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To Recertify, or Not Recertify?
"The real fun and excitement was in the engineering department, and I was told the sure way in was to get my CCNA. Well I got my Sybex book, and with the help of our small lab (two Cisco routers and a catalyst switch) I received my CCNA with a [score over 90].
Thrilled as I was, the engineering department was taking some hits, and I couldn't get in. Instead of remaining stagnant I took it on myself to get my CCDA, which I got a month later. Engineering department still going down, me still wanting to rise, I looked for something else. At about this time my company was trying to get a contract working with Nortel routers and switches. 'This is my chance!', I proclaimed.
One and a half months later I was a NNCSS (Nortel Networks Certified Support Specialist), but then contract fell through. The engineering department was taking BIG hits (as was the rest of the networking industry), but I was determined. We only had one CCNP in the company, and my goal was set. With the help of the lab, and some determination, after three months I became a CCNP and CCDP.
Did I get in the engineering department?
Nope.
Did I give up?
Nope.
I got my CCIE study guide, and was all ready to rent time at a major Cisco lab at The University of Colorado, in Boulder (I am not even sure that they have this lab anymore). A month later there were two people left in the engineering department, and then was laid off.
After six months of unemployment checks and sending resumes, I gave up and decided to go back to school and do some independent consulting for some small businesses in the Denver metro area. Now, I am again looking for a full time job, and I am dealing with the same problems that I dealt with, two years ago.
I am happy to admit that all my hands on Cisco experience have not been in a production environment. I understand that the difference between the lab and the real stuff is huge. But the certs didn't, and still don't even get my foot in the door. My resume has been critiqued by many people, and is in tip-top shape. I do have experience on Gateways (Nomadix) and many switches (SMC) and have worked on some MDU engineering projects.
Any suggestions?"
One C/S degree > many certifications, and probably cheaper over the lifetime.
This is my sig.
Learn Hindi and move to Delhi. That's probably a better use of your time.
Go ahead. You won't get hired without it. Of course your next job will pay 50% less than what you're making now. Get the band back together too. Good for a couple hundred a week if you get good.
Vote Quimby!
In a slight misquote of the Bard... To Certify, or not To Certify, that is The Question...
Once your foot is sufficiently in the door, certifications mean little or nothing to hiring companies.
Don't waste your money.
Many jobs nowadays want X years of experience in lieu of Y certifications or Z years of schooling. A lot of IT management smartened up when they certification-mills pumped out losers with some theoretical knowledge but crumbled under practical pressure. You can thank the Dot-Bomb for that. The money-motivated didn't want to spend the time in school to learn the trade lest they get left behind so certification-mills filled a need: impatient people that wanted to make lots of money in the "new economy".
Thankfully a lot of those that were in it only for the money are unemployed (no insult to the submitter intended) or selling crap. Of course different parts of the world and different companies have varying policies so I have to stress YMMV!
Trolling is a art,
1. Post certifications and work-related experiences on a front page slashdot article, along with a plea for help.
2. ???
3. Profit!
11*43+456^2
Try to get a job with this allmost-expired certs. Maybee your next employer pays your study. You never know. If nobody wants you with this certs, get some new. Or whatever, its your choice.
I saw these rules posted on the door of the geek compound.
During my 11 month unemployment spree I could say one thing for sure. My certs didn't mean shit in the workplace. People just wanted on the job experience, same thing with formal education. The same questions always prevailed, "Do you have any work experience?" I won't bash certs that badly as my curent workplace is offering to fully certify my ass for free... Now, final note, none of this rings true for CCIE's.
It's the future of America. I'm not really joking.
I work in a two man IT department at a factory. My pal and I realize that this is the last of the gravy train. When these jobs end because of corporate restructuring or the factory moving to Mexico we will most likely never work in the Tech industry again.
in my experience, certifications don't mean that much.
What they do mean, is that someone is booksmart enough to sit there and study the material, go in, and take a test. They don't mean the individual can actually fix anything.
In any technical job, be it mechanical or information, the fundamentals of troubleshooting and resourcefulness are far more important than any piece of paper.
i put alot more stock in good references and job experience than certs..
ALL THAT SAID THOUGH:
HR and employers are still waking up to the facts mentioned above. so no matter what the reality is with certs, the problem remains; how can you prove yourself a good technician if you can't get hired.
companies are getting better at recognizing intrinsic skill rather than going whats on a resume, but that has a long way left to go.
i didn't get any certs tho, because i refuse to pay money for something i don't need. i can do my job just fine without a piece of paper to help me along, heh.
I know you're probably not interested and I can't blame you but look into getting you Microsoft Certified Sysstems Administrator cert instead of recerting on your Cisco. Makes you more well rounded and it's 4 easy tests. Plus you already know what you're doing w/ Cisco products and your experience will count. :)
Also, don't you mean you got a 900 on the CCNA? Not a 90
This guy is way out there
You won't get hired without it. Of course your next job will pay 50% less than what you're making now.
funny, I didn't have any Cert's when I hired in I was hired over certified people and I was able to command more money before accepting the job.
I would guess what you say is true if you have zero expierience, but it's 100% false when you have 15+ years in IT and IS and can demonstrate that fact right there in the interview.
now? I run the department and WILL NOT hire anyone that is certified, I only hire people with expierience.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
To me I would think that a college degree is about the same as certifications. When I get my degree at least I won't have to come back and renew it, only maybe the occasional refresher course to keep me updated on new technology. Even then I'm hoping that my employer will at least go halfers on it with me. But don't get me wrong I'm not cutting down certifications. I would have almost gone that route rather than paying $30,000 to go to RIT (At least there would be more girls and I wouldn't be freezing my nuts off every winter). Might be cheaper in the long run?? I shall never know...
Even a stopped clock gives the right time twice a day.
I'm in the precise same boat, cert-wise - 5 months away from expiry of my CCNP/DP, and no desire to recert in them. But, I'm going ahead and taking the CCIE written anyways because it's the next logical step, IMHO. After taking the written, you have 18 months to schedule the lab, and 24 months to actually take it. Insofar as I know, the passing of the written doesn't confer recertification on the NP/DP, but it's at least as hard as those recert tests.
And for all of those saying don't waste your time/money on the CCIE, please familiarize yourself with the job landscape pertaining to CCIEs - there's quite a bit of demand, from what I can see, and very little in the way of CCIE certified candidates (that do not work for Cisco). I'd say that the CCIE is the top vendor certification available at the moment, in terms of need/desire by employers.
Consider this...when the I.T. industry makes a turn for the better (this year) what will set you apart from the thousands of other I.T. folks looking for a job? That's right..either that huge port wine stain on your melon...or certification. I honed my skills in a networked environment of over 6000 workstations, in a help desk situation. If I would have had my act together and gotten certified during that time, I would be in a much different place than I am right now. I'd say go for keeping your certification current as that will show potential employers that you follow through and that even though you've been unemployed in your chosen field, at least you're passionate enough about the work that you've kept up on certs... my2cents
Money not found! A)bort, R)etry, D)eclare Bankruptcy
But not because you think it will get you a job, it won't. The days when people were hired in IT because they carried the right bits of paper are gone and dead. These days you get hired because you're the only person available who can solve a critical issue, solve an impossible problem, or otherwise convince your potential employer that hiring you will save him money and tears.
Certification is a commodity and commodity jobs have been shipped overseas.
So, it would be better to do some research in a few prospective companies to see what kinds of essential IT skills they are short of, then go and get some practice in that area. Arm yourself with a skill an employer is actively seeking and you might get the job. One more certificate (or even a CS degree!) won't mean squat.
Ceci n'est pas une signature
The year I took studying for the 7 MCSE/W2K exams was a year I will never get back, and it's gotten me exactly nowhere. I actually had tech industry background and experience. Most of the people in my "class" didn't. The day before my appointment for test #5 of 7 was 9/11. That basically sealed our fate.
MCSE on W2K3 Server? No fucking way. Redmond can pound sand.
My suggestion: start studying nursing. They can't outsource that job yet...although the anime Roujin-Z suggests that perhaps eventual outsourcing to cyber-nurse beds might be in the cards for the future. Same with teaching. You can't dial in a teacher from Bangalore...at least not yet.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
I think that tech certifications are not very useful: they have an extremely limited lifetime and are usually relatively expensive.
I strongly recommend to get non-technical certifications and titles. While an CCNE, MSCE or NZTSGREF is only valid for 2 years, a Ph.D. or Mensa membership is for life.
And both are usually much cheaper than those exams - for the Ph.D. you could get an industry sponsored topic, earning you money, experience and sometimes even patents. And Mensa membership cost just 30 (US) bucks.
And there are much more such certifications like MS or MBA in different scientific areas out there.
And it usually pays off if you have an higher academic title than your boss.
Owner of a Mensa membership card.
your links don't work. plz fx k thx.
I would say not, unless you are at a level where you could realistically get some high-level security certs or something really rare like a top-tier BICSI cert. Those aside, I just don't think they're worth it. I'm not going to renew mine.
I know that a lot of CS people have really suffered over the last few years, from the economy, but I think that maybe it's your location. Why don't you get recertified and consider relocating to a state where the certification is in high demand? If that isn't an option, I would weigh the costs and benefits in CO- are there solid companies who will appreciate your recertification? I can't believe that the CS need is so low that the Professors were let go-sad! Good luck in making your decision.
Jax
From the sound of your plea, your certifications have done basically nothing for you thus far, so my question back at you is: what has your certification done for you?
Laugh while you can, monkey-boy!
Other than that, no jobs means no jobs - I know quite a few people that having lost their job started builg up their accreditation portfolio to no avail. But the silverlining is that when the job market tunrs around (and it has not yet AFAIC), those with more credentials will be much better off.
I'm sure you've heard the expression, "One definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results". You keep getting these certs and still fail to get the job you want. Maybe you need to pursue another type of education, another company, or another field altogether.
Sounds like A+ got you in the door. I have that cert. I was in your position sort of. Bought the books for CCNA about the time things started going to hell. I quit studying for it. One good thing about A+ is that it doesn't expire. You should have gotten a Net+? Maybe you should get a Security+ now.
Nope.
Did I give up?
Nope.
I got my CCIE study guide, and was all ready to rent time at a major Cisco lab at The University of Colorado, in Boulder (I am not even sure that they have this lab anymore). A month later there were two people left in the engineering department, and then was laid off.
Lemme get this straight? You didn't give up by throwing more money at the problem? I don't like this, get some more work as a senior network technician and take on more responsibility. Offer your services if this is what you really want to do because you know what? Someone really likes to do that. And if they don't they're as good as gone. For some odd reason, I don't here many pre-CEOs griping about what documentation they seem to need to present to get the job. Oh, that's right. They take an initiative and get the damn work done. Hmm, not saying your lazy, but if you have the skills, maybe you could being doing it in your free time as consulting. Yeah you need a life too right? (obl) Ahh, the dilemmas of psuedo-geeks ... to live or ... wait ... there's an option outside technology?!?
Hey man, nothing against you, but just go out and be happy. If this makes you happy, then golly gee, start up your own business. Initiative. A computer geek in this day and age is all about being social. Good luck!
I wouldn't say that certs are completely without value. They sere two fundamental values. First, as a pre-screening criteria for hiring managers, they know that you have, at least, passed a minimum skills test. Second, when the decision is down between you and another person, with your resumes laying side-by-side, the certifications are going to come up as bonus points. Plus, and this is equally important, you can safely bet that the other applicant has certifications.
That said, I wouldn't get too stressed about renewing. I've yet to meet a hiring manager that has asked if a certification was still "valid".
Good luck in your search.
Ryosen
One man's "Troll, +1" is another man's "Insightful, +1".
Learn Hindi, get a tan, learn to appreciate the third world, hairy chicks, funky music, and move to India to where the jobs are.
The pool is smaller, and it's harder to stay in. My company is interviewing right now, and people in your boat are a fair chunk of the applicants. In our opinion, the certificate isn't as important as what's in your head -- if your cover letter is well written, says you've been studying the things we need you to know, and demonstrates that you read the job posting and are sincerely interested in doing the work (as opposed to getting paid), then you'll probably get an interview. Expect to be grilled on what you've said you can do though: saying you know Perl because you've run some scripts written by other people is going to get you escorted to the door.
I would seriously evaluate your interest in IT though -- if you love geeking out so much that you spend personal time on it, you'll probably be able to find a spot somewhere out there, though it may be an insultingly entry-level position. If you can afford to do so, would you take it and try to claw your way back up? With the exception of salespeople, everyone I know who preferred doing something else with their evenings is doing something like selling insurance or waiting tables. Harsh, but there it is -- maybe the world needs more CPAs than MCSEs.
"Nothing was broken, and it's been fixed." -- Jon Carroll
i personally wouldnt see anything wrong with keeping the cert on your resume for a short time after it expires, assuming that you actually know the stuff. afterall, a cert is just a piece of paper that says you know something, right? plus, networking technology doesnt seem to change as drastically as a lot of other things in IT. the difference between a network engineer who was certified today vs one that was certified 5 years ago is probably a lot smaller than say... a mcse for nt vs a mcse for w2k. just remember to renew the cert when the market picks up and you have some extra money.
Gyrate Dot Org - "Where high-tech meets low-life"
i mean 90% of the crap on the CCNA is useless anyways in a modern IT job.
I'd rather see you get more certs and more experience than just renewing the same old shiz.
Remember that expenses for education to get yourself re-employed (books, classes, certification testing, etc.) are all tax deductible.
Recently I was unemployed (given I already have a 4-yr degree and 10+ years of experience) and decided to re-up my MCSE. I spent $7000 and 2-weeks to go to one of the many MCSE bootcamps (http://www.intenseschool.com). I got a job immediately following signing up for the class and the company paid me while in class.
The kicker here is we recently went to the family CPA and he said all $7000 was tax deductible plus all the materials needed to complete any certification.
Just my $.02. Good Luck
Having a degree opens many possibilities that weren't there before, including higher-level technical management positions. Even if your future company scales back to 5 techs, they'll still need someone to manage them.
I myself would not put a high school graduate into a management position unless there were extenuating circumstances.
Look and see who is hiring what kind of people in the place you want to live. If you see something there you want to do, THEN get certified and/or qualified and do that.
Geeks get hung up on what they *want* to do. Jobs are about doing things for other people. Find out what the people want, where you want to be and do that. Anything else is insane.
Networking is down because the market is saturated, supply exceeds demand. The same is true of Mathematical Programming (what I love to do). So I do Enterprise Programming. Much less interesting, but people want/need it, so I can make a living doing it (even that used to be easier though).
If Enterprise Programming goes down the tubes (read off-shore competition), then I will find something else. That's life.
...thanks to all those "Got a pulse? Then you can be an MCSE in 6 weeks!" ads that replaced "Learn to drive the big rigs!" commercials on daytime TV, starting during the dot-com boom.
Those cert-mills deluged the job market with people that can barely spell "MCSE" but somehow managed to achieve the certification.
...is teaching. Break out of the rut that takes your valuable labor and converts it to ready cash for company executives that simply don't give a shit about you. You have had a great opportunity to see the world of networking from the inside. Isn't it time you passed the torch onto others?
You cheapen the value of your knowledge and time by entertaining thoughs of going back into industry. There are always going to be people in this world content to work for someone else. You can take what you know and leverage it into a new career in education. Sure, the pay's not what you would get in industry, but you will have enough extra time on your hands to start a consulting business on the side. Between your consulting income and teaching salary, you stand a strong likelihood of earning more than you did when in industry. (Plus, teaching is often an added badge of credibility to prospective clients. Ignore the adage of "Those who can, do...those who can't teach." This is the mantra of those who can't do either.)
Work smart, not hard.
Applying for a new job, OTOH... The certs imply that you have the book knowladge. But unless it is a consulting firm (where they have to "resell" you), then the certs themselves again, mean nothing. Choosing beteween someone who has worked with X product for years, and someone who has read a book and managed to pass a test, who would you choose?
This is not to say that certs in general are bad. But to some people/companies they dont mean anything. And I suppose that given otherwise identical canadates, someone who dosent care about certs would likely choose the guy with them.
One of the historical problems with certs is that they have been used as a marketing/mind share tool. Back in the day, becoming a Netware 3.x CNA was trivial. MCSE and CCNA today is the rage. Novell has "fixed" their education program, and even the one exam CNA's from 4.x on has been fairly good. But the damage was done. Today, everyone makes fun of MCSEs. And personaly, even being unemployed, I wouldnt wipe my ass with an A+ cert.
I think in your case, someone is fucking with you. Maby its just some lowly worker bees having some fun, and maby your company is just evil. But I would be looking for a way out.
No set of skills meets every employer's wants. Particularly in view of the job exporting craze that is in full swing now, being able to COMMUNICATE in grammatically correct English gets you lots of points when you're an otherwise technically overweighted person. I went from technician to tech manager at a solid financial services company in four years because I could research projects, work up a presentation for execs and directors, and lead implementation. My boss took credit for my work for a long time, but eventually she was exposed. Wanna know what my credentials were before I landed that entry-level job? I had a BA in journalism/PR, 10 years of retail management, an MCSE, and a fairly good grasp of the bash shell. Be strong technically, yes - - but show that you're more than that. It will get you attention in this day and age when so many geeks can't put together a proper sentence.
It's only funny until someone gets hurt. Then, it's hilarious.
Most of the best techs I work with have no certs. They got where they are becasue of what they know.
Saying Java is nice because it works on all OS's is like saying that anal sex is nice because it works on all genders.
The big reason to get any cert is because you see a series of jobs that specifically state you need the cert AND you are underqualified for the position. The certs will get your foot in the door, but your personality has to get you the job. If you're qualified, certifications don't help or hurt- they're like a mole on your back that people will be aware of only when you tell them they exist.
However, if you are targeting a company like Microsoft or Cisco for employment, get the certs! These companies are going to want to hire people that are:
- familiar with their solutions
- compentent/experienced enough for the position open
Companies this large tend to want folks who can help dogfood their tools and improve them. Additionally, dogfooding means that you save these groups plenty of cash- A microsoft tester who knows java is probably going to loose a position to a tester with an MCAD- who will in turn design and implement MS-based solutions rather than trying to evangelize some Javabeans solution.I made the cert choices I did because I wanted to be in Information Security, I looked in some books and I decided I'd mirror the certs of the authors of these texts. The only thing left that I'd like to get in terms of a certification is an MCSD, but that's only if I am trying to get employed at Microsoft. If my next job is one that will be long term and give me the flexibility, then I'm going to target a Masters degree, because really, what's the point in getting another technical certification if I will acquire the experience that should equal an MCSD?
Will I renew my certs? Probably only the CISSP. How else do you convey to people that are mystified by the shamanistic ways of Hackers that Yes, I am the guy that can help keep them out. A big fat badge on your chest that says 'CISSP' makes those who don't understand feel safe. A 'CCNA' badge? meh... networking equipment will only get easier to use- The days of the Network Engineering team are starting to fade. These guys will be blue collar and unionized in another 10 years.
Ummm... most people look at Mensa membership as an indication that you haven't come to terms with being beat up on the playground in school by kids who were dumber than you. I'd probably qualify for it, but even if it was free, and something posessed me to join, I sure as hell wouldn't put it on my resume. Every experienced employer knows that being smart is not a very good discriminator for job performance, beyond simple qualification.
WARNING: there is a trojan on your
Decent living, can't export, plenty of fun stuff at Source Forge, the possibilty to expeience immeasurable joy when handing an outrageous bill to your ex-boss on Christmas Eve. I chose carpentry for my new life but I realize now that the money is in plumbing,
I met a guy who had been working in tech for several years. He then lost his job and sent out 200 resumes. He didn't get a job and found himself competing against people with 20 years experience for jobs.
He decided to give up on tech and lent some money out to open a liquor store. Now he makes tons of money, far more than he did in programming, and the work is easy. For instance, he went to Costco, bought $900 worth of Champagne and sold it for $5000 on New Years. He's putting in an underground cofee shop just like he did in his native Lithuania. Sorry guys, tech is a graveyard right now and unless you're really good you should explore other careers. If there's another dot.com boom come back but otherwise it isn't worth it.
You're full of it. Experience is the the key to finding a job. You can still command a decent salary too if you've to the hands on knowledge to back it up. Every job I've had has been higher paying than the one before it. Even when I got laid off from a Telco back in early 2002 I still kept my head above water for 6 months doing small contract jobs or selling laptops that I had refurbished. I did all that without one damn cert or a CS degree. I'm going to college now, at 32, but I'm not majoring in CS. I'm majoring in Business.
There is nothing inherently safe about liberty. That's why so many people died protecting it.
This query paraphrases the resurgent question in the IT world as to the relative value of technical certifications in today's market. Can anyone contest that IT/IS job market in Silicon Valley is worlds away from those in sparsely populated regions of the midwest? Bearing this in mind, surely we can't assign a universal value to any certification, so how can anyone definitively answer mckeefarley's question?
I'd like to cite a couple of cases to illustrate this point further, in case it's helpful to anyone. My cousin and I work in related IT fields and we occasionally compare notes between our respective job markets. He possesses several major tech certs, including CCNA, MSCE, CNA, A+, Network+, et al. He reports that in San Diego, the IT job market is so competitive that many employers prequire MCSE certificaiton for Level 1 Help Desk positions. A November 2003 slashdot article addressed a similar sort of brass employment strategy.
In other markets, a certain certification is assigned an unusually high value. In southwest Michigan, for example, the IBM AS/400 enjoyed great popularity for years. Regardless of how this came to be, it created a market that strongly favored certified AS/400 Professional System Administrators and certified RPG programmers, while those certified in competing UNIX platforms found the job market relatively thin.
This unpredictability has caused me to favor certifications that don't expire (especially CompTIA's) whenever possible.
First-Generation American's Job Taken By His Father
READING, PA -- Miguel Martinez, 48, who immigrated to the U.S. 30 years ago, last week lost his leather-cutting job at GST AutoLeather, Inc. to his 66-year-old father Roberto. "I came to this country in 1974 to make a better life for my family," Martinez said Monday. "But in December, they moved the factory where I've been working for 22 years down to Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. I love my father, but that damn beaner stole my job." Martinez's $18-an-hour duties will now be performed by his father for $7 a day.
I'm going to be wearing a hockey mask when I go off on everyone...
Take job that's related to your field. Any job. No matter how low the salary.
I have been on the hiring end several times, and let me tell you that nothing looks worse on your resume than not working for a significant length of time, even if you're busy working on getting more certifications.
If you can't find employment in your field, then start your own company and offer on-site network support for local businesses at a very low price. It might not earn you a lot of money, but you'll be gaining credibility as a self-directed, self-motivated go-getter and IMHO that's worth more in your resume then just piling up certifications.
Good Luck.
So far, all you've succeeded in doing is making money for the people who run the study courses and who hand out the certs. Seems to me you ought to turn that around and look for a job teaching some of those study courses. Your lack of production experience shouldn't be much of a problem because everyone knows the old adage, "those who can do, those who can't teach."
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
I would concetrate on doing more in the job you r in at the moment than worrying about certification.
Nobody is hired simply because of degrees that much any more. What matters is what you accomplished at your last job and your job references.
So concentrate on networking and expanding your responsibilities in leadership roles in the organization you are in now.
That is something I look for in a resume and I don't even look at the education sections anymore, at least for Senior positions.
Besides, increasingly education means you just have more money than the regular sod out there to sit around and go to class all day long, without having to work. School is great, but it is has no bearing if you have 20 years of IT experience and great references.
Try and do more with management and planning.
IT in general though in the US, along with computer technology jobs are going away, so long term if you do get a job, I would consider health care retraining.
We need nurses, and lots of them. We need even more doctors too. There are people, believe it or not going back to school to be a doctor at the age of 35...
There will always be sick people, and there won't be any cures, because managed care/drug companies frown on that sort of thing. (Hurts long term profits if you cure people rather than keep them doped up constantly.)
-Hack
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
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Then you can decide what kind of certs your employees will need to work for you.
Also, expand your skills horizontally. That is, rather than continue to increase your specialization in one thing, learn some new skills that will compliment those you have. This will make you more valuable to prospective employers, and it will make you a better entrepeneur (if you start your own business.) So maybe instead of spending your money on new certs, spend it on a class that teaches you new skills.
Beyond that, praying that congress extends unemployment another 6 months usually works for me.
"commodity jobs have been shipped overseas"? Wrong industry. Programing and EE, yes. Sysadmin jobs are staying firm in the US. You can't have someone fly in from India to fix computers, install network hardware, and maintain security updates.
There's less jobs, since networks are more static (not many people are upgrading right now), less money, etc. But to get those jobs, certs and degrees can mean a lot. In some companies, the person interviewing is clueful, and won't care. In others, they'll be clueless, and that's the only thing they'll have to go on to know your tech knowledge.
It also helps get your foot in the door.
what will set you apart from the thousands of other I.T. folks looking for a job
Heh. everyone is certified in something or other, so the certification itself won't `set you apart'.
A lot of experience, and good networking (as in people networking) skills, is another matter. I find that the best thing to `have' to get a job is a (good) friend on the inside at some huge company.
"If anything can go wrong, it will." - Murphy
Something nobody ever seems to mention when these articles come up is that your resume or even experience by itself is not going to get you what you want automatically. I'm not saying anything about the submitter but I know that some folks continually get passed over for things and don't know why. Sometimes it's because they are qualified to do the work but they are either lazy, slovenly or outright jerks.
Sounds like it.
Plus during the boom I'd interviewed my share of paper IT people that signed up for crash courses to get their certs but knew jack shit about IT, so I had a fairly cynical opinion of them.
That said, with most companies you need to get past HR first, and HR are for the most part clueless about IT, so... they think the certs mean something.
So the certs aren't bad, and may get you past HR and get you an interview, but unless you've got the smarts or experience to back them up you're not going to get much farther.
The only kind of cert that is worth keeping current is something like the CISSP, where you have to submit regular CEU's and that sort of thing, but don't have to re-test. The CISSP is a worthwhile one to get at any rate, as it's vendor-neutral and "security" is the buzzword du jour.
I've got a whole bunch of certifications, but all employer-paid, and my job is reasonably secure.
In my experience, a few years of experience plus several certifications is worth the few years of experience. I think a lot of companies are beginning to catch on to the fact that people can have a bunch of certifications and still be worthless when it comes to getting anything done. Not to berate those who have gone for certs, but they just don't translate into real world ability the way that actually doing it for a few years does. It's nice to have a few knowledge-based theories about why the network is slow as hell for everyone, but explainations generally take a back seat to getting it fixed.
The reason most large companies do like to see college on your resume is that colleges don't sit you down and throw a bunch of info about one topic at you. Most colleges construct major requirements in such a way as to produce well-rounded individuals. While art history may not help you kill the network virus that's spreading through the corporate LAN, it does help you to a certain degree with other things, like social interaction. This comes in handy when you berate the idiot who brought his infected-all-to-hell laptop into work and plugged it into the LAN without telling anyone. This is why trade schools are helping less with finding work, and why college remains a good starting point for a resume.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
move to India.
is not vote for bush and his free trade policies.
By law, unless you are Indian you can't legally work in India. It's not like here where anyone will get you a green card after you get in through school etc.
Join Mensa. Riiiiiight.
To paraphrase Groucho Marx, Krapflinger, "I wouldn't join any club that would have you as a member."
Go fo the skill first and back it up with practical experience if possible. If there is a good Open Source (or just any project) place to find projects that need people and would help you grow and give of your knowledge and skill, then I don't know. Then again, it has long been acknowledged that documentation is the main problem of Open Source. (that means that if there _IS_ a spot out there, then it is not advertised well)
My CCNP and CCDP came due last November. I recertified with eight hours to spare. I don't recall what I got on the monolithic recertification exam but I should have read the Catalyst QoS book first - the router sims are going to weed out anyone that doesn't do this stuff all the time.
The CCNP/CCDP has been a meal ticket for me since I got it. I get paid again on the 28th and I'm going to take the BSCI exam as the first step towards completing my Cisco Certified Internetwork Professional.
I *am* unemployed. I hang around the house in my bunny slippers and wait for my cell phone to ring. I'm in the 53rd largest metro area in the US and so far it has rung a little over $6,000 worth of work in 2004. I fully expect to crack the $60k mark this year and I'm going to work about 800 hours to do that. Given the benefits of getting my money pretax I have a full time job pay wise and I'm only there forty percent of the time.
Oh, I should mention I do have the ideal complement skill for Cisco wizard - I am a BSD ninja, too. As a long time slashdot reader I realize that BSD is fragmented and dying
I am very easy to get along with, but I don't have time to waste being nice to people who are being stupid. -Theo
A computer science major can RTFM and get by where mosts certified vocational guys can't. Being that I'm a vocational certified type, I need to differentiate myself by doing what the rest of the drones can't. Sure! You can configure a router worth thousands of dollars, but can you build a linux router for under $800.00? Most branch offices under 200 people can live with a minimal router and a measly T-1, and they'll appreciate the savings,
I recommend a computer science degree from an internationally accredited university.
Certifications are respected by some people, but not much by others. Many certifications are offered purely as another revenue stream for the offering company, with little interest in conveying knowledge. That's not to say they are useless, but you should see them as a supplement to higher education rather than as a replacement.
I agree with previous posters that you should try to get more hands-on experience if you can; ultimately, that's the most useful thing.
A lot of the comments here is fairly negative to certifications, just remember that these are probably NOT the people that are going to hire you anyway. The way I see it, it is nothing WRONG with certifications, and if nothing else, it shows you have some drive, and is willing to put in an effort to read some books and go through the hassle getting certified.
If you're really good at something, but don't bother to get the certifications - in my eyes it shows that you're either a) not that good, or b) lazy. Note that I don't imply that ceritifications mean that you're really good. I was laid off from my former job, and my certifications (MCSE, everything cisco including CCIE) helped me get a new one. They didn't get me the job, but they helped.
Also don't ignore the fact that a lot of companies doing business with cisco (resellers, silver/gold partners) are REQUIRED to employ a certain amount of certified people, so you might want to check out cisco premier resellers in your area.
In a pressed marked, everything counts, and I don't see why certifications shouldn't.
The best part about your post is the mention of independent consulting for small businesses. Developing something along these lines is likely to be better off in the long run than getting more certifications. I hope, that while you are deciding what to do and looking for a job, you keeping that work alive.
If you have not done so, consider paying the $200 to $300 necessary to incorporate an LLC. You do not need to hire a lawyer to do it. I recommend the books published by Nolo on the subject, and tehy are available at the Public Library for no cost though worth the price if you have the money -- the filing fee for the LLC may put you on Ramen and hot dogs as it is, it did for me.
Even if you are only doing a few hundred bucks a month under the LLC, saying that you formed and ran a company on your resume may put you ahead of any certification. It depends on what job you are trying to get, of course.
Finally, there is one part of the question I didn't understand. You keep mentioning trying to get into the "engineering" department of a company. Engineering what ? In some companies that refers to a bunch of software writers, in others to traditional engineers working with physical designs, and in others to a glorified network maintainer who is allowed to plan out the network before maintaining it. In some firms the "engineers" do mostly economic analysis, and figure out if products or civil engineering projects are going to make cost limits.
The reason why I am asking, is because I suspect that in many engineering departments what may help you more than being a certified whatever is knowing programming and some math. Modern engineers of any specialty, even the economic guys in civil, spend a lot of time programming tools to help them, or programming in specialized environments within powerful design tools. If you were to write some simple utility and sell it via the web and kagi, for example, or just release it open source, that also might outweigh certifications.
Try to focus on investing in things that have multiple ways of paying off. The LLC thing can look impressive on a resume, but it can also save your hide from a lawsuit or turn into a bigger business where YOU are hiring someone. Writing a program to demonstrate your skills can get you a job, but be sure to pick a program that is highly useful to yourself or others anyway, and if possible, something you can sell.
This myth is wrong. Democratic administrations have performed better economically since the beginning of the 20th century, often markedly so.
Possible reasons are many, perhaps increased confidence in the future under Democratic administrations for the common people, vs. increased fear while the Republicans are in power. Also, to promote growth, Democrats prefer to tax higher income people, which decreases the gap between rich and poor, while Republicans prefer to have the government go into debt, increasing the cost of capital and interest rates and making banking more profitable, but also increasing the gap between rich and poor.
Which do you prefer?
now? I run the department and WILL NOT hire anyone that is certified, I only hire people with expierience. That is fucked up. You won't hire someone because they have a certification? I can completely understand _ignoring_ certifications, but how the hell do certifications hurt someones qualifications? You know, it IS possible to have certications _and_ experience. It almost sounds as if you're jealous and taking it out on everyone who managed to get a certification you couldn't.
I don't know the price of a cisco cert, but there are practical things you can do to add to your skill set. Learn network coding, securtiy, network dependent apps - work on oss projects. Show potential employers you can apply what you've already learned. -k
Your mind moves quicker than a nun's first curry. - A. Rimmer
The more and more I think about it, and talk this issue over with my wife... we (yes, she also agrees and pushes my to do it)... we agree that pr0n may be the ticket. I good site takes someone with a wide variety of expertise, from routing, streaming, load balancing, securirty, SSL and much more. And best of all, all research that I've read (Consumer reports, profit margines, overhead, and non-bais articles from reports unrelated to the field) show that this business is recession proof. - No matter what the current standing of the economy, people pay for p0rn. They always squeeze it into their budget, regards of how broke or out-of-work they are.
So if they are going to spend their money regardless... they might as well send it to us.
Our biggest stumbling block with this is figuring out how to solicite folks, without spamming; which is soemthing that I absolutely refuse to do.
Never try to beat a professional at his own game!
Start doing some open source development and get some experience.
It also helps if you know people, so start networking as well.
100% Insightful
I'm a hardcore Geek, and proud of it. Now that said. I have become very touched by this whole tech crash. I was a technical leader for a large company that host over 10,000 desktop PC and most were shared profiles, 50 servers, etc. Large scale stuff.
I am currently working for a company that is paying me on a per diem basis that is less then minimum wage.. if you count all the after hours work that has to be done. But made a deal with them that they pay for any certiifications that I write. Which is a total tax write off to them.
Now the POINT!
I have attained atleast 15 certs.. some big some small. MCSE 2k, 2003k, MCSA 2k, 2003k, N+, Server+, Security+, Novell 5.1, CCNA, etc.. you get the idea. Now I've been doing this so when the tech sector comes back again, I will be sharp on my knowlege and ready for anything.
I hope to be one of the first to be picked up as I didn't leave the tech sector to become a truck driver, stock clerk, like so many other colleagues became.
And we all know the tech sector is starting to come around again, and in the last two weeks I have gone to 4 interviews... where in the last year I've only been able to get one interview. So ya! It get's you into the interview process as when someone who is looking over the resume's, all they have to do is judge you by your papers... after that it's all up to you to score the job.
P.S. I've been turing down jobs as of late! Go figure!
learn what you think will help you in a job.
If this means going through some of the CCIE, do it.
Don't just take tests for the purpose of the title, that means little.
On a resume, indicate you are self taught in the areas you find interesting.
CCIE is very broad.
Move to India and get your certification there. Afterall, that is where all of your jobs are going.
Cert's were helping people get thier foot in the door during the .Com boom. But today there are too many experineced people looking for work, so cert's don't do much for you anymore. I'm part of the interview team at work and even experienced people are having trouble now. We are getting people out of work for a year or more and from not doing the work daily they are forgetting troubleshooting and other skills.
I say get hands-on experinece anyway you can. Help others, do volenteer work, anything to do real work. That way in an interview you don't sound like someone parroting a book. You will know real world answers to questions. Like in interviews we ask someone about their experience with a product or technology. If they start sounding like a spec sheet or text book they have two stikes to against them. If they start telling war stories about having to deal with deal with subject, we know they've been there.
The relative cost of labor overseas has very little to do with currency exchange rates. It's all to do with the cost of living, and the expected standard of living in the area. That's why you'll see call centers moving to the middle of nowhere, 'cause people there don't expect $60k/year to answer phones. They're happy with $25k or less. The reason: the standard of living is lower out there, and the cost of living out there is lower. Extrapolate that out to a third world country, and you'll see why that same thinking leads to overseas workers...they're happy with the equivalent of $8k or so.
Changing the exchange rate won't do a damned thing to stop offshoring. That's a complete red herring. The only thing that will effectively raise the price of offshoring is raising the standard of living and the cost of living in the countries that we're offshoring to. But that's hard, and won't happen quickly, so don't expect to see the economics of offshoring change anytime in the next few decades.
Try getting a job as a help desk tech or something similiar. With all that networking knowledge you probably have a lot of computer knowledge as well. This way you get your foot in the door and when a higher paying network admin job comes up, you can go for that within the company or organization. I find alot of tech jobs are filled internally within a company/organization.
I second that. Over the last 10 years I have hired a lot of techies (over 200), and those posting a prominent "MCSE" logo on their resumes were the first to be sorted out to go back to HR with a nice 'thanks but no thanks' letter.
As far as other, more substantial certifications (CCIE) go: they really only show that someone passed the test successfully, and I have never based a hiring decision on it. I sent many junior techs to go to Cisco training for their CCNA's etc (so at least they had gone through the fundamentals), but unless they come with the CCIE (or equivalent advanced certifications), it's not much of an incentive on a resume (plus, a CCIE usually has very high salary expectations, and may not even be that good in the real world).
If it helps any of the readers with my 2 cents: experience is what we look for, relevant to the job to be accomplished. Our best programmer and troubleshooter has never done any formal schooling in the IT arena. In larger companies, general formal education is usually a requirement (such as a 4 year college degree; but then, this is the US, and education is a low priority, and the quality is often mediocre; the individual effort for qualifications and skills is what I am looking for), but as far as IT education in general goes, actual experience and skills count the most.
Going through some of the comments on here, and reading comments expressing "I sent my resume everywhere and still cant find a job": in my experience, applicants tend to flat-out lie on their resumes; sure, everyone wants to make it look as good as possible, but when one deviates from the truth, the applicant loses all credibility. I think that networking is probably better, get to know people, allow them to get a read on your actual skills, and see where that goes. Most of the people we have hired at Melior, we knew or had some exposure to before.
Of course, just my opinion, hope it helps any of the readers. I wouldn't spend money on certifications if I were you, especially if you pay yourself, and money is tight. Rather continue to learn and use the time you have available besides job hunting, and improve your skills (by the way, IT skills are not the only desireable ones: in a global economy, language skills count even for techies).
If you are in the Dallas area (US) or in Germany (around the Stuttgart area), feel free to check out the job postings for direct hires: www.ddos.com > Jobs @ Melior.
Good luck!
Thomas J. Ackermann
CEO, Melior, Inc. - CyberWarfare Defense
There's always the possibility of working on an open source project. Granted, as a network engineer it's not very likely you know any programming languages but even some network troubleshooting scripts written in Perl that are publicly viewable probably would help.
I've only known one person to do that personally. He's also a sysadmin for the ISP I work at. He's since moved off of network troubleshooting and develops customer facing apps and toolsets for different groups but he started out doing network type stuff early on. It's not easy to get that kind of job here in Alaska, supply outstrips demand so that example does have a bit of relevance.
Certification won't set you apart but maybe having a couple of simple open source apps the interviewers can see might. It'll also demonstrate you're a self starter (although they should know that by the number of certs you have). You're fighting against a pretty shitty time to be in the IT industry though. Good luck.
Actually, I've had several HR people ask me when my certifications were awarded and when they expire. Mine are all up to date and good for another 3 years as of yesterday.
I got my CISSP last year, and so far it hasn't helped much. That's with 9 years of IT experience, being employed by a couple of Fortune 100 employers, and doing consulting for several more. I'm still making money, but steady employment with benefits has been elusive since 2001. Then again, that could just be my local job market. It looks like most security work is concentrated in the Northeast, especially near D.C., but more and more of that is requiring a security clearance before you can even apply.
Some certs are going to be more worthwhile than others. I'm not sure how worthwhile the Cisco certs are going to be, but just yesterday I took and passed the Securing Cisco IOS Networks (SECUR) exam in an effort to complete the Cisco Certified Security Professional cert. It's vendor specific, but Cisco isn't going away. The ultimate goal is CCIE Security.
I'll be taking the CISA exam in the summer, since they give it once a year, and that's supposed to be highly desirable to employers when linked to the CISSP. Only time will tell.
Remember the Alamo, and God Bless Texas...
I live in ontario canada i had a great intrest in computers so i decided thats what i wanted to do for a living..with about 3 years experiance with a local hardware repair shop..and 2 years Helldesk tech support i decided to get some certs under my belt went for mcse network+ A+ CCna and security+ thinking i would at least get out of hell desk now the town i live in is quite small..but the only job i could get in the area (within about 20 miles or so) was 6.50$ an hour (which is min wage here)network field tech or 10$ an hour back on hell desk..half the work twice the money working with peoples who's last job was mcdonalds? well im still her 2 years later check the job adds everyday and there nothing in my area i don't know about other people..im even willing to take that old 6$ an hour field tech but no such luck.
people on slashdot dont RTFArticle.
What makes you think they would RTFComments?
comment directly in my journal
Yup, I've already got a CS degree and just got laid off from IBM. Now I'm in school again for Chemical Engineering.
Truth is CS is never going to grow up in this country. I spent five years inside IBM and can say with confidence that IBM isn't going anywhere with real computer science (the software stuff I mean). They solved some hard problems twenty years ago with high-performance computing and data storage, and now they're just milking existing revenue streams and selling products solely on marketing hype. Reducing development costs by moving software development and testing to India and Poland. To be fair the Indian developers are very good. It's just IBM isn't in the business of innovating software anymore.
I would suggest that if anyone is still more than two years away from graduation, switch immediately to another major. Or plan on leaving the USA to have a viable career.
I am personally getting tired of all these posts about not being able to find a job. There are tons of jobs out there for tech people who want. I could name off the top of my head at least 10 universities that would love to hire someone who those certifications. I could also name at least 10 companies that are looking for web application developers in the J2EE space right now. There also seems to be a ton of work for folks willing to do general computer consulting for small businesses. I even heard the other day about some government and healthcare opportunities for folks who could help them move away from Windows and Office.
It is interesting what all of the above jobs have in common though. None of them are listed on job boards such as Monster. Why do you think that is? As a hiring manager, I will tell you. If is too big of a fucking hassle to deal with hundreds, sometimes thousands of resumes. And for companies with more than 50 employees there is a lot of process associated with resumes and hiring, so most aren't interested in dealing with that kind of volume.
So how do you find a job? You fucking network... get off your ass and get out to social events and meet people. The last 15 people I have hired I had a previous relationship with, they were friends of friends, I met them at user groups, and in one case I met the person at a Slashdot meetup.
The job market is hot again for those who get out from behind their computers and find a job.
Join the military reserves and get one. You will be marketable, with or without the certs. That is, if you want to stay tech in the US. Those jobs will not get outsourced overseas. The current indications are the jobs that have been lost, are not going to be coming back when the economy gets better. If you do not want to stay tech, then go back to school and get trained in an area that will not get affected by outsourcing to a third world country. Don't wait for your cheese to come back, go find it.
From the time to time that I look for new jobs. One thing has become more and more important than anything else.
Conver Letters Count More Than You Think. Especially Applying Online!!!!
It gets boring writing a different one for each position, but you have to. If the advertise position doesn't give enough info, then you need to get crazy!.
I think if you took my 4 boldest cover letters (typically written after then 5th Sam Adams) during job hunts, I got responses on 3 out of 4.
Anything else, just wouldn't do.
And I mean it. Drink some beers, smoke some weed. Do whatever it takes to lift yourself up into a different state of being with the Universe, and bang out some sh$%t story as to how the company can't afford not to hire you!
Expose a little passion!
Let me let you in on something.. a certification means nothing but that you can pass a test.
I want people that have good troubleshooting skills. I dont give a rats ass if they know that the boot and system partitions of a NTFS install are named backwards because of morons at microsoft.
I dont care if they have a Cisco certification, I care that they have enough troubleshooting skills to find the correct answer with the tools they are given.
Expierience and troubleshooting skills mean 10,000% more than any worthless paper that says you know some obscure terminology and concepts that are 100% worthless in the real world.
BTW, I did go get sertified after I was hired, because the company paid for it,I let all of it lapse as over 50% of the information needed to pass a certification test is worthless. (This is MCSE, A++, N++ and Cisco... the Novell one is really worth something, but almost nobody uses novell anymore)
I have a team that can solve problems and create correct solutions 80% faster than the best that corperate has in their NOC and IT department at corperate headquarters, we are always answering questions for them and was nominated into the circle of success 2 years in a row and all members have recieved many awars for excellence.
If you come to me with expierience, I look at that, I could care less about certifications as I have found them to be worthless indicators of skill. show me what you can do, pieces of paper you bought do not impress me.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Cisco composite exam 642-891 @ $125 through any Prometric testing center will renew both CCNP and CCDP certs instead of taking both BSCI (642-801) and BCMSN (642-811) @ $125 each. This is from the e-mail I received from Cisco yesterday letting me know my certs were almost up.
But without experience, all the certs in the world won't matter. Get experience any way you can. Work for free if you must, but get some experience deploying the stuff.
That said, some certs are worth more than others. Cisco isn't going anywhere, but there's a glut of CCNP/DP's out there after the bubble burst. CCIE's still walk on water and can still get a job almost immediately.
If you really want a job, get Oracle training. Oracle DBA's will never go hungry, at least not where I live.
Remember the Alamo, and God Bless Texas...
I've been working in IT for close to 14 years, and I have no certs. When I was laid off last year I was only out of work for 3 months (longest 3 months of my life), and I've been getting steady contract work since then. As part of my current contract I'm helping the company interview people and we see lots of people with tons of certs and no experience, they rarely even get a phone interview and the ones that do don't make it past that stage. Now, I'm not saying certs are a waste of time, I'd most certainly have a much better job if I had certs to go along with my experience, but even with your certs you're most likely going to have to start at the bottom and work your way up the company ladder. And by start at the bottom I mean helpdesk.
Including just casual friends. See if any of them know anyone in a company that is hiring. Doesn't need to be in the same department even. Have your friend introduce you to the guy they know in the company, then try and get that guy to talk to the person in charge of hiring for the job you want. That should at least get you an interview.
You'd be supprised who some of your friends happen to know. They probably never mentioned it since it didn't seem relivant, but if you ask you can find out.
And personal recommendations go a looooooong way. Even if people don't know that it influences their decision making, it does. It makes you stand out and turns you form just another person to someone they kind of feel like they know.
Just about every job I've ever gotten has been in part because someone I know knew someone that did the hiring.
In the 14 or so years I've worked in I.T. (in various capacities, ranging from a tech. behind the counter in a small "mom and pop" store, to support specialist in a multi-company corporate environment, to freelance consulting, to on-site service companies), I've run into the whole spectrum of "computer professionals".
Almost without exception, the highest paid of them didn't correlate with the most knowledgeable of them.
Also, finding a correlation between having multiple certs. and being "better than the other I.T. guys" at performing their job was difficult. Quite frankly, some of the "best and brightest" I.T. people I've ever run across weren't certified in anything at all. They simply worked with the stuff "hands on" for years and years, learning the facts that really matter, without the "fluff" and largely useless theory that comes with the certs. (If you get your MCSE for example, much of it will test your ability to construct a complete LAN/server infrastructure that best meets the needs of a group of hypothetical users. That's all well and good, but it's utterly useless 99% of the time. How often do you get hired on with your MCSE to build a network and infrastructure for a company from the ground up?? If they're hiring, it's because they already HAVE that set up and they need help administering it! You simply don't have to concern yourself with all the small details of why everything was set up. In fact, your MCSE knowledge might well tell you things are designed poorly - but trying to change that upsets some office politics and then you're booted out the door.)
What I guess I'm getting at is - the MOST VALUABLE thing you can have on your side is KNOWING PEOPLE. Make connections! A good friend who has some hiring power in a company that needs another computer guy is worth 10 certifications. Looking back on it now, I believe every job I ever had was at least partially due to knowing somebody. (Heck, even my very first job doing telemarketing for a carpet cleaners was obtained because a good friend's girlfriend already worked there, and told me they had openings if I was interested. Then, she put in a good word or two for me - and I was hired.)
My son has CCDP/CCNP and outta work for 2 years. His friends are getting out of college and most are going for advanced degrees ( no jobs).
Before dotcom-bust, you could get by with no college and certs. But now, with jobs few and far between, a collge degree is minimum ( see above).
Forget high tech, become a lawyer.
Me? We have hired 1 person in a year and our work load has tripled. And that person has years of network experience.
For my certifications, I've essentially let everything lapse that doesn't point towards security management:
It's kinda cool to keep non-computer industry certifications. Keep your first-aid card up to date. It's one of those nice, cheap little things that shows your follow-through: "Certified in first aid/CPR since (whenever I was a boy scout)"
After getting a couple of certifications, it becomes obvious that the ones really benefitting are those businesses in the certification industry. I'm going for an Associate's degree in Business. I don't know if it will do me any good. But its more logical than studying without getting a couple of initials on the diploma. Option 2: Plastic bag and plenty of sedatives- relatively quick, painless and effective. That's my advice for recent college graduates, also. Isn't the American Dream wonderful?
Is that what certifications are supposed to be is a reflection of knowledge and skills you have (I know they often aren't, that's the point). So if you go to get a cert, you should already be pretty knowledgable about what you are getting certified on. Sure, you'll probably have to study a bit for all the tricky shit they put on there, but you should have all the fundimentals and skills down already.
The "paper MCSEs" are the people that spend a year studying. They learn enough to pass the test, but have no real useful skills or experience. We hired someone like that, though in her case she was a paper CCNP. She spent over a year basically doing nothing but studying for the CCNP, and passed it. However, she had no real experience on routers and no skills to solve any problem not precisely from the book. Now she's smart, and has since developed those skills, but the certification did not give them to her, nor all the time she spent on it.
Now compare that to the guy who was already our network guy. He had only his CCNA. However he had plenty of real world experience on big Cisco routers and switches. He studied for a bit, like 4 weeks, while working full time, and passed with flying colours. In retrospect, he said the studying wasn't necessary and he could have passed it straight off. The cert was just a confirmation of his skills and knowledge.
So, if you had to bash your head against a wall for a year to get an MCSE, and don't feel like you gained anything, that's probably because you don't really have the skills to back it up. Your Windows skills ought to be enough that it isn't that hard and you learn mostly obscure facts and tricks.
Remember: Certification isn't training or experience, it's (supposed to be) a confirmation of that training and experience.
C'mon dude, if you're going to quote the Onion then at least give them credit.
Such a scheme isn't new, however. Probably the king of it is Hallmark that pushed it so far that people send greeting cards to others they really don't even like any more.
If you reply, do so only to what I explicitly wrote. If I didn't write it, don't assume or infer it.
Certs and School dont mean crap. You need real life experience. I never got anyplace doing Tech/networking. I have/had a bunch of certs from MS, Novell, A+ and that never got me anyplace. I just do what I love now and I got a great gig w/no certs or schooling in the field. --dan
Remember that expenses for education to get yourself re-employed (books, classes, certification testing, etc.) are all tax deductible.
This is true. You can take all the courses and seminars you want, and deduct all the costs, if they're related to a field in which you're already established. But for costs to establish yourself in a new field, you can't deduct a penny.
there's no need ... I can't compete with the young's willingness to be exploited
Well, one advantage of doing your Cert renewal now is that if an empoyer asks what you are doing right now, you have a tangible answer. You can even list that you are doing this on your current resume to show activity.
You might also want to get some professional organization memberships: IEEE, ACM, etc..., and even get involved with available activities. The activities may yield professional contacts but will also help keep you aware of additional technical advances and movements in many areas.
Anyway, it's my two cents...
Sam Nitzberg
http://www.iamsam.com
A friend of mine way back in school quite her job last week from IT. Instead, she went work for Pacific Union of all jobs as a train engineer. She said it's gona take her about 5 years to get there. The hour sucks because you have to work lots of over time, 8hr on 8hr off and always on call. The money is greate though because of the over time. She figured she does that a lot already at IT with little pay. Might as well switch to something that pays a lot.
Right now Union Pacific is hiring tons of people because many engineers retired and they have no choice but to promote lots of conductors to engineers and that leaves a void for bottom rank.
This might be something you should look into.
for making money for the certification companies.
Job experience and university degrees are the only things that I would recommend for improving your resume.
$10,000 and a week in Vegas. That outta do it.
I think the time is coming where self-checkout lanes will roughly cut in half the number of cashiers employed. But right now, self-checkout is as much an intimidation tool by the stores as anything else.
(EG. Right after the strike by all the union grocery store workers, the "Shop and Save" stores by me installed several new self-checkout lanes. I have to believe this was a retaliation move, basically saying "Fine, if we have to pay you more money, we'll use fewer of you!")
As self-checkout currently works, I don't think it's "user friendly" enough. I've tried it a couple times, and found it frustrating and confusing. It seems like it's always telling you to put an item back on the counter, or to wait for assistance, etc. etc. Often times, when you do have to wait for assistance, it takes forever for someone to come over and help you. (There's no way around waiting for help if you're trying to buy alcohol, for example. The machine doesn't automatically make sure you're of legal drinking age.)
I do think that RFID tags will make much of the hassle disappear. The system of ringing people out needs to become practically invisible. When that day comes, retail is definitely going to see some changes.
Not from this board. We're all* unemployed (or barely hanging on) dot-boomers. No profit their.
*read this board enough and you'll get that impression. Reality be damned.
I used this job site to find my last job!
Being well rounded technically is a big benefit. Don't be just the network guy. Be the network guy, the UNIX guy, the Windows guy, the Mac guy, the programming guy, try and do it all. I'm not saying you'll be a grade-A pro at everything, you'll certianly be better at some things than others, but try to at least be proficient at the major things a company might be interested in. Work the most on whatever your specialty is, but don't be JUST that. Keep your knowledge and skills up about other popular tech things.
But I won't be putting this cert on my resume (I don't intend to stay here any longer than I have to), for the same reason I don't mention that I was vice president of the senior class in high school: it wouldn't impress the kinds of people I want to work for, and it would distract from my actual qualifications.
> Makes you more well rounded and it's 4 easy tests.
This is exactly why the tech certs are little better than ass-wiping paper in many cases.
Any test that is easy (in the tech field) is inherently worthless. It means nothing to the prospective employer since any monkey could pass it. It means nothing to the applicant because the job applicant queue is... full of monkeys who passed it.
Easy tests are only useful to companies who get paid to train for and deliver said tests.
You're right about there always being small shops needing computer help. But what I've seen is that this void is being filled by the on-call computer service companies. I work for a firm that does that right now. I initially suspected we'd mostly get residential work, but at least half of our customers are small to medium-sized law firms, doctor's offices, specialty retail shops, and the like. They don't want to pay to hire themselves a computer guy, so they pay for X number of hours in advance on a service contract with us, and then we come out whenever they need help.
This is all well and good, but it's interesting to note that in the past, things didn't typically work this way. It used to be, someone with computer experience couldn't find a job with an employer, or he/she would start out on their own, handing out business cards and talking to people to see if they could do some work for them at a given hourly rate. Now, even this has become more "formalized". As an individual on his/her own, it's getting tougher to freelance. You'll encounter resistance from businesses saying "Nah... we feel more comfortable working with this on-site service business because they always have someone answering their phones, and they have more resources to give us a fast turn-around time."
Two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a saltshaker half-full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of uppers, downers, laughers, screamers... Also, a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether, and two dozen amyls.... Oh sorry, wrong movie!!!
In September the CRN magazine did its own survey of employers and asked what certifications were the most sought for.
For small businesses the top results included CheckPoint certs and Microsoft MCSA (not Systems Engineer, mind you, but Solution Architect, which is on of their developer certifications).
For large businesses it was MCSD (Microsoft Certified Solution Developer) and MCDBA (database).
One caveat with this advice:
If you are applying to a consulting/services company, certs are important. Not for the technical manager though. They are import to the sales managers.
I'm in this boat. I've been a consultant for a little over 5 years with the same company. I know my field cold. Yet this year I am looking at completing no fewer than 23 certification exams for an updated MCSE (useless) vendor certs (semi-useless) and a few "industry" certs like the CISSP (sorta usefull on a resume). Why? Because our vendors require them and our sales staff uses them to sell our services to our customers. My boss (12+ years same industry, same company) is in the same boat.
In consulting, they are unfortunately a necessary evil.
I browse on +1 so AC's need not respond, I won't see it.
Ive read all the comments and most are centered around 'certs arent worth jack' and that degree and experience count far more. Some swear they will never consider certs.
However think about it. Anyone serious about this line of work will get a CS or CE 4-year degree. So you have 70% of all CS people with their degrees, how will you differentiate between them. Most of the unemployed ones might have less than 3 years experience and probably not in the technologies your company will use. So what criteria will you use to fish out the better ones among all the degree holders who know the technologies you use?
Most tech cert organizations wanted to make money, so they made the exams too easy the most notorious being the MCSE. There are a few certs however that do have their value. There are SAP certifications which can prove you know that ERP software at least in theory, which strongly differentiates you from someone with 7 years of industry experience with no SAP experience. The highest cert in networking has been the CCIE whose eliteness is being maintained by cisco to keep its value in the market. I have seen job posts asking for nothing more than a CCIE, and if you really start studying for it, youll respect that certification and its holders.
I think you can seperate all certs in two groups... the basic run-of-the-mill certs like the CCNA, CNE, MCSE, A+ etc which will mean you are not completely clueless in front of computers despite the lack of experience (which would otherwise cost the employer more), and the better certs like SCSA/SCNA, RHCE, CCIE, CISSP which are better suited on top of 4-year degrees to compensate for the lack of your experience and show your specialization to the employer.
I know many HR managers look for the academics only, and several slashdot posters enjoy completely trampling certs because they put their time and money into degrees and cant stand competing with others who didnt invest so much.
Tech-savvy companies know that University programs focus too much on Java/ADA/Pascal and sometimes too much on Microsoft or some other specific vendor and arent really better than certs in developing PRACTICAL skills. Most companies have a specific set of requirements, say, Lotus Domino, Win2k active directory, linux firewall, some html+CGI, perl, SNMP tools, IBM xSeries hardware etc, and they couldnt have cared less about 4-year degree holders who know everything theoretically, or cert holders who know something else really well. If youre ambitious and can afford college, dont stop till you have a degree + the right certs + a couple years of experience. Oh yeah, make sure you make plenty of 'contacts' and friends at University.
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
> I dont care if they have a Cisco certification, I care that they have enough troubleshooting skills to find the correct answer with the tools they are given.
Many Cisco classes, including the one I just left, include a LOT of troubleshooting assignments...
> If you come to me with expierience, I look at that, I could care less about certifications as I have found them to be worthless indicators of skill. show me what you can do, pieces of paper you bought do not impress me
I think you need to get the difference between "bought a book, crammed, and regurgitated for the cert" and "took two years of class and gained experience that way, with the cert curriculum being an added bonus" through your head.
if the answer isn't violence, neither is your silence / freedom of expression doesn't make it alright
Did you also filter out those who said that they had a disability or who were of a different ethinic origin to yourself ? I would imagine not. So, how is it that you would know exactly what the MCSEs were like ? You could not have done so it must be prejudice that got in your way. You risked not getting the best person for the job.
/.ers have actually passed seven MS exams to get MCSE. The constant stream of 'Windoze can't do this / Winblows can't do that' followed by corrections from those who _know_ different shows that there is more prejudice than knowledge when it comes to MS products.
Sun certify. So do Novell and Cisco. But, of course, the MS one has to be the worse and every MCSE knows nothing (Linux fans know everything - except when it comes to MS platforms !!). Wonder how many
I work for a large, privately-held consulting company and I have the (pleasure?) of interviewing many potential employees. We have hired several of our consultants who were referred by our staff, but I can tell you that we won't hire anyone technical unless they have a certification. Period.
Anyone with a month of computer experience could pass one. They're not worth anything more than getting a job as a tech at CompUSA.
Ask these simple question:
What do I want to do?
Where do I want to live?
Who do I want to work for?
For myself I am concidering some certification and if I do not get a job before or after the certification I will then return home. After this I will get another degree in Hard Engineering (complete what I started before transfer to Computer Science).
----- rant ----
To all of you out there in the Industrialized World, only jobs that will remain will require your face to be present in front of the Consumer who will be another like you.
If people in Industry want to benifit with profit from this Offshore/Outsource busness they better start getting jobs back in the Industrialized World. It would have been better that India and China Competed head on then pull the wealth and investment from then Industrized world. This way we would think we had a chance to pay for the goods and services local and abroad. Now we know we can't there fore we will not and focus on the esentials then a new Sterio, software, etc.
5.6 Million's worth?
Which BTW is underreported.
I've found that Certifications are most valuable when you plan to apply to or already work for a company who is a 'partner' of the certification company. For example, 'Cisco partner' companies have some sort of quota they need to fill of cisco-certified engineers in order to retain their partner status. There's most likely a similar setup with microsoft partners. If you're already working for such a company, a cert or two is a good idea as (all things being equal) un-certed employees will get dropped before you during lean times.
A cert also shows that you're willing to stay current with the technologies you work with. When a higher-level position opens up a cert can get you promoted over the guy in the cube next door. Combining a cert with frequent industry conferences seems to be the ticket to management from where I sit.
Go back to school (as in a reputable University) and get a degree. (of course, some would say that Universities are a scam too, but at this point they're probably the preferable scam).
Of course at this point, you've got to conserve your cash, so if you had a 401K or IRA when you were employed you can pull money out of it to pay for school without paying the 10% penalty. It will, however, be considered income and you will be taxed on that income. However, there are a couple of education tax credits (the HOPE credit) that would offset a lot of that income.
Then the big question is what to major in? There are a lot of CS grads in the parks downtown asking for change these days (or soon will be). Be wise and get into some field that isn't easily offshored - consider medical related or environmental related degrees.
It depends on the niche of the consulting company. If you are in networking, or if your company focusses on the one time set up of machines, the certifications are key. If the company has a base of products that it pushes or is doing custom programming, the certifications are not quite as important.
There is also a little bit of graft going on where a computer company will send you leads if you pay their exhorbitant price for certification materials. I mean, if your employees are certified.
Consulting firms vary by the niche market they pursue.
I have my CCNP and my MCP, but what really gets me noticed is experience. If you don't have much experience, try going to a local organization (i.e. church, etc) and voluteering your services. Some people might laugh at working for free, but it gets you contacts and experience at the same time. Oh, I also have a side biz of doing small business consulting. The volunteering has contributed to this a lot. Have fun.
This space available for rent.
"Anyone with a month of computer experience could pass one."
.net. I need people that can do run of the mill PC support in an office environment. That's my department. So ultimatly A+ matters to me. But what do I know?
True, but employers want some form of proof that you can do the job, and oddly enough, your say-so isn't normally upheld as proof.
I have a small group of three guys who work under me, I have alot of pull in who gets hired to work for me. When I look over applications I'm not looking for "working knowledge", I'm looking for proof of knowledge. I hear a lot of guys and gals telling me they tinker with all kinds of technology but most often these people think that doing end user tasks with MS Office or making their own web page is computer skills. Perhaps they are to some but in my department I need people who know what's on an A+. I don't need someone who can set up a Linux server, I don't need someone with '3l33t skillzzzz' in C++
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
I've interviewed and hired a lot of people. And, my choices have always turned out well. Admitedly, my experience may not be directly applicable, since I'm in hardware engineering, but I'd be surprised if it's that different in your area.
I seldom bother to ask a candidate what degrees and certificates they hold. And I never let the answer affect my final choice. I talk about engineering, problem solving, and experience. As for experience, I don't ask questions like "how many years doing X?" . I ask questions like "give a specific example of your experience of X".
I can name many very smart and talented people I've hired over the years, and I still don't even know whether they have a BS, MS, or PhD, nor from what school. On the rare occasions when the subject comes up (I don't bring it up), I see essentially no correlation between degree of formal education and the value of the engineer.
One caveat, here. I select candidates from the pool who already have a foot in the door. Perhaps lots of degrees and certificates are helpful in getting the foot in the door in the first place. In my current organization, some pre-screening is done by other interviewers before they get to me. So, I know the candidates all meet a certain baseline, including a BSEE degree. But the pre-screening lets an awful lot goofballs, fast-talkers, shmoozers, empty-shells and slugs through. And, if anything, the worst of the hopeless candidates frequently turn out to be (on paper) the best educated ones.
I think you need to get the difference between "bought a book, crammed, and regurgitated for the cert" and "took two years of class and gained experience that way, with the cert curriculum being an added bonus" through your head.
if you can show me the markings on a certification that shows the difference between the bought certs and the earned certs, I'll show you a way to make millions. The certification factories that are STILL cranking them out make certifications 100% worthless, that's the crappy part.
when they REQUIRE the classes or require an instructor to test you out of it by making you do a few hours of real world tests... I.E. simply set up a few tests on the boson router simulator will seperate the purchased certification and the earned certification.
but then I just hired a kid that has never touched cisco stuff before in his life that within 1 hour was able to get the info he needed to solve the problem by simply searching the internet.
that is what I want, that if you dont know, you have the skills to find out and do the task anyways.... and again, you cant get a certification for that.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I could have gotten certified, but the IT market is shrinking in the USA. So instead I decided to change careers. I am now taking Business Management and I am earning a four year degree and then my MBA. Those will not expire like certifications.
True I might end up a PHB instead of a Dilbert, but at least I will have a job and not be another disposible employee. My computer knowledge will be an extra benefit, and I can manage an IT Department and know what I a doing, unlike a PHB.
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
Well Lawyers have to pass bar exams, which is their own certifications. With most of the USA getting sue-happy, Lawyers are in high demand. :)
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
Forget actually getting certified, just put every certification you think will impress on your resume, with dates showing that you've had 'em for years. After submitting your resumes for a couple of weeks and you _still_ don't have any job interviews lined up, I think you'll arrive at the answer to your question yourself.
The job market is tough. I saw the writing on the wall years ago, and decided to go it alone and start my own business. Companies like to hire consultants, even if they're $100.00/hr because they don't have to pay benefits, and they can let 'em go when the job's done.
I think a stack of business cards, membership in a local toastmasters group and making the rounds at local business networking groups goes a lot further than any piece of paper you have.
Ruby on Rails Screencast
Did you minor in anything? Any tips for potential CS majors? I'm +2 years to a CS degree so I'm looking at my options at the moment.
I am starting a class for my CCNP, but its not a boot camp. Its just a cheap community college class.Its something to do while i take a semester of from my immensely crappy university.
If you are looking for a job now, you might consider getting a certification in something thats still emerging. VOIP is heating up and Wireless is hot so maybe one of those two things might help with a job. You don't need a cert for them but just learn as much as you can about them and if there is a one-test ($125) cert that might help you get recognition than go for it.
Otherwise just make the consulting thing full time cause consumers are where the money is these days.
I don't have formal training in either. I got the job because at the time, I was willing to work for not alot of $$$, I was a quick study, and the person who was currently doing it had absolutely no idea.
It's 3 years later, I'm still working there. The $$$ still isn't great, but I have a job forever if I want it. I've learned a pile of stuff, and more every day. We are slowly and steadily growing and expanding into new markets.
A recent freind of mine work(ed) in the same field (graphic art) for over 30 years. He made the mistake of trying to be a 'one man band', in areas that he was not very good at (recording studio, DJ, Video, etc.)
He lost his shirt, and his sanity.
He was appling for jobs in his 'real' field and was told by the HR person that there were over 300 applicants with similar qualifications, but less experience (fresh new Graphic Art students). All these people, and no jobs.
He now lives in northern Minnesota, trying to get his life together.
My longtime pal (25 years out of 32) is working for a larger nonprofit as a Network Admin. He went to school to be a psycologist, quit 2 weeks before he graduated, and got a job at the U of M in the IT department.
He didn't have any formal training either. He now has a few certs under his belt, and has an entire room full of old PCs, Sparcs and Macs that he messes with at home and takes the experience to work.
We were discussing the irony of us having jobs, while there are people who would blow us away in the certification/experience dept. He thought we just happened to be at the right place at the right time. We both read /., and are well aware of how lucky we are to be working in fields where there are more qualified people sitting at home watching a Sci-Fi Twilight Zone marathon.
I guess my advice would be to screw the certs, leave some stuff off your resume, and try something at a tangent to your experience or something not at all related.
Move to a smaller town, and look at smaller companies .(I live in rural Minnesota, and although I'd make more $$$ doing the same job in the Cities, I would also be competing with a huge population of more experienced people for the same job.)
One thing I've often thought about is how /. has an impressive amount of smart people that are unemployed, and if they all worked together on something, they would be a force to be reckoned with. Perhaps a 'distributed' start-up of some kind - I would think that the OS community would be knowlegable in working with widely located people.
Like I said, not very helpful. I'm just a musician who got lucky.
I don't think certs are the entire picture. At my job, I got the job first, then certs afterward. If for some reason I were to lose my job or look for another, I would bank on my experience, not the certs. Almost like the experience is the big mac, and the certs are the fries (or onion rings, or baked potato, etc). I obtained my ccna last year, and this year going for my choice of others. Having the experience made certain parts of the ccna easier for me. Also, looking over the requirements for ccnp, there's a few things in there I stop and say "Wow, thats part of this certification? I've done that a million times!".
I think (and would like to hope) I got my job in the first place not because I had any certs (I had none in fact when I started) but on the merit of skills and what I was willing/able to learn.
FLR
No serious technician gives a rats assabout static straps installing memory or RAM.
Take any brand of aeither or these, strap on yourrubber shoes,and rub along the carpet making *as much static as possible*. The odds of you doing any damage is like 1 in a trillion.
The only component you shouldworry about REstatic is if you'rereplacing the CPU.And even then as long as you're not running around the carpet you're likely fine.
It's not WHAT you know, it's WHO you know that gets jobs. Learn the art of small talk and go out there and chat up some people who can get you some work. Hell you can pay pepole to teach you how to do it.
I also don't agree with the degree idea. I have my BSc in computer science and frankly very few places care (and some didn't even know what my A+ was). I'm glad I did it and feel that the knowledge I gained was worth the time/$/effort even if it doesn't get me a job. However, companies say things like X years experience with y required. Oh, and Y is always some specific version that didn't exist for X years. Though a CS degree could serve as a good stepping stone towards your MBA if that road floats your boat.
In any event, I'm pulling for you, we're all in this together.
Jared
Sorry you took offense, but this question has been troubling me for some weeks now, and I didn't get many responses to the original post, so I felt it needed a little more exposure. Now I can look over all these responses and make a more educated decision. Thanks Slashdot surfers! :)
Start your own company. Sell your services to small businesses that need them, but not full time. Hire your own people, ride their asses for certs. You'll be making plenty of money and have job security. Just undercut your competition's hourly rate. You should still be able to get $90 an hour. Sell contracts to people who don't want to pay that much, but make them buy 2 discounted hours a month as part of the contract. Maybe charge them $75.
Often in Error, Never in Doubt.
Setting a programmer in front of a computer is a much better test than giving him a sheet of paper. A good programmer makes use of all the tools he has available, including online help files and debugging tools.
Some places do this sort of test on paper only. The people who pass are those who know their language cold, and who tend to write very few bugs in the first pass of thier code. But many of the ones who fail are of the more resourceful sort, who can make good use of their tools to adapt to problems with which they were previously unfamiliar.
Of course ther ARE people who are 1337 in both categories, but the previous paper-only test won't reveal such people.
Ok, I'm done.
Maybe that's why I'm having so much trouble finding a new job: HR cuts the claims on my resume by at least 50% to adjust for the presumed lies and everything on mine is true.
Good, inexpensive web hosting
I'm facing a similar question with my Check Point and Solaris certifications. I live in Connecticut where IT people have become an endangered species. I've been in IT for 17 years now and I've seen many jobs leave for India. I'm lucky that I still work in an UNIX environment.
My friends have been laid off, going on 2+ years now, it really got me thinking: what would I do if I was laid off in this economy? I have no other skills outside of IT and I don't have a Disaster Recovery Plan for my family.
I think there comes a time when you realize that you may not be working in the same industry you started in. I would encourage you to get a 4-year degree, but NOT in C/S. You may be painting yourself into a corner. What if you never get another job in IT again?
Focus on getting a degree that will complement your IT experience, but offer you flexibility to move into another industry if you need to. For example, a degree in Management, Accounting or Finance, may be a perfect complement but still allow you to move into another industry.
It's all about keeping your Options opened.
A+ of all things is what got me my last job. My whole department was outsourced, and the incoming company was under obligation to take a few of the old techs in.
Men with a decade more experience were passed over for the two people with an otherwise worthless A+.
My state (Minnesota) will pay for certifications and training to assist the unemployed. If yours does too, you've got nothing to loose.
/* Back off man, I'm a scientist. */
Business or English.
:)
CS + Business is a good combo because PHBs need someone to cut through all the tech BS that their techies push at them and then dumb it down to their level. If your into Design Patterns think of yourself as a techie PHB Adapter
If you don't care too much for business then go for a minor in English. No matter what career path you end up going down, knowing how to read and write (and do it well) will be useful.
So I'd say your chances of getting a fulltime job soon just improved 10,000% - now I'm actually getting daily contacts from HR departments and headhunters, and have 2 job offers I soon have to act on......so what I'm saying is don't spend the money for renewing your certs just yet, get a job, maybe the employer forks out for it, or maybe you decide if it's then worthwhile for you to spend money on yourself.
I spent a considerable amount of time unemployed before I got my current job, and there are only two things I can say about my experience. First off, if you've got a clean past (no arrests and clean credit) and are a US citizen you'll fastrack for a Security Clerance, and that is one piece of paper that means a ton in the right parts of the country. The department of Homeland Security is newly formed and growing, and there are literally thousands of small-buisness IT contractors that are always looking for qualified people to place on contracts across the country. Secondly, and most important is your willingess to do what it takes to get your foot in the door. In my case, with a 4 year degree in Computer Engineering and over two years experience, I took a job installing ethernet cable for $10 an hour from a temp agency just to pay my bills. I took it with the hope that maybe I would get some face time with someone who could give me a *real* job. Well, my a week into job I approached the manager with my resume in hand and two days later I had an offer for a SysAdmin position. Don't be afraid to get your hands dirty if it offers you the chance to seperate yourself from the crowd. Nothing will take you farther than a little bit of face time.
I would not bother with the certification. I would change your job hunting methodolgy. It obviously is not working.
Befriend Recruiters. How? Refer them to quality candidates for jobs they post that you choose not to pursue. Respond quickly, professionally and briefly to jobs that do not meet your job search criteria.
Identify key employers. Research specific companies, preferably ones in which have contacts or even acquaintances. Do not ask for a job or a referral rather let someone offer. The most valuable knowledge comes from understanding a company's current prospects, customers, and hiring methodologies. Pursue leads and new contracts agressively.
Stockpile industry standard tests, essay answers, and cover letter templates to cover common questions from recruiters and employers. By having these resources at your fingertips you can respond faster, stronger, and more effectively than the typical applicant.
Dress wealthy and look comfortable in fashionable, high quality business attire. If it were me, I would find a wool blue pinstripe and a wrinkle free, trim fit white spread color shirt with a subtle blue stripe, and match it with a blue striped tie. If it is a casual company, take off the tie and wear it open collar. Be sure to have a real undershirt and don't go wild with unbuttoning the buttons. Wear a quality shoe.
Interview regularly, even if you must go to interviews for jobs you would never accept. However, do not interview unless you are serious with jobs that you are referred to by recruiters or colleagues.
Verify your references. The amount of time you have spent looking may be due to a poor reference hurting you.
Reach out to the local technical community. Spend time in as many user groups as you can. Never pester people about jobs. Express interest, enthusiasm, do people favors, and let the job take care of itself. After establishing a bond it is fine to mention you are looking but do not treat user groups as career fairs.
Study sales techniques. Your job hunting skills are selling a product: you. Read and re-read "What Color is Your Parachute?", spend time with books on selling to prospects. Master the craft of job hunting, in this world; it will have more value than a certification.
You get the idea.
~~ What's stopping you?
No-one wants someone with outstanding technical skills (certified, degree-d, or not!) who comes across as either a) someone who can't talk or write well to others b) someone who isn't willing to work with others, or c) only knows the field they will be working in. Technical skills in one particular field is the domain of Ph.D-toting specialists, and those people are a dime a dozen.
In other words, having good connections and handling yourself well in an interview are the 2 most important parts of landing a job! Everything else is for the birds.
Math would be the obvious one. Where I got by BS (University of Colorado) computer science majors were required to minor in mathematics. (Well, you didn't have to request the minor, but you had to take enough math classes that you could get one)
:-)
Another good one would be English. There are many, many people out there who don't know how to write well.
I belive someone mentioned business; taking a few business classes could be a good way to find out if you're interested in that side of things. If youre planning to go on for a higher degree, it'll help you decide if you want a PhD in computer science or in computer information systems.
Of course, you could always minor in something totally different - say chemistry or psychology - so you have something to fall back on if you get tired of computers
Twenties Retirement
And pray that you don't get a dream job offer from a company that does pre-employment drug testing. Write a good cover letter, have a couple people proof read your resume, drink a beer to relax, sure. As for the weed part, you can smoke as much as you want after you're retired.
I can show you the two binders full of class assignments that show the lab troubleshooting experience, but if you dismiss my resume flat out because I have the cert on it, I'll never get to the interview stage and never have the opportunity to show you.
Oh, and it's a bad idea to hire someone for a networking position that needs to google for his answers. What'll he do if the network is just plain down?
if the answer isn't violence, neither is your silence / freedom of expression doesn't make it alright
Are you hiring? (seriously)
RHCE? Cannot replace experience, OK - but shows that person can troubleshoot the system and install more than basic networked environment.
In my consulting practice, I am sometimes called upon to make recommendations to clients regarding potential IT staffers.
One client, a large advertising agency in South Florida, uses me from time to time as an recruiting consultant. They have some positions that require an IT pro with both MacOS and Windows capabilities. The candidates are screened by a recruiter. I'm given a list of 10 or so people to interview. I talk to everyone and give the agency a recommendation on who to hire.
I have a list of questions I've developed that I hope give me some sort of feeling for how well each candidate would do if hired. I usually ask about certifications. In the Windows world, I look at having an appropriate certification as having "stepped up" It doesn't mean that the candidate is any good at server administration, or that they have any experience at it, but it is an indication that the candidate is serious about her/his profession. Certification is just one of the metrics I use, and I've recommended one candidate who wasn't certified. So far I haven't had any candidates who have had any Apple certifications but I believe that will change soon.
wherever I go, there I am.
You pick
He's right. I have a CS degree and a minor in Math with a high GPA and I can't get a job doing anything remotely computer related.
What the fuck are you talking about? CS grad school usually pays (at least at a reasonably good institution), at least in the non-terminal MS/PhD track. The terminal-MS track (sometimes termed MCS) is different. JD students usually don't get payed, but LLM and JSD do (although they are much much rarer).
THE NERD IS THE COMPUTER.
My job entails a lot of recruiting for software developers; for each person that I hire, I probably have to screen through 60-70 resumes and 10 interviews.
When I see a resume with a lot of certifications on it, I think, "Hmm, this person has a lot of useless certifications, which means that he or she is trying to make up for a lack of a technical degree and/or relevant experience." Sure, there are some people who are actually pretty skilled and have a couple of certifications as well, but the vast majority of those that I interview can't make it past the initial technical screening. They know some specifics about whatever product the certifications cover, but they rarely have the broader analytical and problem-solving skills needed to survive in the real world.
At best, a certification shows me a person who is willing to work to improve himself or herself. At worst, it shows me someone who is missing the forest for the trees - someone who thinks that a bunch of initials after your name is more valuable than actually learning something. In the absence of other positive things on the resume, I'll pass.
Based on my own experience, I offer these tips:
Software Shouldn't Suck
E-mail: frank at jacquette dot spamless com (remove the spamless!)
Why did this guy's post get modded down? He's got a good point. You are going to have a hard time finding a job if your skills consist of plugging in routers. But if you are a skilled and experienced programmer, you shouldn't have a problem getting a job. Especially if you are willing to relocate.
Pursuing a CS degree opens up TONS of internship/parttime jobs for you. That will build up experience and allow you to have a decent looking resume. Also there are design projects, and Professors research projects which will allow you to get experience and make contacts in the field.
Once again. a skilled programmer WILL BE ABLE TO FIND A JOB. A great way to START is to get that CS degree.
What good is that when you can't get hired on as a technician?
Democrats or Republicans. They are both taking us to the same place and they are not afraid of us anymore.
The marketplace is telling you that it doesn't want technical people. Why don't you listen to it? Getting all those certifications was a big waste of time, why are you even considering getting more pointless certifications?
Think outside the box. Look for courses which would qualify you for jobs where you might be able to make a living. Selling real estate, for example. Use your imagination. Don't repeat the same old pointless behavior that failed in the past.
or wash cars , or even better , get a field job
and pick some tobacco cause most of the high tech
jobs have gone the way of India.
These guys have Phd in the stuff.
You better realize that with your American Education
you aint getting anywhere in this Global World.
with the American education you got,
youll need alot more than certification.
In the U.S? Get a security clearance. You will never be out of a job again.
In this kind of job market, a paper network technician is worth less than what you payed for it... When there are tons of people with lots of good, valid, relevent experience, all the paper (degress and certs) in the world isn't going to get you a job in the face of some guy who has NO degree, NO certs, but 15 years working on networks...
Of course, those people actually worked their way up to where they are now, didn't try and short cut their education by getting certs... they actually went out and DID it, so my question to you is, are you in it for the paycheck, or in it for the technology... if your in it for the paycheck, you will ALWAYS loose to someone who is happy to get paid to do something they would pay to do...
This MUST be a joke, right? Economy laggs several years behind administrations... always has, always will...
I have news for you: COMMON PEOPLE DON'T GROW THE ECONOMY. 'Common' people want someone else to put in 80 hours a week, so they can punch the clock, and not have to think about work the rest of the time... COMMON people don't want the responsibility of keeping hundreds of people on their payroll...
Hence, UNCOMMON people (entrepanurial types, you know, the EVIL businessmen) who create jobs and wealth for themselves, must be supported to see any real increase in the value of our economy.
Simply redistributing the wealth via government will only insure that:
1) the Economy contracts (due to the fact you are imposing a consistent loss on it becuase of government overhead AND that fewer people have an incentive to start a business, because they get the holy bee-jeezes taxed out of them to redistribute the supposed wealth they now have!)
Deficit spending is a proven way of jump starting a stalled economy, as it allows the government to purchase things on 'credit'.
It would be amazingly simple to shuffle the books the way the clintons did to make it appear that the government was opperating at a profit! (wait a minute, profit is EVIL EVIL EVIL!!!) After all, when you are using the numbers of all those corrupt companys that just went bankrupt to project your tax revenue, it is stupid easy to say 'we have more money comming in than we are spending'...
Excersice some common sense.. don't buy into the hype from BOTH sides... Bush is doing what very little he can to inject some life into our economy, and it is working, but don't be fooled into thinking anything the president does matters to the economy. He just gets to take credit for it.
I wouldn't do it.
I'm A+, Net+, MCSE(NT4), Dell Tech Cert(all 4)...
My former employer invested quite a bit in a migration strategy fron NT4 to Server 2000/2003, a project that I spearheaded. I probably know just as much about 2000/2003 than any other certified tech.
Point is, I could get 2003 certified easily if I wanted to.
But I won't.
Why?
I'm sick of the field. I'm sick of having to recertify every product generation, which sometimes equals once a year. I'm sick of my life's work revolving around the the act of supporting someone elses software. I'm sick of being in a field where we are ultimately ruled by the ignorant management class.
The industry rules us, software vendors rule us, ignorant management rules us, etc, etc.... I'm sick of it all.
I'm so sick of it all that I've gone back to college to change fields. I'm hoping to be a physics major. Fuck IT.
I'll put my CCNA at the bottom of my resume to get past the gatekeeper but the fact that I've worked with Cisco switches and routers for five years is up at the top.
I don't want knowledge. I want certainty. - Law, David Bowie
Sorry to be a troll and -1 me if you must but my suggestion to the poster is:
RE-Certify & if you think you have even the slightest dissadvantage at getting the position lie like a dog during the interview and on your resume if you must.
Learn the job requirements and go through the R&D in your spare time up untill the interview and you will sound like you have been up to speed with current tech in and outside of cisco.
Hire a consultant (preferbably an extensively experianced software analyst with ADHD) to give you a rundown of current enterprise solutions for several possible scenerios that each job your eyeing might have.
Do this to give an impression that you fit that you won't need much training, get your foot deep in the door and make friends. LEARN LEARN LEARN and work your ass off.
Low expetations and a nice resume work.
I lost all of my CISCO certification in October. I have been way to busy to take the test, and could really give two shites. I work on networking equipment everyday. I already proved I can be certified, as I was. Why keep it up to date, unless you are talking years later.
When we hire someone, we never take certification as the be all of what someone is technically capable of. I know many people with MS, LINUX, CISCO, etc certification. They know nothing. What they do kn ow is how to study and take a test. 2 years later and they are still not that good. Do to that, they are alwats lookinh for a job.
I would keep up the the technology and changes, and wait down the road to waste the money. Unless someone is going to pay and, and all bills, to get recertified.
My advice to the original poster is to let the certs expire. Nursing your remaining cash is far more important. There were too many idiots that paid $5k-$10k for some Boot Camp where they were spoon fed the answers to the cert exams. That burnt most employers out on certifications.
I think this is a true statement, however unfair or bad you think it is. I got my current job because my dad was friends with the director of human resources of where I work (same church). So I got my foot in the door there. He didn't just give me the job, but with out that contact I probably wouldn't have been considered. I was contacted by a family friend about my next job opportunity. He also went to our church and was president of a company. They were looking, but I like where I was more. So really most of my opportunities and even side jobs are because of family friends, church members or people I've known.
:wq
Otherwise, get re-certified. I think too many people act like schooling or certification is a video game, and they keep score with framable pieces of paper. Its not about having a degree or cert, its about learning something. If you dont like what you are learning, maybe you are in the wrong field. You can always train for a new field; it may not pay as well as your old career (at first, anyway), but having computer skills can be used as an added bonus, kind of like speaking another language. Since a lot of companies dont actually hire IT staff, having somebody on-hand who can do so really wont hurt your prospects of winning out against other people going for the same, non-IT related, job.
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
How about the first step of recruitment: resume selection? How do you go about doing that? Who selects the candidates: you or HR? I think a lot of people with problems, including me, get stuck on the first step. We don't even get selected for interviews. Once you get an interview, then it isn't a big deal. You either know it or you don't. I always find the first step the most difficult. I'm sure many others here feel the same way.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Seeking the meaning of life... @slashdot of all places
If you can feel the tingle/shock, thats 100-300 volts (or more). If you can see the shock, you are looking at more than 1000 volts. Some chips can be damaged by 30 volts of static. Designers try to make them resistant to much higher voltages, but doing that conflicts with speed considerations.
The president has little to do with your job situation, it more like thirty years of government policy.
You need to lower your salary expectations or seek a job that matches your skills.
The economy is a highly cyclical thing. The late 90's were an extreme example of a boom, and basing your expectations for jobs & salary on the late 90's is dumb.
Exchange rates have little to do with US companies exporting jobs overseas. In fact, China is going to be facing a huge crisis, particularly in real estate as they maintain articifially low exchange rates with the falling dollar.
India has a massive number of people with great educations who don't need to make $70k/yr to raise a family. Here in the US, huge numbers of college freshmen enter school without the reading or mathematical background to survive a CS, Biology or Engineering program.
US government policy is centered around handing out pensions to seniors, medical care and building armies to keep our outrageously inefficent society functioning. Blame a generation of american leaders for your plight.
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
Let your potential empoyeers know you will get recertified after you find work. I f they ask why, just tell them you can't aford it until you start working.
Honest, open, smart, and most people will understand.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I have never had a cert in my life. I've been gainfully employed as a systems administrator by organizations ranging from 10 people to 130,000 people for 6 years straight and have never been asked why i don't have a certification. I have, however, been told by a few supervisors that certifications mean nothing to them whatsoever. It's all about real life experience. The CS degree will likely help you only if you plan on moving up the ladder to management in a larger company. Certs... blah. Waste of money. Maybe i will get one one day. I still have to use my GI bill for something... might as well not let it go to waste and use it for something that may change the mind of someone who does not share the same views as myself.
OK, this is my first post to Slashdot after years of lurking - go easy on me guys!
As a previous post said, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Certifications have not been held in any high regard since the dot bomb boom period - and only then by ignorant/naive investors. You NEED A COLLEGE DEGREE AT THE BARE MINIMUM!
However, my college degree (class of 2001) is in computer science and I think it will become worthless within the next 5-10 years. No big problem for me since I've got my foot in the door working for a Fortune 100 company. But for those in high school/college now, my advice would have to be FIND A NEW LINE OF WORK!!! I can't stress that enough to anyone that tell me they are majoring in Computer Science or Information Technology of Computer Information Systems or anything related right now. Within the next 5-10 years, I think these skills will be an EXPECTED skillset for any job requiring a college education, be it biology, chemistry, geography, especially any engineering field.
Why? These are the fields where the real skills and INNOVATION are required. Think about it - anyone can set up a computer network or program in whatever language with the right tutorial, that's why these LOW SKILL jobs are being outsourced, anyone can do them and the people that can do it the cheapest get the job. You can't have a skill set containing only the lowest common denominator and expect to employed because of it unless you're still living in 1999 (in which case, can I use your time machine please?) Unless you are ultra-brilliant in only CS and will be forever employed by IBM/Intel/AMD/Microsoft, please don't waste your time with a straight up vanilla CS/CIS/IT degree. 1999 isn't coming back.
The money makers of today (and the future) are not those that learn CS for the sake of learning CS, but those that learn CS for the sake of applying it to something greater. What that something greater is is an exercise left up to the reader. I would be very interested to hear what everyone else thinks. (Possibly a future Ask Slashdot?)
I am looking into transferring schools as my current school has a piss poor tech program. What I want to persue is a career in network engineering. I had thought the best idea was to major in network engineering and concentrate in something else, but someone told me I should think about majoring in something a bit more broad and just to concentrate in network engineering. This would make my job of hunting for schools a lot more easy as even finding a school with network engineering as a major is difficult. What do you think my best option is - NE as a major, or concentration? Also, are technical institutes like Devry or ITT Tech any good?
What you said originally and what you are saying now are different. Originally you said you won't hire anyone with certification. Now you are saying that you don't care about certification. They are two different things. I think you mean the latter and you probably didn't mean to say the original...
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Seeking the meaning of life... @slashdot of all places
There are two kinds of skills which employers look for: knowledge and (inductive || deductive) logic.
Knowledge is nice, and that's what the certs prove that you have. However, knowledge is useless - as the failed dotcom industry proves. Certified folks without logic are just apes with a pedigree.
Logic is just like any other skill: it can be learned, contrary to popular belief. People can learn how to deduce and think. If such a thing were not leranable, then there would be no means to become logical, for anyone, since it is not something that is genetically inherrited.
College is supposed to be a vehicle through which reasoning/logic is instilled into the minds of students; however, this isn't often the case nowadays, since most colleges/universities are borderline worthless. From what I recall of Mensa, joining up there might be a good idea - IIRC, they're mainly just a group of people that are able to solve problems.
For those that don't know what logic is (and there are a lot of you, rest assured), it is essentially the ability to problem solve. Being mathematically inclined does not mean you are logical, as maths only use a subset of the logic required to solve problems. (This illustrates the value of things like 'word problems' in elementary/secondary school math books.) Problem solving involves looking at the boarder picture of things. Inductive reasoning is drawing a general conclusion from the facts available (aka, most term papers), while deductive reasoning is more pointed, and is done by drawing on general principles to reach a conclusion that is (not necessarily) true.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
and one will get hired by an isp.
Seems pretty simple. Worked for me.
After all, the internet is made up of ISPs.
a great deal of the people who work at the local walmarts(saskatchewan, canada) i'd say have to be over 65. some look 80. which is sad...i mean, working at walmart is in my opinion a lower place than being stuck in a old folks/retirement home.
welcome, my freind, to the new wild west. work or fucking die, shall be the continuing mantra... without unions to let our elders at least have their tired and useless hands lay idle, we are doomed to follow their fate or worse, working until our grave.
what's my solution? Work hard. mabye not for Wal-Mart, but put a zeal into everything you do. line your veins with caffeine. do provigil, ritalin, or whatever you need to get through the night. burn your body and be prepared at all times to commit suicide. sooner or later powers greater than you and i are going to want us for our meat... don't let them continue this. look into ways to defeat them in the long run. debate rationally, and encourage rational debate.
are you sure there's nothing in your past that would provide are you communist? socialist? liberal? homosexual? democrat? have you ever suggested committing of a terrorist act? don't bother to awnser, but consider it. i mean, i at least can blame a few weeks of my unemployment on my 'terrorist' status... (who wants to hire a terrorist?).
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
Ok, so i read through and lots of people say certifications don't matter, many places don't require any certs at all. Well think of it this way. Say you find an add in the paper for a decent networking job and it doesn't have any certification requirements. so you submit your application. OK so they dont require any certs but what happens when two other people apply that do have certs. Why hire the guy without them? why even interview him? The other two applicants are obviously more qualified, they've got an MCSA to prove it. So when you look at it that way. Certifications definitly matter.
Although I don't believe this is currently true,
the CCIE lab exam (at least when I took it)
really stressed troubleshooting: you set up
a network made up of various protocols
(Frame Relay, ISDN, etc...) and then the
examiner broke quite a number of things
in your network. This meant that you had to
fix a certain percentage of these problems
in order to pass the test. I failed the first try
(but passed the second try). You actually
couldn't move to the troubleshooting phase
until you had correctly set up a specific portion
of the network setup phase.
My point is that some certifications are valuable
(depending on where you want to work) because
potential employers know you can troubleshoot network
problems (this used to true for the CCIE...not sure
any more...since I only recertify every two years
with a written test). The ability to troubleshoot
a problem is very valuable skill. Sadly lacking in
many new hires. They simply throw up their arms
at the first sign of trouble....I really think there are
two kinds of people in the world (paraphrasing
something from "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle
Maintenance": those that are willing to ping and
traceroute and those that don't.
I think that a CCIE may get your foot inside the
door in many companies. The trouble is that you
may need to move.
Fortunatly, IT is pretty much ubiquitious across all fields at one level or another.
You not hiring anyone who is certified is bullshit.
I have 6+ years of what I do and you aren't going to hire me because I have one cert? With a closed minded attitude like that I'm glad I don't work for you.
A friend of mine went on to graduate school this summer, and his parting peice of advice was "A professor once told me that over 80% of the great jobs right out of college are by people who know people, not by credentials alone, and I believe it now". He went to grad school not because he really wanted to, but because at the time when he left, we didnt know anyone. Times have changed in one semester, but the advice rings true.
I sat in on a dinner party with people from IBM, Apple, and other companies and colleges one evening (it was after a Tech Fair that I helped put on). The discussion was about why college students download MP3s. I gave a few wise-sounding remarks, everyone nodded and agreed. Three days later I was contacted by the head of the IT department from the large university that was present. The email was favorable and asked for further information about the topics that we discussed as a group earlier that week. I replied that I could put on a presentation for their deparment and a month later did.
I found out as I walked up to the building to give my spiel that they werent interested in me coming to talk about mp3s or anything. They wanted me to see their staff and what they did. It was a job interview in disguise (and I recieved another email when I got home asking if I wanted a possition under the manager).
Its an example, but its a real one. I'm only a sophmore now, but I've been noticed, and people pay attention to me, so I'll believe it when someone says "its all in who you know and who knows you..."
-- Page
We don't need an "overrated" so much as we need a "you completely missed the parent's point, dumbass..."
I have been doing the IT thing for 10+ years. I'm currently employed, in spite of all the slashes in the IT undustry currently. I have one certification (in an obscure high end network managment system used by carriers) that is irrelivent to my current position, and a couple of years of college (they didn't tech networking when I went to college, so I learned to program in COBOL... guess why I bailed :)).
:)), and a small set of questions, including some "Tell me what's wrong with this config" ones. My favorate was the day I had a dead NT machine and pointed my applicant at it. They looked at the "press ctl-alt-delete to login" screen and froze. "Ctl-alt-delete reboots the computer, it doesn't log in!" Oops. MCSE you say... uh-huh...
:)
I've also done a couple of tech/managment split positions where I hired people in the past. It didn't matter what letters you had after your name, when you got to my desk you got to explain the difference between an interior and an exterior routing protocol (You'd be suprised how many couldn't... or maybe you wouldn't
The only cert that will hold any water if I'm doing the interview is CCIE, if you put your number on your resume. And that will just mean that we'll skip the "What's the difference between an interior and external routing protocol" question and skip right to the "how do you set the speed of a null modem connection on a cisco serial port and which cord do you set it on" set of questions.
Don't get me wrong, I've delt with some fine people with various certifications, but just because you can put the letters on your resume doesn't mean I'm going to assume you have the chops till you prove it. Mind you, just because you have the chops in an interview doesn't mean you're not gonna freeze when the BGP table starts to eat its own table on the production network, but it's a start
Min
On the whole, I find that I prefer Slashdot posts to twitter ones because I don't get limited to 140 chars before
If you think that youre going to pass your ccie lab exam, go for it. Id take that over a cs degree. it all depends on if you like what you're doing.
-humboldt
As a hiring director, I recently had a great big pile of resumes on my desk. My preconceived idea of an ideal candidate for a "all arounder admin" was a Math or Physics major, with a passion for computers and hobbies that involve playing with computers, gadgets, etc. Military experience a plus. Certifications mean nothing to me.
After weeks of interviews, some lasting hours, with people with piles of certs and degrees, I ended up hiring a guy pretty much on the spot after a five minute interview. No college, no certs, ex-military and he had a clear passion for computers and problem solving, documented experience and solid references (not friends).
Plain and simple, his resume and interview demostrated a clear knowledge that an IT job is about problem solving.
The two best things to be able to do in this business are:
1. Know how to ask a good question
2. Know what you don't know and know where to look it up.
Far as I know, they don't teach that in Certification Boot camps.
FWIW - the guy I hired is a key member of the team after only eight weeks on the job.
Those ITT Tech adverts promise that once I graduate I'll be entering a booming job market. Oh and I won't have to live from paycheck to paycheck.
"Fighting for peace is like fucking for chastity."
It can take a long time: couple of hundred interviews even. We're not in dot.com anymore so you need to reset your expectations.
Unless you can see that a certain type of technology is in demand, and thus getting a certification will help, don't bother. Make it clear that as with previous experience, you're dynamic enough to take on the work, and certify on your own (part time): prospective employer is going to like that.
Sounds like Cisco, Nortel, book publishers, and testing centers made a few bucks on the deal.
You, on the other hand, are left with zero exerpience and a lot of soon-forgotten theoretical knowledge based on fictional networks used by fictional organizations.
I recently had an interview candidate who had (literally) 30-40 certifications, but 'friends of friends' informed me that he was an arrogant ass who couldn't work with anyone else. It didn't matter much because he had no clue. Too much time spent in the testing center, not enough in the data center.
If you really want to prove your networking mettle, then write a BGP routing package for OpenBSD, or some other OS. You'll learn a lot more at the fundamental level and have a nice line item on your resume.
Can't write code? How about finding someone -- anyone -- YMCA, local school, red cross office, library, etc. who will let you change an old PC into a Linux/BSD/whatever firewall. Do it for free and for the line item on the resume. Do a couple more. If you're collecting unenployment, just consider it an investment in 'training' since that sort of experience is a heck of a lot more valuable to an employer than yet-another-IT-certification. An added bonus is that although these organizations usually have zero money, you would be working with the head of the office who would report this sort of thing at the board meeting. Guess who sits on the board? -- Prominent local business leaders. Holy crap -- networking in the human sense at the same time. If you're lucky you'll get asked to present your idea directly to the board. Nothing gets you more 'in the door' than having a VP ask the HR director to get you an interview because you seem like a nice guy...
Let your certs expire -- you can always claim 'former CC-whatever' and employers shouldn't care since (lets face it) TCPIP routing, and the Cisco user interface, hasn't changed all that much in the past few years. If certifications haven't opened the door for you yet (and they usually don't) then they are unlikely to magically open it next week or next year.
"But actually trying to use m4 as a general-purpose langage would be deeply perverse" --ESR
I just started going to school at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff as a CIS major. I was wondering if anyone had ideas of whether I would be better off continuing my studies towards a four-year degree or should I just try for certifications??? The fact that I'm 29 years old with a family and only a freshman is making me want to finish quickly, but is the problem with finding IT jobs widespread or is it localized to certain areas??? I sure would like some advice on this. I'm borrowing too much money to go to this school anyway...
Actually, healthcare professionals are in demand now. Nurses (RNs) and nurse assistants (CNAs) are in demand, as are nursing instructors. Even EMTs are in demand.
It is much easier to find a job as a healthcare professional than to find a job as an engineer in computer science.
http://github.com/gbook/nidb
ROTFL! That sounds like wistful advice, maybe some 20/20 hindsight?
The contraction of 'you' and 'are' is 'you're'--please tell me you didn't get a degree in reading and writing! I'm already an incorrigible cynic about the educational system.
Damn those pesky terrorists
LOL, yep I have been tech all the way. Now that I'm looking at getting a masters, I'm probably going to do something other than tech to address my weak areas(MBA possibly).
/. though :p
With that said, I actually have seen my writing skills decrease by playing MMOs. In order to keep typing to a minimum I find myself shortening words in every way possible(you're/your/ur).
I do triple read everything that I write for professional purposes to make sure the mistake you pointed out doesn't slip through. WTH, this is
But don't speak for all CS majors; this one is doing just fine.
My work history is similar. I co-op'd in 05/99, graduated in 05/00, and became a *very good* developer since then inside IBM. I had consistent raises, and was making 50% more than my starting salary and kept working hard right on through the DotBomb as my friends exhausted their unemployment; my final salary was equivalent to a ChemE with twice my work experience (I know one, we compared). My layoff was due entirely to a personal beef with my last micro-manager. I had two other managers ready to pick me back up but I decided to accept the generous severance package. I know I could get another (good) job with my skillset, and could probably even last a good 10-15 years.
But.
Let's talk about what grown-up industries do, like mechanical, civil, and chemical engineering. Student chapters exist at all the universities, *big* corporations commit lots of money not only on college recruiting but also internships, luncheons, and raising awareness. At my local school for ChemE, $20 dues in AIChE gets you access to 12 luncheons/year with some really big names. You get your money back on the first meal, actually. Then there are several national design competitions that you can get to for about $100+food (the corporate sponsors cover the hotel, dues, and most of the flight). And inside the school, there's always a strong bond between upperclass students tutoring the freshman/sophmores.
All this is for *undergraduate students* who can still drop out anytime! I've *never* seen that kind of attention devoted to the fields of software design, development, or engineering. Nor have any of my Old Skool IBM friends. Some were around doing real work on the mainframes through the 80's, others have worked with HP and Sun. (No DECers alas.)
To continue though, the grown-up industries have annual salary surveys, work satisfaction reports, employer critiques, and research opportunities galore. Computer Science has ACM (which has been *dead* on most of the campuses I've been to), a big taboo inside the industry for discussing wages, terrible overtime compensation, and hardly any big-dollar *software* research outside the games sub-industry, Los Alamos, and a handful of universities. (Hardware research is still funded, but those are Computer Engineering/Electrical Engineering degrees.)
This is what I mean by grown-up industry. If you lost your job right now, you'd be tossed into a pool of business and communications majors looking for work, and you'd really have no place to start in the well-established job search circles. Your local unemployment office might not even have a job title that matches your skills. Software architect? Software engineer? Network troubleshooter? System administrator? When you apply for a job, your technical skills would have to match *very closely* to it's listed requirements to get an interview. And I do mean CLOSE: like "JSP" instead of "JavaServer Pages" because it's a wildcard filter. And you can ask your friends for help, but between July and December no one is hiring full-time so networking won't get you far.
OTOH, if my brother (who is a ChemE) lost his job, he would have places to go. Employers routinely post their engineering positions to AIChE's site, the unemployment office would know how to place him, and if all else fails he could just apply for those government positions that require a Professional Engineering license. (Note: license, not certification: it takes five years understudy and a battery of tests to get it.)
I don't see Computer Science ever reaching this point. Which is a real shame, because there's plenty for us to do before we have Star Trek-like AI. Instead, companies are abandoning the CS major via outsourcing just at the moment they should be pushing for it to get past adolescence. We could see a university program offer students a rigorous education in creating quality production-ready code ("Software Engineering") in any lan
One thing nobody is talking about(and a another possible 'ask slashdot' article) is what about online CS degrees (or any for that matter). It seems to me a lot of (accredited)online universities have come a long way in the last few years. Not to mention brick and mortar universities offering online degrees. Has anyone gone through this type of program? I'd be very interested to hear your experience, as well as any scoffs you may have had by a potential employer..
TK
First let me clarify a few things: .com boom when experiance wasn't important. People just now starting out are going to have it A LOT harder then I did.
:)
1) I've been working in the computer field (first IT then engineering) since '93.
2) I never finished college (changed majors 3 times in 6 years).
3) I have a resume that a lot of people would kill for.
4) I got one certification (Novell CNE 3.x way back in '95) which I never renewed.
5) I interview well. I've people think I had a masters during the interview process until I mention I didn't finish my BS.
6) I got lucky- I was able to get a lot of my experiance during the
So what I've learned when I interview and when I interview others is:
1) If you have a lot of *relvant* experiance, I/they don't care if you have a degree or certification. Real world experiance trumps all.
2) Certifications are tie-breakers... just shows one person is a little more serious then the other. I've met too many paper CNE's, MCSE's, etc to count them as actually "useful". The CCIE is about the only certification that I and many people count as useful.
3) Don't write "expert in XXXX" unless you are one. When I see the word "expert" in a topic I know pretty well, that's where I go first with the hard questions. I've had people tell me they're an expert in TCP/IP and couldn't tell me all the flags and their meanings in a TCP header. Since I had the free time, I spent the next hour trying to make him cry. (Yes, I can be an asshole.
4) Illustrating in some manner that you do a good job of learning on the job and picking up new things is critical.
5) A lot of people/companies won't even bother to interview someone without a degree or certification right now because there are so many people trying for the same position- they are in effect using it as a means to reduce the number of resumes they have to look out.
6) If you get an interview, ASK SOME QUESTIONS! Do a little research about the company and ask intelligent, thoughtful questions which show you did some research.
7) If someone asks you an open ended question or where they ask you a question designed to see how you think, ask questions to narrow down the question.
8) In this job market if you don't have experiance, look at temp agencies for work. It'll be crappy work, but finding FTE w/o it is nearly impossible since you're competing against people who do have it.
9) Find ways to stand out in the crowd. You need to find something to put on your resume that nobody else will have.
you think an HR kid is gonna attempt to pick up the phone and pronounce "Sivaram Velauthapillai" to call you in for an interview? Hundred bucks says your resume gets tossed to the trash just for this reason.
Your new name is Sammy Smith.
I started in unix in 1984.
I was a CERTIFIED SCO Instructor (1990ish).
If I kept my certification current what would I do now?? (DARL are you listening???)
The certification is a COMPANY CERTIFICATION.
The College Degree, is independent of any company and lasts until you die. Even if the college goes bust.
And when the company goes bust??
SO, my personal questions/problems- Should I get recertified with:
1. My "DENNIS FASTOW ENRON ACCOUNTING" Level I CERTIFICATION.
2. My Dennis Kozlowski CEO "How to loot a company"" SILVER certification.
3. My Bernie Ebbers "How to turn a company into an 'overnight wonder' using dubious business models and send it crashing into the ground." gold Certification.
OFF-TOPIC: The strong>CERTIFIED SCO Instructor Shirt is for sale...
I went the other way. I did the UNIX/LINUX thing and the Microsoft thing. This along with various enterprise projects for a local firm.
This is what you need to understand. We have just gone through a major business downturn. That means everyone, including and especially cost center personnel (us) will find it hard to find jobs.
This is what I would suggest. More than likely you are trying to decide without talking with those in the industry. Find the managers that are hiring and ask WHO they are hiring. Second, I would suggest you find an operating system, and become a specialist. Spend you cert dollars doing that. It is my impression that the world of the next two years is going to belong to those who have specialized skills.
Hope this helps.
A TS or higher clearence.
geek + pulse + clearence = job
Scary but true.
I recently decided to seek IT "employment" and obtained my first interview after sending out over 100 resumes. I continually revised the cover letter to its current perfection, listing my contract referrences to prove I can "accomplish". This is what got me the interview.
Certs & degree's, I'll spend my money elsewhere, I don't want a government job anyway (been there).
I have my resume on Monster and various others. As well as on the web. Either my resume sucks, or I have none of the skills people want.
i'm not sure how that screwed up notion got into your grandfather's head.
granted, there are plenty of people out there who are happier working, and post-retirement stress of living under different(ie non-work) conditions have killed many people off...and don't get me wrong, if older people *want* to work there's no reason why they shouldn't.
my grandma's finally getting into the music that she wanted to go into as a teen. my grandpa has all the time in the world to spend working on crafts and whatnot, and my other grandpa&grandma are dead. there is _so_ much more to the world other than work it is
take europe, for example. i havn't been there...and i probably will never be able to go there. but instead of holding 'work' as something of value holding the experience of a paid europe trip as something of value...would make much more sense.
but the oncoming forced labour until death, is detestable. and seeing the odd should-have-retired-ten-years-ago still working because they aren't sick enough to qualify for the 5th tier or whatever medical hospital-house (round here, if you cannot go to the bathroom _and_ feed yourself, by yourself.. you) that the local con's are trying to force-privatize even further...makes me sick.
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
Verizon has a standing offer for 120k+
for certified cisco engineers. I am sure that most cable, and telco's have the same problem, not enough engineers.
You can't get a network working that you can't connect to. No one (with any sense) is outsourcing CCIE. You need to try Telcos, ISP's and cable companies. Satellite TV may even need them.
To recertify your CCNP/CCDP (as well as your CCNA) you only need to pass one exam: 642-891 Composite. This will cost you $125 (or less, if you get a discount voucher online). Considering all the money you invested in the original certs, the price of this one exam plus (possibly) a book and your self-study time may make it worth holding onto them, even if you're not sure of the exact value of the titles to you right now.
Also, on the issue of a C/S degree, while I agree with others here that they're becoming more important, it all depends on the reality of where you are in life. It's not impossible to get an IT job without a degree, and you have work experience, which is *the* most important factor, so I wonder how much a degree could really do for you, esp. considering how much IT may change in the next four years.
One thing I noticed is that you have five certifications: A+, CCNA, CCDP, CCNP and Nortel. Do you list all of them on your resume? Part of the reality of certs today is that while HR staff love them because they're easy screeners for resumes, many actual hiring managers (IT dept. head, etc.) may frown on a long list of certificaitons, esp. if they're not matched up with experience -- just too much "paper" stigma going around. What you might want to try is to play with exactly what ones you list on a resume: For example, if it's a lower-level position, list only the A+ and the CCNA, or if it's mid-level, list only the CCNP and Nortel. You can still talk about the other titles in the interview (show that you're constantly learning). Also, make sure your experience comes first on the resume, and certs toward the bottom (if you haven't already) -- that way, they're still there for the HR manager who wants them, yet for HMs that are sensitive to them it doesn't look like you're trying to justify your qualifications via the certs.
A lot of your post is dead on.
We could see a university program offer students a rigorous education in creating quality production-ready code ("Software Engineering") in any language on any platform. But the CS degree remains focused on teaching boolean algebra, digital logic, and assembly language, just like we were creating the microcode layer all over again. Or it targets the PhD with AI classes that still haven't proven their utility outside games. Unix, TCP/IP, SQL, security, data mining, and GUI development are upper class single-semester electives, when they should be the core of the major throughout the first two years.
I disagree slightly here. I wish I saw more CS emphasis on the basics of how the machines work. I've known way too many CS graduates who can click buttons and configure software, but who do not have clue one about what is going on under the surface of the GUI.
The reason that a lot of IT can be outsourced is because a lot of IT boils down to "GUI development" and "SQL". This is technician work that can be done by anyone with a reference book. Computer Science is a wholly different animal.
Oops! Got the price of the exam wrong. it's actually $187.50 -- slightly more than a standard Cisco exam, but still might be worth it.
When my company receives 100's of applications for a couple of jobs, we always throw out 20% choosen randomly.
Don't want to hire unlucky people..