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I've been researching different fields to go back to school for (30 years old, male). One of the reoccurring fields that Reddit and even goons love is the IT field. Which, it seems like a lot of people just love it because they can sit around playing video games while they are at work all day or basically just have a crazy easy job because we know how to use Google. Surely, I'm reading the wrong posts from the wrong people. I've grown up with computers since I was 11 and have been The Guy for everyone in my friend or family circle to go to for anything computer or electronic related for the past decade. Whether they need a new graphic for a tshirt, their computer isn't working, they need a computer built, home theater stuff is confusing to them, whatever. Granted, solving people's dumb & simple computer problems isn't exactly how I envisioned my life, but there has to be something that's hooking people to this field so much. IT Goons....sell me.
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May 31, 2017 20:20
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It's a combination of good to very good pay, it's a field that exists in literally every medium sized town up to major metroplexes, and it's (to an extent) a quantifiable skill that can be learned (as opposed to something like art, which takes a certain amount of innate talent). The fact that you don't have to interact with THAT many people is a bonus to some as well - most folks don't enjoy being in front of clients.
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May 31, 2017 21:36
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And college vs. certification? Which route is better to go for IT?
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May 31, 2017 22:23
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89 posted:And college vs. certification? Which route is better to go for IT? Certifications for entry level. College for anything 'serious'. No one cares about your certifications in the mid-tier professional circuit, except maybe some disciplines where certs aren't a total joke (CCNP, etc.) I would highly, highly recommend not going into the 'Tech Support' world, unless you have immediate plans to leave it for something more professional (Network or Sys Admin, Security Admin, etc). You do not go from 'Desktop Support' to 'System Administrator' without a different and developed skillset. Using Tech Support to bridge the gap between your career to something better. Tech Support generally sucks huge balls and generally does not lead to anything 'better'. Canine Blues Arooo fucked around with this message at 00:54 on Jun 1, 2017 |
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Jun 1, 2017 00:49
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Tech jobs pay well. The tech sector is also strong as hell while basically every other field that isn't medicine is doing absolute poo poo. If you're a good enough programmer you can make six figures with a bachelor's (sometimes not even that) but to do that in other fields you'll need more advanced degrees if you can accomplish it at all, ever. Tech jobs also have insanely low unemployment rates. The unemployment rate among people with CS degrees is like 2% right now. I don't know how it is among IS degrees but it's still better than the national average. If you have a few years' experience in anything techie enough recruiters will constantly spam you with interview offers. IS doesn't do quite as well as CS but still does very, very well. If you can keep a network running you can do pretty good for yourself. edit: Also every business in existence uses computers in some form. They need a person/people to keep the drat things running and loving hell the e-mail just broke again. ToxicSlurpee fucked around with this message at 01:34 on Jun 1, 2017 |
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Jun 1, 2017 00:59
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Canine Blues Arooo posted:Certifications for entry level. College for anything 'serious'. No one cares about your certifications in the mid-tier professional circuit, except maybe some disciplines where certs aren't a total joke (CCNP, etc.) What's the best route to go, then?
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Jun 1, 2017 01:00
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89 posted:What's the best route to go, then? Tech Support / Desktop Support is fine, entry level experience. It's totally cool to start in the industry there and there are plenty, plenty of jobs available. I would have immediate plans to exit those roles inside two years though. A lot of people dig that work, but it gets old very fast. You are totally disposable and are often treated like it. The first step into 'Serious IT™' is probably System Administration I broke into System Administration through pure luck - I was in desktop support and a small company desperately needed a sys admin. I had a lot of desktop experience and they hired me. I flailed around and broke their email for 3 months while I spent 8 hours a day desperately googling, trying to solve one more problem I accidently created before getting the domain into a stable spot and I could start actually learning without fires creeping up on me. To that end, I have no idea how you'd 'traditionally' get into Sys Admin, but domain administration is a pretty common role and I'd imagine there books and guides to the basics of Microsoft Exchange, Domain Management / GPO, and Machine Virtualization (Probably Hyper-V in an exclusive Windows house and VMware's suite of tools anywhere else). You can experiment with Virtualization on any professional version of Windows 10, since Hyper-V is an addon you can just install. Spending just a day with that software answers so many questions and is very worth it. VMWare is more of an Enterprise solution and isn't as easy to get up and running to experiment with, but free licenses exist and if you have the time, it's very worth getting used to ESXi, Vsphere and such. Again, if you have a Professional Windows license, you can start dinking around with some aspects of domain administration, specifically, GPO (Run > gpedit.msc). None of this is magic, but there is just *a lot* of it and it's worth exploring and understanding. Learning the basics of how to structure some Powershell is probably worth your time. It's esoteric as gently caress, but if you understand the structure, you can generally piece together what you'd need to in a job with tab complete and google. -- Windows System Administration is where I'd start, but that's just because that happened to be the route I took into the IT industry. Someone might have a better understanding of 'real' progress into the industry than I. Canine Blues Arooo fucked around with this message at 01:27 on Jun 1, 2017 |
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Jun 1, 2017 01:23
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I think the consideration of 89's location/willing to move-edness should be considered. If you live near a city, I think certs will be great since those type of positions are open and sometimes a company will hire the bare min just to fill seats/contracts. If you live in a flyover state where there is no tech industry to speak of, you might be able to take advantage of a degree since the colleges there will probably be way cheaper.
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Jun 1, 2017 03:08
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It's in Conway, AR. There's been crazzzzy growth with this place in the past 10 years and continues to grow like crazy. Lots of tech is setting up shop around here.
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Jun 1, 2017 03:24
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A couple more things people haven't mentioned: Internet communities like here and Reddit tend to be populated by computer nerds and the generally tech savvy anyway, so a predisposition towards an IT career is fairly natural, and you're going to see a lot of discussion about it. It is a really interesting industry that's growing and changing (and I mean that in a "new cool poo poo gets invented" kind of way, in addition to the obvious "there are more jobs" way) at a breakneck pace. Your job is almost never just rote task repetition (and if it is, your real job is to write code to automate that poo poo so you can do more interesting work), it's mostly about solving problems. Do you like solving problems, finding out the whys and hows of a thing, and making things work better and more efficiently? You'll probably like IT. I'm in software engineering, which means I  CREATE for a living. I currently work on an extremely boring-sounding product, but the work itself, the technical challenges, the problems I get to solve, what I learn from solving those problems, and the fact that at the end of the day I'm making things a little better, more stable, faster, or nicer to use, is quite satisfying. I'm almost never bored at work (usually if I'm bored it's because I'm writing documentation). How many people can really say that?The money being good, especially considering that these really are creative disciplines, is a very nice touch.
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Jun 1, 2017 04:16
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I've been going through the first JavaScript course for the past couple of hours on Treehouse and I'm pleasantly surprised that I've actually been doing a lot of this stuff already and just didn't realize it was considered computer "programming". Thanks to things like Kodi/XBMC, video game mods, and websites, I've had quuuuite a bit of exposure to this kind of stuff. Just never really sat down to learn it from scratch.
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Jun 1, 2017 07:31
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I have no other marketable skills and IT pays well above average. That's it.
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Jun 1, 2017 17:56
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NihilismNow posted:I have no other marketable skills and IT pays well above average. That's IT. But yeah, same here. GED. No Certs. No Degree. Worked my way up from the bottom, and I've been making 6 figures for a bit. Recently shifted into management. There really isn't any other career path that I can think of that could've gotten me that, and with readily available positions. It's really not about sitting around all day and playing video games or whatever. Like someone above said, it's really about problem solving. Your job, really, is to make sure your users (or clients), can do THEIR jobs. If the IT department isn't doing their jobs, no code gets written, no sales get made, no support gets done, etc. I also agree that it has a lot to do with where you look. If you ask online there is always a large concentration of IT people. We spend a lot of time online during the day while we are waiting for things to happen/complete or if we have downtime or whatever. If you ask outside of online circles, it's usually a very different story. It is, however, a pretty thankless job. (But most IT people don't want to be in the spotlight anyway) There is a saying... -- Everything is running great, what the gently caress do we pay you for? Everything is burning down, what the gently caress do we pay you for? -- metavisual fucked around with this message at 18:32 on Jun 1, 2017 |
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Jun 1, 2017 18:30
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How did you get started without a degree? My roommate's mom was wanting to get me in the trenches with the banking company she makes 6 digits a year doing software development & testing. Entry level is about $30k (which means I still need to bartend cause I'm doing about $35k-$40k doing that) and entails bank processing and monitoring those jobs. I've just been hesitant cause it doesn't require a degree. But, I'd be getting in with the top dogs that run that place. Right now, maybe it's cause I'm older (I'm actually 29, but turn 30 in a month) and I feel like I should have accomplished more. But I just still don't know what my dream job really is. So I've thought, maybe just tackle what I'm already familiar with?
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Jun 1, 2017 19:03
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metavisual posted:-- Ha. This is IT in a nutshell. You never truly make management/users happy. You can only make them forget about you for a bit. 89 posted:How did you get started without a degree? I worked as a Paralegal studying for law school until I was 28 and said "gently caress this" and decided to just go into IT. I self studied and got my A+, Network +, Security + I took a night class at the local community college to gain some hands on experience, I then volunteered with them for a bit setting up computers and moving Switches around and hooking them up. I then filled up my resume as much as I could with the certification and volunteer experience and threw it up on as many jobs sites as I could (monster, linkedin, DICE,USAJOBS, ect) and waited. I applied to probably 20 jobs a day. I actually got lucky in that the first company I worked for found my resume online, gave me call and I went in for the interview. I did well enough to get hired. It was really basic tier 1 stuff and I started at $40K, but I learned a lot. Two years later a friend at another company put a good word in for me, and now I do a mix of remote and desktop support for $50k. Which still isn't great, but it beats the $35K I was making as a Paralegal with a History degree. As others have said though, Service Desk is called Hell Desk for a reason. Its great to start in and you gain a lot of experience, but if you do it long-term you will burn out. I'm currently self studying BASH scripting and am learning towards taking classes for the CISSP to get into Security, however Sys Admin is another route too. Essentially, once you are *in* have a plan to advance. Solaris 2.0 fucked around with this message at 19:27 on Jun 1, 2017 |
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Jun 1, 2017 19:25
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89 posted:How did you get started without a degree? I started in 1st level tech support. Tech support is pretty much always hiring. (As someone mentioned, I don't recommend it unless you have a plan. Languishing in tech support forever without a plan is soul crushing!). I showed up to the interview, explained that I knew how to follow directions, knew some linux, a bunch of Windows, how to build PCs, how to run SQL Queries, basic networking, etc. and that if he wanted more proof, I'd be willing to come in and do a working interview for one day. (i.e.: work for free). (I had a voicemail that I had the job before I even got home from the interview.) (I had come from data entry, retail, car stereo, computer stuff was a hobby for me). I was 23 or so at the time. Granted this was in 2000, so EVERYWHERE was hiring, but honestly for tech support, it's not very different now. I was team lead at that job in less than 3 months. Went through a few layoffs, etc. I worked in Tech support for 5 years. I learned as much as possible, took all the extra hours I could, etc. Cross trained into other teams on my own time, etc. I always tell new people if you want to be successful, there are 3 things you need to do - Listen, Learn, and do a lot of <head nod> rather than <head shake> (it works better in person  , but basically when you're new, take on whatever responsibilities you can to try to learn as much as possible. People tend to appreciate the help, and you become a go-to guy. When budgets are tight, people say things like "Oh, Metavisual has his hands in projects on 3 teams, we can't let him go! We'd need to hire 3 people to replace him!"The only time I ever had an issue with having a degree was the first IT job I applied for. Everyone in the company had a PHD or Masters. (Literally everyone, it was ABSURD). The company did Supply Chain software, so everyone was in Ops Research, and things like that. I went for 4 interviews. On the 4th interview the CTO said to me "I'm just having a really hard time with you not having a degree" and I was so frustrated I just said to hime "We can't keep doing this. I'm not going to magically sprout a degree. I know I can do this job better than anyone else you hire, degree or not, just give me a chance, or move on!". I was with them for 4 years, and learned a TON. I did all their tech support, all their internal and customer facing IT, I literally did everything I could to prove myself. The last person I hired for my department has a degree, and to be perfectly honest we didn't even look at it. I didn't care. I was more interested in the fact that he worked his way up in Apple stores from entry level to their Business team. I was also interested in how he was able to deal with he people at the company and on the team. In IT, at least with all the people I talk to and have worked with, there is a general feeling that we can teach most people anything technical, but we can't teach people to not be an rear end in a top hat. So being a generally easy to deal with person goes a long way. -- As far as the part about being hesitant because it doesn't require a degree, I'm not sure why you would be hesitant because of that. If you a way in, and you see a clear path to run with it, then go for it. Honestly, if you want to be successful, and are willing to put in the time and energy then you will be. Seriously. I grew up with a lot of people that have degrees that have poo poo jobs now, and I have a bunch of friends who are dropouts that have 6 figure jobs because they wanted to be successful and worked their asses for it. I know it sounds corny, but it's the truth. That being said, a degree doesn't hurt. EVER. More education is more education. I don't want anyone to think I'm saying degrees are useless, because that's so far from the truth. It's just the way it worked out for me for a bunch of reasons. It was much harder my way, but it's part of why I got into IT, because I could. Sorry for the wall of text!! metavisual fucked around with this message at 19:34 on Jun 1, 2017 |
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Jun 1, 2017 19:30
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Entry level "NOC" operators are an easy way to get yourself into IT, and generally do not require certs or tons knowledge. It's generally "keeping the lights on" and responding to fires when they happen. You can definitely stay an operator forever, but the cream does rise to the top and it's easy to distinguish yourself there. I started as an operator, then took over an old monitoring application that no one wanted. Got good enough to be the sys admin for it. Then I got head hunted on LinkedIn into working for a much better company.
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Jun 2, 2017 03:48
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Hey, I'm curious about this too. I'm kinda miffed about missing the tech train. I'm in vocational rehab, with a degree in psych, and while I like working with people and consider myself a decent counselor, the money and future opportunities just seem so much better in the vaguely tech direction. Should I just poke around on some free coding training sites and see if it sticks at all?
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Jun 2, 2017 03:56
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89 posted:Granted, solving people's dumb & simple computer problems isn't exactly how I envisioned my life, but there has to be something that's hooking people to this field so much. I'm a self-taught programmer with around 3 years of professional experience as a software engineer. The last job offer I received was for over $130k in annual salary. (I do have a college degree from a fancy school, but it's in liberal arts and it's not a school that's fancy in the tech world, so I don't think that had any impact.) Programming's a different world than IT, mind, so I can't really speak to the admin/hardware side of things. There's plenty of opportunity in programming if you like/can tolerate doing it and you definitely don't need a degree to get hired.
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Jun 2, 2017 04:44
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Get a job in the field you want to work in, whether it's sysadmin, embedded, web dev, whatever. Don't worry too much about salary. Your goal is to get 2 years experience. Once you have that the job market will explode for you.
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Jun 2, 2017 05:06
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meanolmrcloud posted:Hey, I'm curious about this too. I'm kinda miffed about missing the tech train. I'm in vocational rehab, with a degree in psych, and while I like working with people and consider myself a decent counselor, the money and future opportunities just seem so much better in the vaguely tech direction. Should I just poke around on some free coding training sites and see if it sticks at all? If you're new to programming, I'd suggest a book or structured tutorial course rather than just poking at things without much of a plan. The important things to look for are an explanation which you can follow without getting too confused, as well as many exercises for you to complete. (I tend to prefer books because I get really turned off by video lessons if the teacher is not a good communicator, moves too fast, or comes across as condescending.)
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Jun 2, 2017 05:06
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lifg posted:Get a job in the field you want to work in, whether it's sysadmin, embedded, web dev, whatever. Don't worry too much about salary. Your goal is to get 2 years experience. Once you have that the job market will explode for you. This right here. ^^ The tech field is one of the few fields this still holds true for. It's like the old adage "work in the mail room and move up". That still works in the tech field. There is a guy at my company that had some programming/QA skills and was a barista at a local coffee shop. The CTO happened to be chatting with him one day, and off-handedly said "Do you know anyone with any QA skills?" and he was like "well, actually...". He got invited to intern for QA and went full time very quickly after. And he's pretty much indispensable to the team now.
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Jun 2, 2017 12:24
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I got my start with low level IT support, worked my way into a senior level, then decided to learn to program. I then went to one of those overpriced coding bootcamps (one of those know yourself things. I wasn't disciplined enough to 100% self-teach) and now work as a front end web dev doing React development. Whether it is IT or programming, you can get into the field without a degree. You might have to pay for a class or two, or for a certificate, but that's relatively cheap compared to going back to college. As others have said though, IT support is only an entry point, kinda sucks, and a dead end. Plan on it for a year or two and have a plan to move into a more specialized field. Networking, security, or any kind of programming will pay the best. If you want to do a mix of programming and server admin, devops is hot poo poo right now (cloud tech like AWS or Azure, plus programming and unix (or docker) admining). Learning a bit of scripting will help any of those along the way. I'd suggest looking up the BLS stats for where you live to get an idea of what is best in your area.
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Jun 3, 2017 15:39
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Canadian here - the market isn't quite as good but still strong. Like a lot of the other posters have said, it's a field where if you work hard and stick with it you can make 6 figures without much problem. I worked as a bench tech in a shop for way too bloody long (10 years), then ate poo poo at a couple godawful managed service providers for a few years - but they gave me enough experience with the basics of servers and networking to get into a decent MSP that handled bigger projects. Stuck around there for a few years and learned some more niche things like Citrix and higher end networking stuff, and jumped ship for a senior admin job in a larger technology focused company. Basically went from making 35kish to 6 figures in the span of 4 years. Not a lot of other fields where you can do that, especially without a degree.
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Jun 5, 2017 06:59
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I'm envious at everyone who got interviewed for help desk after slamming my head at the online job search engine for 2 years. Jobs which never asked for any degree until the interview: btw you need a degree to be considered here. Cya. I'm plan to take N+ once I get a stable work (part-time retail, full-time hell) and devote enough time for studying certs. I'm ambivalent if I want to transfer to a accredited online college tailored for networking/it degree due to increased flexibility because time/money. Also I'm 25 and everyone graduated and working non-dead jobs  Meanwhile I'm flailing around looking to work as a unpaid clerk/office intern which doesn't guarantee a actual job either. Life is disappointing. I'm enrolled at a college but life gets in my way...
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Jun 5, 2017 08:19
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Something to think about - I have an undergrad finance degree but work as a business analyst on financial and eCommerce systems. It's a mix of architecting, basic programming, but mostly designing. A lot of it is keeping up with either federal regulations/streamlining processes/bigger projects. I don't really interact much with the ops side (sys admins, network, info sec, database team, help desk, etc) but stick to the applications side. The pay is absolutely staggering, I'm 24 and could comfortably live on the same salary I'm making now for the rest of my life. If you go down this route, there's quite a lot of demand for competent app side guys especially if you're in a company with a strong focus on integrations. A lot can be hype - especially around big data - but throw in some statistics knowledge and you basically become indispensable if you can save or generate X amount through what you come up with.
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Jun 5, 2017 14:32
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Alder posted:I'm envious at everyone who got interviewed for help desk after slamming my head at the online job search engine for 2 years. Jobs which never asked for any degree until the interview: btw you need a degree to be considered here. Cya. Dude you are young enough to skip the hell desk bullshit some of us are putting up with and get a full degree that will get you paid $$$ in no time. Looking back, I should have just sucked it up and gone back to school full time instead of doing Certs, but life is always 20/20 in hindsight. You said you are enrolled in college, what ARE you studying? dk2m had some good advice if you can get into Architecture/Projects if you like that.
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Jun 5, 2017 17:31
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Solaris 2.0 posted:Dude you are young enough to skip the hell desk bullshit some of us are putting up with and get a full degree that will get you paid $$$ in no time. Looking back, I should have just sucked it up and gone back to school full time instead of doing Certs, but life is always 20/20 in hindsight. You said you are enrolled in college, what ARE you studying? dk2m had some good advice if you can get into Architecture/Projects if you like that. My major is Computer Info Systems (CS minus math) at a local CUNY business school but I haven't attended in the last 2 yrs since I moved out and rent is expensive. There's no way I can work f/t and f/t student unless I stop sleeping and people are already looking weirdly at me for being a non-trad student applying for entry-level jobs. Certs are just something more official than free online college courses and Western Governors University has a IT/Networking degree program meant for people who are interested in it as a career option (you pass certs during the program then graduate). I probably should make a new BFC post but my life = living paycheck to paycheck in a vague idea of what being a adult means in society. Alder fucked around with this message at 01:20 on Jun 6, 2017 |
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Jun 6, 2017 00:08
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You *probably* don't need a degree to get into programming. It depends on what type of programming you want to do. If you want to build web apps, skip the degree and just get a job building web apps. If you want to do cutting edge work in artificial intelligence, get the 4 year degree.
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Jun 6, 2017 01:16
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metavisual posted:FTFY. Sorry, I couldn't resist! Hey, this is my story too actually. I can't program at all, but I do crisis management in IT at one of the big services companies and make quite a bit more than I ever expected to make; what with the lack of any degree at all, even high school. Lack of development experience is going to gently caress me up something fierce someday though, so I don't recommend avoiding that.
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Jun 6, 2017 05:21
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89 posted:How did you get started without a degree? I found the A+ and Network+ certs tremendously useful, in that they filled in a lot of gaps that being a "human interface for Google" hadn't really, and I learned a *FUCKTON* more about computers working in a for-real IT position than I did doing small-shop bullshit. Like, before I feel like I was just a computer guy, and now I feel like I'm actually an IT guy. A lot of IT guys say the certs are useless, but even just the acronyms you learn can be very useful for water cooler talk/job interviews, but I've only been seriously doing this for a little over a year now. Anyhow, it pays well, it can be fairly remunerative for a relatively low amount of work, it is difficult to automate, there's a lot of demand for it, and there's a lot of demand for it in places people want to live (i.e. the Bay Area, Seattle, Austin, NYC, etc.).
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Jun 6, 2017 09:31
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Alder posted:I'm plan to take N+ once I get a stable work (part-time retail, full-time hell) and devote enough time for studying certs. I'm ambivalent if I want to transfer to a accredited online college tailored for networking/it degree due to increased flexibility because time/money. Net+ is $300 or something and can be prepared for with an hour or two of study per day for 1-2 months, it's not a big deal. If you can knock that out along with A+ you have a shot at a very junior IT position somewhere. Probably still hourly break/fix type stuff but better than what you're doing now.
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Jun 6, 2017 20:13
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So, one of my best friend's mom can get me on with the company she works for. It's a banking company that monitors bank processing, monitoring those jobs in the command center, software development and testing. She does software development and testing and has been there for 20 years. Started at $32k a year, is making over six figures now. Works from home. Says Command Center pay starts in the low 40s. Business Analysts low to mid 50s, call center low 30s. She has the big wigs over at her house for dinner all the time and is close with the higher up's in the company and just loves me. Sounds like she can definitely get me on to start working from the bottom around $30k a year. I haven't had schooling. Am I squatting on a potentially great situation and need somebody to slap me to get me to go for it?
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Jun 6, 2017 22:51
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sanchez posted:Net+ is $300 or something and can be prepared for with an hour or two of study per day for 1-2 months, it's not a big deal. If you can knock that out along with A+ you have a shot at a very junior IT position somewhere. Probably still hourly break/fix type stuff but better than what you're doing now. Rumor has it the pass rate for the Net+ for the N10-006 is 33%ish. I have no idea how accurate that is, but I will say that it was a lot harder than I was expecting it to be (to the degree that I wasn't sure I had passed when I hit the "submit" button). This is the version that just hit in February of 2015, and it's possible I've just gotten a lot worse at tests since college. It seemed like there were a lot more questions with multiple right answers than I was expecting. 89 posted:So, one of my best friend's mom can get me on with the company she works for. It's a banking company that monitors bank processing, monitoring those jobs in the command center, software development and testing. She does software development and testing and has been there for 20 years. Started at $32k a year, is making over six figures now. Works from home. Says Command Center pay starts in the low 40s. Business Analysts low to mid 50s, call center low 30s. She has the big wigs over at her house for dinner all the time and is close with the higher up's in the company and just loves me.
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Jun 6, 2017 22:59
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Bartending making $35k-$40k a year. But I'm looking for a way out.
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Jun 6, 2017 23:07
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89 posted:Bartending making $35k-$40k a year. But I'm looking for a way out.
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Jun 6, 2017 23:55
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Take the job. Learn *everything* you can. If they need a cron job to kick off a shell script, you're gonna learn it. Install a MySQL database in dev? That's you again. Be honest about what you don't know, but volunteer for anything they offer. Learn a programming language. It doesn't matter which one you learn first, so pick one that a friend knows so you have someone who can help. Sometime in your first year you should pick up a beginners book on Data Structures and Algorithms. Read it. Implement them all in your spare time. (And you will have spurts of downtime, that's the nature of these jobs.) Anytime you encounter something that seems important, go ahead and learn the basics of it. Databases, Linux admin, HTML/CSS, embedded, whatever. Dig deeper into anything that excites you. After two years of this you will be a highly employable programmer. You can jump ship for a new job and be at 80k (depending on the local market). Another few years and you can jump ship again and be at 6 figures. But it all depends on constantly learning.
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Jun 7, 2017 01:02
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$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ also i actually LIKE programming computers 
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Jun 7, 2017 01:22
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lifg posted:Take the job.
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Jun 7, 2017 01:26
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89 posted:So, one of my best friend's mom can get me on with the company she works for. It's a banking company that monitors bank processing, monitoring those jobs in the command center, software development and testing. She does software development and testing and has been there for 20 years. Started at $32k a year, is making over six figures now. Works from home. Says Command Center pay starts in the low 40s. Business Analysts low to mid 50s, call center low 30s. She has the big wigs over at her house for dinner all the time and is close with the higher up's in the company and just loves me. Do it. Do it. Do it. Banking&Finance experience in the IT world is like a +50% income modifier for your career progression. I very narrowly missed out on a 1-year contract with a major bank last month that offering 135k do some basic database integration and metadata work. The new job I have starting next week only pays 85-90k doing similar work level stuff for a logistics company. I mean, still good money but that's the difference between living well vs paying off a house within 5 years. Work experience is wayyy more important than schooling. I have 6 years experience as a Database developer/analyst and no one I've had interviews with gave half a crap that I never graduated. Also, as you'll seen see first-hand if you take the offer, there are a lot of people in this world with advanced degrees that are completely useless at their job. lifg is also correct. When I started I had absolute 0 knowledge about SQL/VBA/XML/whatever. After 4 years the Seniors were coming to ask me about their technical issues instead of the other way around. I just read everything I found online: w3schools, MSDN, stackexchange examples + a few books and asked as many smart questions as I could. If you've got a good head on your shoulders you won't have a problem OP. And finally, unless your assured a promotion you should be moving on to a different position or company every every 2-4 years. Variety is the key to a good career and one of the best ways to be sure your pay is keeping up with market trends (read: make more money).
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Jun 7, 2017 04:43
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