How to Become a Network Engineer

You have to be exposed to certain areas of IT Networking, take on specific roles, and be aware of how to advance at the workplace when mingling with various personalities and situations.

Great series on this was created on youtube by a CCIE. Here's the link >>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8x2sHIA2PQ&list=PLCA2DAEC05DFCAE98&index=9

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Paul6

Nice post. The hardest part of being new to IT is getting a vision of what an IT career looks like. The narrator does a good job of providing an overview.

egrizzly

Paul6 wrote: »

Nice post. The hardest part of being new to IT is getting a vision of what an IT career looks like. The narrator does a good job of providing an overview.

Yes, he goes further than that to show you a path, which is what a lot of new folks on this board have asked for.

Chitownjedi

I've been on long spells trying to get a networking gig twice now.. once in 2012 and once now.

My opinions on the networking field (MY OPINION) is this.

It's very difficult to get into, not because of technical ability, not because of extreme skill requirement, but because of politics and an almost "frat" like aura that surrounds it.... plus supply/demand

I too many times see 3 years of experience or a CCNP is the minimum requirement for a entry level networking engineering positions. And it's frustrating. I just finished my CCNP route, and was going to move on to Switch, but after looking for the last 3 months, it's the same stuff happening that happened in 2012. I see job after job after job flooded with candidates that have 3+ years of experience for jobs being advertised as entry level. One Jr. Network Engineer position I applied for had 581 applications submitted for it in 1 week. So of course they can ask for 3 years of experience and a CCNP then.

The other part is that people are calling system engineering positions, network engineering positions, as the job descriptions are usually 80% System stuff, and they want basic "Know TCP/IP, know some routing protocols, and troubleshoot vpn clients." To me that's not a network engineer, and I do that in/on Desktop.

But on the other side, (even though I really dislike Windows Desktop Engineering because I find it extremely boring and not challenging) to getting flooded with calls for more Managing Jobs just because I know what a SLA is (thanks ITIL.) I would hope I wouldn't need 2 more full CCNP's to grab an entry lvl Network Engineering position, but unfortunately, my 'Network' isn't there.... so i can't just have my resume put on a HR managers desk by a friend or associate and get the interview I deserve.

It just seems that Networking requires a helluva a lot more work than actually makes sense right now. I even told everyone I'd be willing to go as low as 55,000 to get into the Networking field, but was currently at $93,000 managing Desktop Engineers. 4x now I've had a recruiter call back and say "They have soo many applications that if they do a second round of interviewing that you will go in that group... or they wanted a few more years of experience with you doing only networking." So it's really hard right now in Chicago Land.. I don't know about everywhere else... but I've started to let my recruiters know I'd be open back up to Managing or Sr. Desktop Engineering (*gag*). I thought about putting the CCNP on hold, but I'll finish it, as it's what I find interesting, but wow.... its definitely kills motivation. Especially when folks are knocking my door down to do AD/SCCM/ or Manage with decent$$$$... I want Networking...

Good videos though....

LinuxNerd

It appears your solution is to move from Chicago.

From my research there appears to be a lot of IT jobs in Texas.

Ultimately if you want that great job, it requires moving anywhere, including Kansas.

There are endless opportunities if you can create them. It's a simple as putting all your belongings in storage and living in short term furnished condo's in your target area of employment. At least, that's how I view things, opportunities.

Heero

Yeah, Chicago is not a great IT market. Once you are already in networking it's not bad finding different networking jobs, but the entry level networking jobs are pretty scarce compared to some of the tech hotspots around the US.

Chitownjedi

LinuxNerd wrote: »

It appears your solution is to move from Chicago.

From my research there appears to be a lot of IT jobs in Texas.

Ha.. I've literally been planning on moving to Houston or Austin since 2012 because of that very reason... but every time it gets close to making the move, i get a "Full Time Opportunity, that I hope turns into the one," then .. merger, outsource, yada yada...lol you are right lol. No doubt.

LinuxNerd

Chitownjedi wrote: »

Ha.. I've literally been planning on moving to Houston or Austin since 2012 because of that very reason... but every time it gets close to making the move, i get a "Full Time Opportunity, that I hope turns into the one," then .. merger, outsource, yada yada...lol you are right lol. No doubt.

Well you have great experience so I'm sure you'll land that job you want eventually. Keep it up.

6502

I think I'm going to give the move to networking a shot in a year or so. I'd at least like it to be the majority of my work. Of course it could just be a case of the grass being greener. I've always enjoyed working with switches, routers and firewalls. I'm burnt out on Windows environments.

RomBUS

Interesting video

He hit the nail on the head on some points such as paying attention to different personalities in the networking field
I do have to disagree on the fact that he said there are SO many opportunities in the network engineering field. As I see it it's hard to get into (no one wants to gamble on someone without certain experience) and its so saturated around here