How Long Were You in IT Support?

So I hit my three years of full time tech support in June (I did part time work for awhile, but that never seemed to get me anything so I just forget it). As I hit that milestone it reminded me how much I dislike doing it. The challenge is gone, I generally feel that I have little to no impact, and the university ties our hands on a lot of things so I am truly just a desk side support person. At what point were you able to make the jump to a better position? I realize there is support work in IT regardless of position, but I really want out of the "My printer won't print" and "update my Flash player". Plus I'm hoping for a salary bump....

Find more posts tagged with

Save $250 on 2025 certification boot camps from Infosec!

Book now with code EOY2025

Button

Comments

Iristheangel

After one year and four months for me. I ended up jumping ship and taking a contract security gig for double what I was making at the time

Roguetadhg

Have you been putting your resume in places? You're an smart enough to get out of that hole.

I can understand your feelings of the challenge is gone. With so much red-tape it feels cramped. I was considering picking up contracting work on the side just go get out and about.

shodown

1 year at 1 job at Tier 1
9 months at Tier 2 (moved into Sr Network Engineer after)
18 months at another Tier 3( moved into lead voice engineer after)

dadaji

@the_grinch - I understand what you are talking about as I am in the same boat. I have been doing this for 4 years now. I understand when you say that your hands are tied and can't do a whole lot of things. I work at a state university and the higher ups don't want you to step on other person's shoes for doing his job. Now there was a position open in the same university as a System Admin, I applied for that position, I was the only one eligible because I have bachelors but I don't have the required experience. I did not get the job but a friend of higher up's got it even though he does not have a B.S and not enough experience. This is the ultimate killer of motivation.
Sorry for the rant.

dave330i

Never. My first job had some end user support, but that wasn't my primary task.

Ether_4

Been at my current place for over 8 years. Keep getting the carrot dangled in front of me, to make sure I dont leave but I am not sure how much longer I can stick around for.

Roguetadhg

Ether_4: what 'carrot' is this?

RomBUS

I have been in IT support for just about as long as your Grinch but I've worked for different companies during this stretch (wasn't my fault just was let go for budget reasons) and haven't felt that I have gotten to that "mastery" level just yet where every task is not a challenge...of course you will have your easy ones like "I need flash player installed" or other basic ones but I still run into the problems where I would have to do more extensive research...whether its an unknown error code or a product I havent troubleshooted that much. What I am saying is maybe a change in scenary might do you some good where your decisions do matter and have more freedom to do what you want.

matt333

I've been working in IT support for a little over a year and what keeps me interested is going for certs. its a easy job and the pay is better then most so I'm happy. Red tape wasn't been to much of a problem for me at least, the companies that i have worked at always saw that I wanted more and helped me get there.

my advise would look for something else if you think nothing will change 4yrs you should be doing more then support, you deserve more.

ptilsen

It was almost exactly 24 months. After that, I transitioned to sysadmin roles. There was certainly still support involved and there still is to this day, but in decreasing amounts and generally only as a result of server or network problems or escalations.

My advice is almost always to get out of helpdesk, desktop support, deskside support, or whatever you want to call it, between the two and three year marks. If you can avoid it entirely, great, but most of the time that's not an option.

Akaricloud

I spent 3 years in Desktop Support, only because I was attending a university full time in a college town that really didn't have other opportunities for me. From that I took a temp Jr. Systems Administration position and then got hired on by a different employer as a full Systems Administrator.

Jackace

It's been 4 years total for me. 2 of those years were while I was in school and I did more than just help desk. We were the do everything IT for a group of users at the university. My current job takes help desk calls, but we do a lot more than that. We manage backups systems and network monitoring systems as well. Like many people here I enjoy working in IT, but I'm ready to move to a job that is not responsible for help desk level calls.

VAHokie56

I did 1.5 years in a wretched horrid awful call center, then 6 months ( got CCNA here) in desk side before I moved into a net engineer role...did I mention how bad that call center was? I did't ? ok it was really bad

wake

I've been doing help desk for a little over 2 years but I'm still in school (graduating this year) but it's always been part time work. I hope to land a better job after graduation.

Vik210

I did 1.5 year call center too! It wasn't that bad for me (except last 2 months) as I was working for DELL but there was hardly anything to learn after first month.
I was actually there in 2004-2005 time when DELL started charging $40 per hardware issue and $100 for software from out of warranty customers. Trust me I have never been abused so much in my life as I was in last 2 months of my job there! Thankfully I got hired as system admin and I resigned from DELL.

VAHokie56

Iristheangel wrote: »

After one year and four months for me. I ended up jumping ship and taking a contract security gig for double what I was making at the time

@Iristheangel
off topic but I was just looking at your photo album and your cat is kind of freaky looking...

snokerpoker

My first job was tier 1 tech support. I was there for about 20 months. With that being said, all of my jobs have had some support thrown in.

Roguetadhg

VAHokie56 wrote: »

@Iristheangel
off topic but I was just looking at your photo album and your cat is kind of freaky looking...

Thank you! Im not the only one! >.>

Instant Rep Givenith!

Keener

I have been in a support role similar to yours for about 7 1/2 years, but I have slowly progressed up.
* Started at level 1 - 13 months
* Straight Level 1 helpdesk when I moved from Columbia, MO to STL, MO - 9 months
* 2nd Level 12 months
* Helpdesk supervisor ~ 3yrs
* JOAT with some server support, ~20 months (took current position when moving from back from SC to MO)

I am now looking to move into Network/Systems Admin and working on MCSA now. I have an interview on Friday and some other good possibilities coming up. I am definitely looking to get out of the more day to day "MS Office" is not working role!

the_Grinch

Yeah I've been with three different companies in the past three years. My last job was with an MSP and I tended to do a lot of server work, but was still considered a helpdesk tech. Now I am purely a desk side support tech at what amounts to one of the schools within the university. Those of you who have been within a university system will understand what I'm talking about. Basically anything I need done from accounts to phones goes through the university level IT people. I handle anything school specific and desktop related.

I'm ultimately going to pump out my resume and see what happens. I like the people, but the job is just draining not enough big issues to tackle.

the_Grinch

Oh thanks for the replies!!!! (Meant to put that earlier)

MickQ

Sorry, I've never really done support as such since I've been in businesses that were either too small, or just didn't need someone doing it, as such. Instead, I would be the techie for the company and responsible for more. Basically, I company hopped around the place and got better titles and a better looking CV.

Jackace

Ether_4 wrote: »

Been at my current place for over 8 years. Keep getting the carrot dangled in front of me, to make sure I dont leave but I am not sure how much longer I can stick around for.

This is what my current company did when they hired me and what they continue to do to all of us. They dangle that carrot of possibly moving up, but when a job does open up they interview us all and then hire an external candidate. Many of us have done everything they asked to be qualified, but we lack the on the job experience and they keep using that as an excuse not to give us a chance to move up. After doing this 2-3 times now I'm done and ready to leave.

snokerpoker

Jackace wrote: »

This is what my current company did when they hired me and what they continue to do to all of us. They dangle that carrot of possibly moving up, but when a job does open up they interview us all and then hire an external candidate. Many of us have done everything they asked to be qualified, but we lack the on the job experience and they keep using that as an excuse not to give us a chance to move up. After doing this 2-3 times now I'm done and ready to leave.

You should def move on. No need to waste your time at a job like that. If they continuously do this, you don't want to work for them.

TLeTourneau

I skipped tier 1 altogether, started at tier 2-3 and have stayed there for the most part. I respect the people that do it, it has to be hell some days (not that the other stuff can't be, but at least I generally don't have to deal with the end-user).

NightShade1

None... in my actual work our company used to do tech support and i used to help with that really now and then... but my company is terminating all those contracts already... its a waste of time and well all the engineer here cost too much to have them doing that

paul78

@the_Grinch - good luck in your next steps and job search. It sounds like you have made the decision to move on. I personally enjoy the support side of IT, while I have been on the build side as a software engineer in the past, I found myself gravitating back to the support side.

I describe myself primarily as a joat and I prefer support primarily because the compensation has been better and my preference is for problem solving roles versus long-term strategy or design/build roles.

The big difference is that over time the people you support and the problems change. Instead of "my printer does work" turns to "my million dollar contract negotiation needs help" or "someone is attacking the website, please make it stop.".

Ether_4

@Roguetadhg I have been promised to become an exchange specialist as long as I get my exams done.

thronetm

Probably on the same boat

I do all sorts of calls from the "My printer is not working" to Server Side VPN/Exchange/Permission/Backup/DHCP/DNS etc. calls.

I pick up anything and do complete them myself but you always get the odd one where you go asking Google just as a guidance

I have been doing this for maybe 2 years now, to be honest I can't see myself at it for too much longer, I seem to be gradually growing out of it and when I look for another job in the future I doubt I will be looking for any Desktop Support roles.

Everyone

I was only on a Help Desk for all of about 3 months, then I got moved to a Systems Administrator role. Had several other roles over the years. Ended up back in support somewhat by accident (job turned out to be different than the description), tier 3 Messaging support this time, but only for 8 months.