norm at least for most people and trust me, gas prices in the UK are far worse than the US. My commute is an hour and its currently £1.31 a litre of petrol (unleaded gas). You guys could probably buy a gallon for what we pay.

Legacy User

No offense taken not sure what the equivalent of What your paying for is but it's $3.50gallon here. It increases everyday. But as far as moving up to advance I work for a small place that's been in business for 15 years. They don't do client designs or installs not sure if they plan to since they're expanding with more staff.

I mean as far as Cisco gear I'm the Guy noone else above me. I'm a one man show. That's why I just want to get the exposure with the equipment cert up and get out.

kmcintosh78

My 2 cents???
The commute may kill you, but look to ways to help minimize it. Look to carpool, public transit (Yeah I know, yuk) or van pools.
It sounds like the position is good, and what you will learn will be valuable.
Start off by learning how to write technical documents, like testing policy and such. Create ones that stream process already in place.
By doing this, you will demonstrate your knowledge and ability to apply the knowledge.
It also seems that you will get your hands on a lot of different device types and models. Learn them.
But, doing a 6 month stint at a company and then moving on will look bad to a new employer.
2 months per course I think is hard pressed, but that may just be for me. Job, Family, Kids and so on.
If you are single and committed to it, you can probably do it.

With that said, what are you doing posting here? Go get your courses done

Legacy User

Kmcintosh I like your style

yea 6 months might look bad ill stick it out for a year or so. Now the fun begins let the ccnp road begin.

kmcintosh78

dmarcisco wrote: »

Kmcintosh I like your style yea 6 months might look bad ill stick it out for a year or so. Now the fun begins let the ccnp road begin.

Trust me, jumping around may benefit for a little gain, but it does look bad.
I think a year to complete is a good time frame. I was shooting for a year for the whole CCNP, but my company gave we a training money cap.
So, Router is this year. Switch is next and so on.

spicy ahi

Good luck with your pursuit! I know economics can be tough (I live in Hawaii where EVERYTHING is expensive) but as kmcintosh suggested, you just have to find ways to minimize the hit. Not discouraging you by any means to pursue CCNP, but want to frame a good rule of thumb for certifications that has served me well in my career.

Usually, I look at jobs that look interesting to me and jot down the requirements (certs, years experience, etc.) and try to draw a map of desired certifications for my area. Then I look at which ones I can do within my limits (budget constraint, time frame, etc.) and lastly which ones I can get my employer to reimburse (usually certs that have to deal directly with my job position) From there, the list is usually narrowed down to one or two certs and then I plug away at it. For example, I went through that analysis and came up with CCNA: Security and CISSP as being the best bang for my buck in terms of the local job market here at this time. That way, you'll have certs that are sought after by the local market, possibly reimbursed by your current company (read: free test) and assuming that you've looked at the positions with your years of experience (1-2 years for you I'm thinking. Correct me if I'm wrong) you'll have pretty much all of the requirements for the jobs you targeted.

As for your current position, I agree with the others. Tough it out while you go through the process I mentioned above and by the time you've earned those target certs you'll probably have the right certs and year(s) of experience for any and all of the jr. network positions in your area!

Legacy User

Thanks spicy very insightful

Legacy User

Actually for junior net engineer positions I haven't ever seen ccnp as a requirement. Just asking for ccna knowledge n experience supporting the product and mainly voip, vpn, asa experience. But I want the ccnp for self acheviement n knowledge.

blackninja

I'm a contractor so I jump about and it's no bad thing. Just don't jump about with permanent positions - doesn't look good on CV

Try and get a contract position, easier to get, money good and can jump about freely.

I'm in the north east of the UK and I've only ever seen one junior networking position come up in the last year or two.
In my experience most junior LAN positions are filled by keen desktop support analysts that have a CCNA, I'm training one that does 50/50 networks and desktop.
Or a friend of a friend gets the job.

I've never seen a junior position at an ISP advertised in UK and with being a contractor I keep an eye on the job boards.

I think that networking is the hardest IT sector to break into, but best of luck

P.S. I'd go for some other CCNA's and wait until you've some good experience before the CCNP, as i think CCNPs are expected to be long in the tooth.

Legacy User

kmcintosh78 you mentioned learning how to write technical documents, like testing policy and such. Create ones that stream process already in place. How do I go about learning how to do that.

kmcintosh78

I started by writing step by step processes for competing certain tasks.
Like "How to configure a VLAN" and so on.
I have also written several for an ISP I worked for. Those were step by step for Field Techs on how to login to a TFTP server, pull a customer config and load it to the Adtran/Cisco Router. Plus I did one for the Sales Staff on how to perform Sight Surveys.
It is all about breaking the task down to steps. Once you can do that, and put it to paper, it should help you with remembering the process as well.
It truly is all about muscle memory. Especially CLI.

Legacy User

You guys were right as far as mentioning my interest in ccnp to my boss. We had a 45 minute conversation about What he has plan for me. He wants me to get it all. Ccnp, ccvp, mcitp ea, Unix server cert and he said at some point ccie. He will pay for training and exams. He plans on offering site support to customers. In 3 months. He wants me to convert the office to voip. He provided me with the lab to practice on.