impossible job opportunities

[that1guy15]

Yeah Google is amazing.

Thanks for the advice guys, got a second interview for the Thompson Reuters PAID internship, it went amazing. This one sounds perfect, but the screening process is intense and the internship itself I have heard is rigorous. But they offer full time and benefits after.

The other was for Robert Half. Went extremely well but them being a staffing firm, their standards are much lower. But this a temp position and should be wrapping up right around the start of next semester.

Seriously guys, thank you. These were the things I needed to hear. I was stressing and patching myself out due to the lack of real world experience I have.

Good to hear dude, I hope the best for you! I know you are in a pretty stressful situation but try to not let it get to you. I assume you are in your early to mid twenties. These are the years to get yourself out there and take risk. You can afford to fuck up and make bad choices in your career at this age. Use the opportunity to take large risk for something you want! Worst case is you fail and learn from your mistakes.

Or get thrown in prison for murder. Dont get throw in prison for murder!

[deanwebb]

+1 on not murdering. I think pretty much everyone on the forums is anti-murder.

Funny story: After my first two jobs in IT, Windows 95 support for MSFT and a Win95 rollout for Fina, I never had a job from a placement firm. I either got the jobs from recruiters working directly for the company I got hired at or from showing up and asking for the job.

Getting back into IT after an 11-year hiatus, I did a free internship for a friend, a six-week contract at a small firm, and then went full-time at where I'm at now. This is a field where things definitely ramp up quickly.

[jay9821]

Lmao, I think I'm going to fit in well here. Thanks for the congrats. I'm not stressed, was just super nervous abut the first interviews I've had in the industry.

I'm 27, and this is my third career change. Culinary < Health field < IT. So I know all about making that leap. But luckily for everyone I'm also anti murder, my friends and family call me Mr. Zen lol.

That's interesting about how you got your jobs, I think almost everything now days is via entry level slave work, internship or by placement recruiting. And I'm including my experience working in the health industry too.

What do you mean by ramp up quickly? As in job opportunities? Or how complicated things can get?

[deanwebb]

Both opportunities and complications. If you can learn something that is hard to do, you can get into some very good environments to do that hard thing. But even in general work, a few good years of experience can translate into some really exciting mid-level positions. Pay in key markets like Houston, Dallas, Washington DC, LA, San Francisco, and the Northeast Corridor can be very competitive.

[that1guy15]

Yeah once you get your feet in the door and start getting exposed to real networks you start to gain a ton of knowledge very fast. Usually your first few years are a huge ramp-up.

Also keep active on forums and social media with helping others solve problems or lurking threads and it will help that ramp up even more. You cant be exposed to everything at any given job so social media is where you get that insight. Thats how I did it.

[icecream-guy]

Yeah once you get your feet in the door and start getting exposed to real networks you start to gain a ton of knowledge very fast. Usually your first few years are a huge ramp-up.

Also keep active on forums and social media with helping others solve problems or lurking threads and it will help that ramp up even more. You cant be exposed to everything at any given job so social media is where you get that insight. Thats how I did it.

Keep in mind that  networks you read about in books are directly inverse the networks you will see in real life.
The ramp up is your employers expectation, you'll get some time to get familiar, then the projects come fast then furious. you just gotta dive in whereever you can help, if you can't help ..watch what others are doing. and get up to speed.

[jay9821]

I see what you guys mean. A lot like when I worked in kitchens a long time ago. Step up and do it, sit back and learn until you can help, or get out.

What other forums are there? I noticed that everyone here seems to have just joined in January. Is this forum new? I might have mentioned this, but I'm a forum geek when it comes to cars and had been looking for good network forums for a while. This was the first one I came across.

I have a fave to face interview in 2 1/2 hours. Finally figured out what I'm supposed to be doing. Remote upgrading servers for Dominos pizza stores to server 2k8, then providing call support post upgrade. Any advice on actual real world implementing? Again, thanks a ton!

[deanwebb]

EXACTLY like working in kitchens, yes!

This forum is new, but the members include a corps of talent that has been actively supporting the networking community (and each other) for many years. New forums, old community. The fact that this was the first you came across is good news to me, since it means we must be coming up in the searches.

For the upgrades, that's an entry-level job as a sysadmin, but it counts as IT experience. For phone support, the best things you can do are:

1. Be polite to a fault.
2. Be even more polite than that.
3. Set expectations appropriately - use words like "should" instead of "will".
4. REALLY set expectations appropriately - make sure you can deliver on anything you promise.
5. "I need to check my resources" - that means you will put the customer on hold, talk to your mates, do a websearch or two, go to the bathroom and have a think while doing other things, and then get back on the phone with a fresh perspective.

[that1guy15]

Forums:
Here (obviously)
reddit /r/networking and /r/cisco - Im starting to not like reddit as there is a ton of miss-guided information and ass-hats there who like to just bitch. Tons of good content though.
Cisco Learning network (Cisco Certs)
Twitter.

[icecream-guy]

What other forums are there? I noticed that everyone here seems to have just joined in January. Is this forum new?

This about sums it up:

Once upon a time, there was a guy named Steve, that ran a really cool Cisco Forum. The place had a fantastic group of people whom participated on a regular basis. The place ran very well for like 6 years or so. One day Steve got really tied up with family matters, I would suppose one could say he bit off more family than he could chew. As a result he decided to sell the board and focus on other matters. One day last year, there finally was a new owner.  The new owner, revamped the web site, making it look all new and modern while taking away lots of it's functionality.  Pissed off a lot of the members over there. Many started leaving and not coming back. Then around Christmas time lat December. There was an outage, a big outage, forum was down for like a week,  all the participating members went into withdrawal.  There was a point where one of the members had enough of it and created a new board. Started a thread over there about this new place he built, and invited everyone from there, over here (thread since deleted, over there). So a great majority of the members came here from over there in January, leaving the old board something of a shell of it's formal self.  There are a few people that visit there, primarily for nostalgic reasons. But since we (as a group) couldn't get what we wanted over there, we made it over here. 


So technically Yes, this is a new forum, but most of us are familiar with each other from the place before.

[Fred]

Huh. This one doesn't scare me.

Minimum 7 years in Information Technology, including experience in supporting data networks required.

I'm 38, and the last 15 years of my life have been focused in networks.

-Expert knowledge required on Cisco switching and routing, network protocols and firewalls.

I'm only a CCNP, but I do consider myself to have expert knowledge.

Four year degree from an accredited institution

B.S. in Computer Science

Industry certifications for routing, switching and network engineering and support are preferred.

CCNP, CCDP.

Experience managing technical projects is preferred.

I've led dozens of projects.

Experience managing communications with management, customers and vendors is preferred.

Check. Communication is key.

4 or more years with load balancers

10+ years managing F5 load balancers.

Understanding of firewall, IDS and network security standards

CheckPoint, Palo Alto, Sonicwall for firewalls.
Corresponding IDS/IPS for those firewalls, plus some additional snort experience.

3 or more years with Linux or Windows OS, MS networking, storage, virtualized environments

I could probably change professions to a linux admin pretty easily.  I could outcompete many of my networking peers in Windows admin, as well, but I don't think it's the right path for me.

network and system monitoring and scripting

Led the Solarwinds deployment at my current position. I prefer open source network monitoring due to its flexibility, but can understand the advantage (and limitations) of an 'out of the box' solution.

Demonstrated ability to consistently follow a disciplined troubleshooting methodology

I've been through ITIL training, but haven't worked in an ITIL shop. I've passed TSHOOT. I can certainly demonstrate a disciplined top-down or bottom-up troubleshooting procedure, though I will admit that my own methodology is more educated and adaptive to the particular problem.

Communication with technical staff, IT management, internal customers and external vendors during outages

Seriously, communication is key. I could go on for days about how important it is to communicate, even if that communication is "no updates at this time."

Project management and communications with technical staff, IT management, internal customers and external vendors during IT projects

See above.

Configuration of routers and switches (Cisco)

I like Cisco, but haven't come across an off-brand that's scared me. Most of them model Cisco.

Configuration of security and load balancing appliances (multiple vendors)

F5 load balancers. I haven't had a chance to play with other load balancers other than AWS Route53, and I've only done that for personal stuff (so far).

Documentation, using Visio and office automation applications

Documentation is second only to communication.  I have strong Visio skills, and my MS Word voodoo betrays my open source background. Write shit down, and think about the engineer that comes after you.

Experience with Vmware

Huge fan. Lots of experience with VMWare environments.

and Microsoft Active Directory (design, migrations, use of elements like group policies, etc.) is a plus

I know the basics of AD, but wouldn't want to put me in charge of it. I would, however, put me in charge of others who are managing AD, since I do understand what it's capable of and some best practices.

Understanding of communications/telecommunications circuits

Yeah. I got that.

**For immediate consideration........

If it pays enough and covers relocation expenses for my family, I'm there.

I've seen laughable job requirements, but I don't think this is one.  It seems like a reasonable senior position.  I wouldn't mind if you sent me the link to the job posting, actually.

[icecream-guy]

we'd expect that you'd fit right into the position, will all your knowledge you provide around here,

I think this is a link to the job,  couldn't find the original
http://www.roberthalf.com/technology/it-job-search?5_jobSearch.request_type=ViewJobDetail&5_jobSearch.job_number=43221366&5_jobSearch.single_job=true&specificJob=43221366&referrer=www.indeed.com&referrer=www.indeed.com&custId=0

the range in this ad is a bit lower, like 20K, than the original posting I quoted, from what I remember. RH is a staffing agency, so I'd expect they want to make some money off you too.  Still 100K is pretty good around DC, but not for downtown.

[Nerm]

I agree with Fred. I don't see that as a crazy job listing. I was a server admin for years so Linux and AD are quite familiar. The only places that would disqualify me is my limited load balancer experience and the 4 year degree requirement. Dropped out after year 2 to go make money, plus I came to realize how useless IT degree programs were for the real world of IT. If I had it to do over again I would have majored in business and still went into IT. In my experience though I have yet to see a job listing that requires a 4 year degree and actually stuck to that requirement.

[icecream-guy]

http://www.roberthalf.com/technology/it-job-search?5_jobSearch.request_type=ViewJobDetail&5_jobSearch.job_number=43221366&5_jobSearch.single_job=true&specificJob=43221366&referrer=www.indeed.com&referrer=www.indeed.com&custId=0

yep that's the position

[jay9821]

I just got hired at Robert Half.

Got the job by the way! Lol