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Moving Up the IT Ladder in a Poor Economy?
Andy asks: "As almost anyone who joined the IT industry on the tail end of the Dot-Com boom can tell you, trying to move up in the industry for the past couple of years has been like jogging up-wind in a hurricane. I have sent resumes to countless numbers of employers only to still be working in the same $13/hr. low-end outsource support job as when I started (and $13/hr. doesn't get you too far in Boston these days). Learning more and more languages/technologies/protocols has merely resulted in a larger skill set on my resume, with pretty much the same level of experience, and no new interviews. Has anyone else been able to get out of this sort of slump, either during this economic slump or a previous one? Should I just continue the path of learning as much as I can and applying for jobs? Would getting a cert (maybe an RHCE or some Cisco certs) help? Would it be worth it to get a degree in MIS or CS?"
The economy is still slow without a doubt. It's hard to find constant work even for those who are skilled and experienced. I was fortunate enough to make connections near the end of the dot com boom, and recently those connections have begun to pay off. My income has more than doubled in the last 6 months, although work is still inconsistant. If I didn't have the experience beforehand, or I didn't make those connections, I'd probably be flipping burgers right now.
I doubt many employers want a mediocre jack-of-all-trades kind of guy. You're better off selecting one or two specific areas and focusing on getting experience within it. Most of the technicly adept and smart employers know that tech certifications are pretty much a bunch of BS, but some still require it if you want to get your foot in the door. The same goes for degrees. Either way, couldn't hurt to have it.
And btw, FP bitches!
I was able to get out of that trap by doing volunteer stuff at night to get experience and references.
I currently have a decent paying job and am relocating to the south where I have been unable to get a single interview. Where my wife will be working, the IT manager said they could get 2 of me for the pay i am currently making. Definately not a good thing for me. I am currently thinking of learning some programming languages to maybe start in that field as i have a growing interest in that. But who is gonna hire a programmer with no skill who needs a certain set of income just ot make the monthly bills?
Learning more and more languages/technologies/protocols
In my opinion, a mile wide/inch deep skillset gets you nowhere. If a resume passed my desk with 50 million skills and 5 years total experience, I am going to question that resume right to the circular file. But maybe that's just me.
No wonder you're making $13/hr. We're hiring like mad but won't touch someone without a degree. Even if it's in a related field...I don't have a CS degree but have a couple in physics. Don't bother with the certs...get an education in the field you're trying to get a well-paying job in. I interview candidates in my current job and I can tell you that a degree is worth more than the cert (as well it should be).
I have an MS cert which I will never, ever, EVER use, yet its listed proudly on my resume next to my Solaris and other tech certs. Why? Because HR drones OCR your resume and do text-searches on it. If you don't have the magic words, you never even make it to the real decision makers.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Problem is since the economy is week, the state has been taking in less taxes. Since the state has been taking in lesss taxes they're giving less to the university. Since the university is getting less from the state they've raised tuition.
When I went to the University of South Carolina in 1991 the tuition was around $1200.00 per semester, rumor has it that it's over $3000.00 per semester now. Roughly 13 years over doubled in price. Granted this isnt Ivy league, but not much hope of working part time and paying for shool at those prices. Only hope is to get loans, grants, etc and pray the economy eventually comes back to some semblance of what it was.
Actually, those are all civilian positions.
More like "duck when you hear Iraqi terrorist fire, and hope the Army keeps the terrorists away from the server."
I don't think the military pays anywhere near that well (GS-11 through GS-13) unless you're a high-ranking officer sitting in a nice air-conditioned office FAR from the front. And even then it would be in the O payscale, not GS.
Oh, and also, make damn sure you don't snap any pictures of American bodies going home, otherwise you can kiss that cushy IT position goodbye.
I started my own business too, and it enabled me to move way up the ladder in the past two years: from tech support to Webmaster. I had confidence in myself. I was willing to fall flat on my face and fail. I took a chance. Worked hard. Treated people right. Was honest. It paid off.
One tip: when you have many skills, and little experience, tailor your resume to the job you're applying for. If they want an ASP developer, don't tell them you can do ASP, PHP, Perl, and some JSP. Tell them you can do ASP.
Then, to add to that, tell them you work well with other people. You're not selfish about your turf. They're looking for a quality person who can do the job. Show them that you're a quality person that can do the job. Then, when you get the job, be a quality person, do the job.
My Karma was at 49, then they switched to words. All that work for nothing!
Financial aid may be harder to come by and less helpful than during boom periods, but it's still available... especially if you're just getting by on lousy pay. Community colleges can be a good way to get some of those degree requirements at an affordable cost. It's not easy, but I've been doing it myself, so I know it's possible.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
It's very simple. The IT industry in the US is largely now a low-paying, blue collar job. If you want to make more money, you're gonna have to do something else. Find a new profession. There's nothing that you can do about it. Get over it.
I was in california and could not find a tech job to save my life, so I moved to colorado. Same deal there. An offer from a family friend to move out to a small town in Arkansas turned out to be the best thing ever. There was a major shortage of knowledgable people here and finding work didn't take very long. My first job only paid $12/hr but consider that I also rented a 3 bedroom house in a nice neighborhood close to shopping and schools for $550 a month and gas was a good 50 cents cheaper than california.
I did my job, met people, tried my best to get known as a great tech and I now have a great job as a System Admin that I love to death. The cities are full of people looking for your kind of work. Get out of there and go somewhere that needs people that know the things that you do. Of course, you won't find any software companies in small towns but you will find TONS of businesses that have to use computers and networks to get their jobs done, and all those people need someone to work on their computers.
Most small towns have a few computer repair businesses that take care of the businesses but the days of walking in and fixing a computer quickly are over. It takes time to get to know someones network and software and you can't do a good job if you're charging an hourly rate like the small computer support businesses do. These areas are perfect for convincing a business that they will save money and get better service if they hire you as their admin. Show them all the things that need to be done on a daily basis like following security advisories, updating computers, checking security, etc.
The company I work for pays me quite well and they said their past 3rd party support cost them 3 times as much as I do, and more gets done quicker. Before they would have to wait to get something fixed, sometimes up to 3 days. Now things get fixed immediately and revenues are up because of it.
Drill baby drill - on Mars
When I went to the University of South Carolina in 1991 the tuition was around $1200.00 per semester, rumor has it that it's over $3000.00 per semester now.
It never ceases to amaze me that someone can be sitting in front of a computer and say something like "rumor has it" and just pull some number out of their ass and throw it on out there.
In fact (i.e. this isn't a rumor) resident tuition at the University of South Carolina for the 2003-2004 academic year is $2,774.00.
Isn't technology wonderful?
What part of "shall not be infringed" is so hard to understand?
while my degree has been of great assitance, more than anything my experience has been the real bargain maker. Questions about degree's last less then a minute in your average interview, do you have one or not is all they want to know most of the time.
But job and real world experience are the goods employers will really ask you about, this is where youve got to be able to say youve done good work in the trenches. Working for smaller companies in IT/IS will give you great experience, even if its for less pay.
lots of guys take grunt jobs with "impresive" big companies and end up with resumes that are less impresive... can you say you designed, implemented and supported a new and growing network? or did you just keep the system running? Have you designed, and built applications or key components of them? or did you just fill in code?
Youll tend to get stronger experience working in less attractive jobs but demanding jobs.
While many people will say a jack of all trades resume is bad, the skillset can be quite usefull in creating a new company or helping one start, which may be a better option for you. The main problem with just "learning" skills without truly using them in a real world application is that your unproven.
Stay up with your education, and use what you learn to make real programs, shareware and so on, create a full-fledged (ecommerce,security,flash,CMS, etc...) web site for a small company who may not be able to pay you.
If you take the risk, and the lower paying jobs (or even charity cases!!).. youll find your work oportunities increasing quite quickly.
P.S. ..... go to night school... get the degree... its definitly worth it...
--Idiots, Every single one of YOU, A flaming mass of conglomerated morons, hey wait a second, isnt that how RAID works?
I was looking at an unemployment and job loss statistical page not long ago and Massachusetts was #1 on the list out of 50 states. So while the US job market overall is not that great, it's particularly bad where you are right now.
Thank you, that is the funniest thing I've read today.
And who says you need to go to a school that is THAT expensive ? I went to a technical community collage and got my associates degree in Computer Science and Engineering Transfer ( it was for transferring to a 4 year school as the 1st 2 years ) and finished in night scool at a local community college for far far less than that. My 2 year degree cost me about ( granted this was in 1986-1988 ) 360 per semester for 4 semesters = 1440 for 2 years. My 4 year degree was about twice that so I paid a total of 4320 for my 4 year degree ). And yes.. the degree meant quite a lot when starting out. It gave me a 43 % increase in salary at one job ( going from an engineering aide to a full engineer ). And I too am making around 6 figures a year ( with bonuses ).
UPS Sucks
Ok, you're tied to Boston. You can still work for some smaller place. These places aren't going to have the same advertising budget though and you'll need to do some legwork.
I working outward from where you live. Take note of the kinds of companies in the area. Think of the companies they do business with (who are also likely in the area and you may never even see them). Look up stuff on the Chamber of Commerce website.
The ideal position for moving up is to work some place where there *aren't* enough positions for everything. You want to work someplace where they can't just call some bozo from the corporate office to fix a router. With a smaller shop the first question they'll ask is, "Who knows how to fix a routher?" That question will be asked without regard to who "owns" it. All you have to be doing is standing around and hear that it's broken. Do something like this and save a small place small dollars and you *WILL* be recognized. You'll start to be included on conversations about how things work. You'll be asked for your opinion. These things aren't possible at a large corporation that just multiplies time served by merit points and attendance at company diversity meetings.
I took a job managing some documents once (they needed a person who could read English well and engineer-speak). They decided to test me out at some CAD stuff and thought I would do well at it. My training was: "Here's your computer, here's the plumbing codes (stack of books). Draw."
Learn the business first and you'll get to pick your role later. A year of industry experience is far more important than any particular skill.
"I implemented a java solution to reconile Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable in real time."
"I implemented a Weblogic solution using J2EE and XML and blah blah blah."
The people that actually hire are impressed by the first and fall asleep at the second. It doesn't matter what the industry is or what the job is, the person with industry experience has a tremendous advantage over the other applicants.
Unless it's telecomm, that's just poison these days. I tell them I was in prison (Guest Services Industry).
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Working for a large Beltway Bandit firm I can tell you that the clearance thing is absolutely the path to glory in the IT field. None of the companies doing DOD contract work can hire cleared employees fast enough. I started out of college 9 years ago making $36K and am now well into the six figures, with a good solid Java and OO Design skillset (and I don't have to be a manager!).
FYI - Lockheed Martin (a former employer) is probably the best bet if you don't have a clearance - they have big rooms full of salaried people just sitting around waiting for the clearances to come through. Also the National Security Agency is hiring IT folks like mad, and they will bump you right to the top of the clearance queue. They also have a very good cooperative education program if you happen to be in college right now.
So let's say that you go and buy another book and sit in your room and learn a new computer language. You now know another language but you still don't know anyone who will pay you to use it.
You need to spend just as much effort networking. The most important part of any career is the personal relationships that you develop. This is how you find opportunities. There is no substitute. You can't compensate by learning more technical skills. I'm not saying that you can ignore the tech skills. In geek parlance they are necessary but not sufficient.
For most of us geeks it is much easier to learn a new tech skill than it is to work on the social skills. To be successful you many times have to learn to do things that don't come naturally to you. I know guys who have finished their PhD's. They have tons of skills but they are sitting there wondering what to do now because they spent all their time being gear heads and avoided the social aspects.
Not that a degree is necessarily going to get you everywhere (lots of people with degrees in the field are out of work lately), but it shows that you have breadth of experience, can learn well, can work relatively hard, and have experience working with others, expressing yourself, etc. (At one point, just having a degree -- in ANYTHING -- could get you a job -- in ANYTHING else. Annoyingly, I know people who are programmers who have degrees in such technologically relevant fields as FORESTRY.)
Anyway, a degree will also give you broader technological exposure than any path you focus on in a career path. You'll learn fundamental concepts that you won't likely pick up on the modern career path (like the concept of assembly language, or microprocessor operation, or how to determine the optimization of an algorithm, etc.)
ob.anecdote.amusing:
A non-degreed co-worker who is a coder and former MS employee asked once what he would learn from a college degree that he wouldn't learn just from career experience.
I responded, "OSes other than Windows."
Terrorists can attack freedom, but only Congress can destroy it.
Several pieces of advice:
1. Learn *everything* you can about a real technical domain area that has nothing to do with computers. People don't care whether you can program -- they care whether you can program WHAT THEY NEED.
2. If you are a US Citizen, haven't sold (or consumed) pounds of cocaine, and believe that honest people on the inside of the system can make a difference, GET HIGH LEVEL CLEARANCES. There is a serious shortage of talented pepole (or untalented warm bodies, for that matter) in this area.
3. Present yourself, not as a computer professional, but as a business professional.
Supplementary info:
1. Seriously, who cares whether you know the latest object-oriented, distributed, web-based, googlephonic technology. What people REALLY want is someone who can bring those talents to bear on actual applications that they care about.
I have been a software engineer for a bunch of years, but the best projects I've worked on (and where I have been most valued) were ones where I had to actually learn something about what it was I was writing programs about. When I went back to graduate school in CS to get a Master's degree, I ended up working with people in Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics, working on algorithms for DNA and protein sequence comparison. Since then, I have spent *much* more time reading and learning biology than software.
2. Before I went back to grad school, I worked on military projects involving imagery compression and algorithm optimization. While checking the assembly code generated by the compiler was important, it was every bit as important to understand fundamental aspects of the imaging system involved, from the point of view of optics, error correction, and end-user (imagery analyst) needs. This was cool work, and important for our guys on the ground in the middle of nowhere.
There is currently an **extreme** shortage of dedicated, knowledgeable people with clearances in areas of national importance. Acquire these clearances, and you will never want for employment. Plus: CAN'T BE OUTSOURCED TO FOREIGNERS.
3. Somewhat along the same theme, be a provider of valuable services, not just a computer guy (gal). Right now, I have a contract with the Natinal Institutes of Health, doing research into diseases that affect millions of people. The reason I got this gig is not because I am a sharp systems engineer (which I am), but because I can *communicate* with the biologists and MDs who have very real and difficult biological and medical problems which can only be solved through an understanding of the problems and the shrewd application of computer technology.
In a different world, back when big iron still ruled, I had that same low-pay job. I was the tech support for a bunch of PhD reservoir engineer types. I was the one who wrote much of the code to produce and help process their data. In those days in that place that made me slightly more acceptable than the cleaning crew. What got me out of that and jump started my career was writing something so useful and technically challenging that several sane managers refused to let me attempt it or to ask the "real programmers" to do so. When I delivered it, done in my spare time and over convalesence from an accident, and it worked and was hugely useful, the tune changed. I had a team built around me and my ideas. I took a couple of years and answering a manager's claim that I was not a real programmer without a couple of degrees by presenting him with an outside job offer claiming I was indeed a "real programmer" and for 60% more than he was paying "real programmers" to boot. To get there I read every manual I could get my hands on, force-fed myself theory and practice at the MS level and dared to hack big.
Go for it! Make yourself stand out. Don't just be another specialist weenie. Show them guts, skill, determination and spirit. Even in a down market that gets noticed.
Dont go to a private college. Check out the top schools for CE,EE, and CS many of them are state schools. Mine, The University of Texas @ Austin being one of them.
my tuition and living costs are closer to 10-15k than 40k a year.
"I don't know" is an important answer, if it is followed by a clear understandng of how to clear up the gap in knowledge and get things done.
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Open mind, insert foot.