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Do most of you guys have a plan to move into management or project management as you get closer to 40? You don't see many systems engineers, administrators, etc in the 40-55 age range. Is that just due to our industry being so new, or is the usual path into management the only way to avoid being aged out of the industry? I'm in a senior technical position right now (systems engineer) but often think that I need a plan to move up even though I'm perfectly happy at the moment. My city is too small to have any real opportunities to specialize in one area and I'm too firmly planted with family to move to a bigger city. I keep an eye on the job listings and I rarely see senior technical positions come up and when they do they seem to match my current duties pretty closely. What is the long term path for someone like me? (Early 30s) I've already moved away from day to day administration to strictly design and project work, but I'd hate to think I've peaked already... For the record though I do enjoy what I do now, and the money is great.
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Jul 31, 2014 15:13
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Sepist posted:I'm in the same situation at 28. I only do design and project work now, hate ops, and have priced myself out of most of the market. At this point the only move forward would be pre-sales or management. If I ended up in management, I think I would just end up being one of those technical managers who sucks at delegating work to my employees so I think I am going to have to move into pre-sales. Also the idea of chasing people down because they forgot to log their hours doesn't sound very appealing to me. Yes I relate to this. The other senior technical positions I see come up don't pay as much as I make now (based on the few that show salary range), and I'm in a very comfortable position seniority wise with lots of benefits and vacation time.
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Jul 31, 2014 15:34
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skipdogg posted:I swear these threads make me wonder if I work for some mythical perfect company or some poo poo. I'm celebrating my 10 year anniversary here soon. Started working in one of our call centers while finishing community college and have been promoted multiple times since then. In my current position of Sr. Systems Administrator I'm making a very nice base wage in line with the local market while enjoying such things 22 paid days off, 8 sick days, 90/10 PPO with 500 dollar deductible, paid training, cell phone, hot spot and annual performance bonus (that actually pays out). We're even well funded as a department and get nice equipment. I really don't have anything bad to say about the company at all and have no desire to leave. You sound exactly like me. Going on 9 years, lots of vacation, tons of flexibility, great facilities on site and close with the top executives. Salary is great for the the size of my city and raises have been regular. Changed positions in a similar manner to you helpdesk->sysadmin->sr.sysadmin->syseng, and have lots of budget to research and deploy new technologies every year. That being said, I feel like I'm doing something wrong by staying put for so long, and that if my company every fires me or goes tits up, that my resume will look not so good to future employers because of that fact 
whaam fucked around with this message at 13:08 on Aug 6, 2014 |
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Aug 6, 2014 13:02
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wrong thread
whaam fucked around with this message at 17:01 on Aug 28, 2014 |
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Aug 28, 2014 16:23
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Docjowles posted:The Cisco thread is kind of the de facto enterprise networking thread at this point. My bad, was searching for "network" in the titles and glazed right over that, thanks.
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Aug 28, 2014 16:49
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As a general infrastructure guy getting a lot deeper into networking lately, all this doomsaying about SDN is starting to worry me a bit. I'm a bit late to the show learning the more advanced routing and switching concepts and applying them to my company (who is in the stone age in the networking side of things) I actually have started enjoying the networking stuff so much that I was thinking of dropping the vmware and storage and start specializing. Is this a bad move? I'm in an area with mostly SMB so I wouldn't want to get too silo'd. I've been in the field for over 10 years so have a pretty wide base of knowledge: network, security, linux, vmware, storage. Is it dumb to dive deep into networking with SDN potentially changing things? Or is it better to focus on networking and virtualization together to be more versatile for the changing environment?
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Oct 7, 2014 00:26
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adorai posted:software defined networking still requires networking knowledge. Yes of course, but if you can automate even a modest number of network engineers out of jobs by introducing efficiencies then there will be fewer jobs to go around.
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Oct 7, 2014 01:06
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psydude posted:SDN will probably hybridized a lot of DC jobs, but a lot of network engineer jobs are in areas that probably won't be too affected by SDN: POP sites, NOCs, campus/corporate environments, wireless, and consulting. This is where I am now. We have two very small "datacenters" with vmware networking, but for the most part its routing and switching spread across a large WAN with many branches. I don't see SDN impacting disjointed geographic networking nearly as much as dense datacenters where they are already using network automation and provisioning ports on a daily basis. The issue though is even if you own job is safe, if layoffs in the big datacenters saturate the market with qualified engineers looking for work, its no good for anyone.
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Oct 7, 2014 12:54
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Anyone have any real world experience with the new Dell Force10 switches? Looking at the N3000 line for branch office L3 routing and distribution. On paper, we can get the same switch as the 3750X(IP Services) for literally 1/6th the price. Obviously I have some reservations about Dell vs Cisco but I've heard several people have good experiences with this new line.
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Oct 9, 2014 13:27
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I haven't had great experience with sonic points either but they are a bit better with the latest firmware. We only started using them because we had de facto controllers everywhere already.
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Nov 23, 2014 14:30
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whaam fucked around with this message at 21:28 on Nov 27, 2014 |
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Nov 27, 2014 00:59
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I'm just looking to update my resume and am not quite sure what the current trend is. Should I be keeping it to 2 pages? Is listing technical skills and acronyms needed for HR filters, or is it considered tacky? I'm currently a senior architect and not sure what my next position might be, either management or another architect role. Obviously I will adjust based on that, but generally what do you guys recommend for content and length?
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Apr 7, 2015 15:33
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Gyshall posted:Three pages, first page list of work history/certifications/education, second page itemized technical skills, and page 3 is a quick overview of major projects I've worked on in the past with a quick executive level summary of what each accomplished along with timeframes. Right now I have experience taking up page 1, education and major projects taking up page 2. The big question is do I need that third page full of acronyms, protocols, etc. I know that would depend a lot on the position being applied for. Do you guys list all of these skills on your linkedin as well? It seems like that is where they would do the most good/bad at grabbing recruiters attention. Bhodi posted:Mine's also two pages, but the second page is mostly poo poo for search engines - a list of common skills, my certs. The first page is what humans look at. Definitely have more than a decade of experience but I haven't done a lot of job hopping. Many positions working up through the same company. I can fit my experience on one page but I like to have three detailed paragraphs about my biggest and most successful projects. I think a summary to start with is good as well. My big sticking point is if its worth listing line after line of technical skills like: CentOS, BGP, VMware SRM. Or is it best left to things like: Network architecture, Storage engineering. I feel like the filters will only pick up on the specifics even though they look messy on a resume.
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Apr 7, 2015 16:35
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evol262 posted:You're a senior architect. Do you need attention from recruiters who spam everyone who has Force10 experience for a 4 month contract in NJ, or are you going to be applying to jobs that you're actually interested in and where you can reasonably expect them to know what the acronyms are talking about (or call you/bring you in for an interview where you can either explain them off the cuff of they don't matter)? Thanks, that snapped me out of it a bit. I see others with all their skills listed in detail and think I'm missing out. I'm not looking to get spammed by recruiters, just want to make sure my profile is top notch and my resume is as well. In fact I'm not looking at all, just want to make sure my resume and career networking is up to snuff so that if I ever do need or want to move I can hit the ground running.
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Apr 7, 2015 17:01
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So I've got $5k of training budget to personally use each year and having a really hard time figuring out what to do with it. I'm the systems architect for a fairly large conglomerate, designing all of the storage, networking and virtualization for the various companies under our umbrella. Heavy focus on disaster recovery, security and WAN stuff as we are highly distributed geographically. I don't have any certifications because frankly over the last 10 years I haven't had enough time to pursue them. But I feel like my resume is lacking without them. At this point in my career should I start at the bottom and start grinding up through CCNA-CCNP, VCA, etc? I'm pretty sure my next gig will be more of a management or project management role as these days I spend half my time on calls and in meetings and less and less on the command line. Should I just hold out and give the money back? Should I hit some conferences and network instead? Or should I go try to get as many certs as I can?
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Jun 15, 2015 20:21
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evol262 posted:Do you have enough experience to start a PMP? Get a PMP. Or a CISSP (most architects should have a breadth of knowledge large enough to make this less intimidating). I like the idea of a CISSP because security is one of my favorite things to work with, but none of our industries are high security so it may not have as much value for me here anyway. I am strongly considering more of a PM role, but I don't have a degree, which is also another fear I have going into a less technical role. You can get away with no degree as an engineer or architect, once you get into management they start to look at that a lot closer. Docjowles posted:That was my takeaway, too. What more senior technical role do you aspire to that "X years experience as the systems architect for a fairly large conglomerate" on the resume wouldn't be enough to get you an interview? Most certs are to help you get a foot in the door in the absence of experience. But you already have the experience. Anything short of one of the endgame certs like CCIE or VCDX just seems silly. Even moreso if you seriously expect your next gig to be as a manager vs an individual contributor. No one is going to demand that the Director of Ops running a large team have an active CCNA. Any good conferences besides VMworld and Cisco live, which I just missed?
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Jun 15, 2015 21:03
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We've been using password safe which is a fairly expensive piece of software from a German company. It's been fantastic though. We host it internally and publish it via a dual-factor Rds server.
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Jun 16, 2015 10:33
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So is the consensus that if you want to get on recruiter's radar you need to fill that skills section with specific bullshit like NETAPP, CISCO, LAMP? I'm only looking for architecture and management roles at this point so should I fill it with RISK MANAGEMENT, LEVERAGING VERTICALS, SYNERGY ARCHITECTURE?
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Jul 4, 2015 11:32
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Any advice for an architect who never got any certs? I get budget every year for whatever training I want but I'm having trouble deciding if I should pursue certs at this point in my career, and if so which ones. On the technical side I do probably 50% network design, 20% security and 30% VMware/DR. As well as a lot of project planning, budgeting, etc. I'm pretty sure I don't want to pursue management or a PMP, because the reason I love going to work every day is the technology. I also don't think being a middle manager in IT would provide anywhere near the job security as being the senior architect who knows how every system and silo works. Is taking the long road through CCNA and CCNP worth it at this point? Maybe a CCDA is more worthwhile at this level? When I look through CBT nuggets I get overwhelmed and want to take all of the courses, but I know that's not realistic. As far as what I enjoy, I love security and am thinking about CEH and CISSP but it's not super relevant to my current day to day. Any thoughts?
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Jul 15, 2015 10:50
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Do you guys apply for new jobs that look very interesting even if you are super happy where you are? I don't want to waste the time of the company posting the job, but they don't give any idea the pay scale so the only way to find out is to apply I guess. I'm in an architect role at a large private company now making good money for my city (small) and now there's another technical architect role at a large MSP here being posted. These jobs never seem to open up so it's tempting to apply, but it would be very unlikely that I would leave where I am. I'm in the middle of several major multi-year projects here of my own design and leaving would be a super dick move. But they have replaced some top brass and are looking to cut costs all over the company which makes me a bit nervous.
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Aug 31, 2015 12:40
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nevermind
whaam fucked around with this message at 18:25 on Aug 31, 2015 |
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Aug 31, 2015 12:47
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Vulture Culture posted:Do you like sales? Being in any position at an MSP, if you're not doing support, you're implicitly working on the sales side of the pipeline. It sounds fun if you like the technical side of the architect role, but you also like interacting directly with customers. I've never done any form of sales. I do quite enjoy "selling" projects and solutions to our executives, but I understand this is a whole other beast. Currently company is in the middle of massive changes, which includes me taking over technical design/architecture for a second company that doubles our employee/revenue footprint, while pursuing constant acquisitions, and starting a cost-cutting initiative and potentially a freeze on anything more than cost of living raises. Also they are hiring a new CTO who will be a complete unknown quantity. One of the two industries we support is experiencing a downturn, while the other (new one) is thriving. So I really have no idea where I stand. On one hand there are dozens of potentially impactful and interesting projects on the horizon for me to uncover and manage, but on the other hand all this upheaval could be bad, and cost cutting measures are sometimes carried out with a hatchet, not a scalpel. In addition to this we are still barely scratching the surface of merging the IT departments of the two companies, of which we were the larger, absorbing the other. Aside from all that: love the work, the company and the compensation.
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Aug 31, 2015 18:24
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What's you guy's take on moving to management from a senior technical position. I'm a Systems Architect right now and the most senior technical person in the IT department, but am being encouraged to revise my role into taking on a few direct reports and leading an Infrastructure team, broken off from the main IT team. I think it will still be mostly technical and I will need to continue to be the one who "knows how it all works", but with a lot of knowledge dump and mentoring for my direct reports. My worry is that this will take me too far away from the technical side, as learning new stuff is what keeps me engaged with my career. Also I don't have a degree, and I feel like this is pushing me more towards a management track that feels like a dead end for an uneducated swine like me. They also don't like my architect title and want me to change to more of a manager/director title. Is there one that still reflects more "technical management" than "people manager"? I know titles don't matter within an organization, but I'm always wary of what story my resume or linkedin tell, and if the story is that I'm losing my technical chops and turning to middle management, then I imagine there will be a lot less recruiters knocking.
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Feb 20, 2016 13:13
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Colonial Air Force posted:I moved from Engineer/Architect to Manager, I love it, and I wouldn't go back. By crossover you mean you still do all the design and high level stuff? I'm happy to delegate away all the mass device configurations, quick changes and field work, but I really want to continue to do the architecture and learn/research new technologies.
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Feb 20, 2016 14:00
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Virigoth posted:If you love the tech side so much I'd think hard about it. Managing people can be a huge chunk of time. The IT here likes to think that good technical people make good managers which isn't always the case. I know my boss regrets picking up 2 direct reports because it cut his tech side by like 40% I'm thinking of proposing it as more of a team lead role than a manager. Still have the team report to their current manager (Director IT) and just lead them on projects but not deal with the personnel side of things. I just don't want to give the impression that I'm not capable or willing to accept a challenge because that's not the case. They are really hung up on titles too and I can't think of a title between Architect and Manager/Director.
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Feb 20, 2016 15:19
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adorai posted:1) I made this move. It is nice, because it satisfied my need to control everything, however (and this will likely depend on your organization) it's hard to prevent being constantly leveraged for the same poo poo you used to do. Something will need to be done, and they'll say "Whaam did this before! Let's call him agian." So just don't be afraid to delegate. I've never seen Officer used in this case. I like it but I don't think it would fly in my company. I am definitely a control freak so I like that aspect of this idea. I'm more worried about my future outside this company if I have to leave. A year or two down the road if I'm no longer a SME on networking or vmware or whatever, my job prospects aren't good. No one is likely to clamour hire a "Manager, IT Infrastructure" who has no degree and has started to lose their technical edge.
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Feb 20, 2016 15:27
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Anyone made the move from senior technical (architect) to team lead / management smoothly? I'm having a hard time downloading all my work into my team. I have two full time engineers working for me now after being the only real infrastructure guy for a long time. We've always had a large help desk and a few sysadmins but all the storage, networking and linux stuff fell to me. Now I have resources and I'm always feeling like I'm not feeding them work fast enough. They are still getting adjusted so can't really identify things to change on their own and run with it, so they are constantly looking to me for task delegation, but I'm still neck deep in some of the core infrastructure projects as well, while trying to juggle budgets, spreadsheets, manage projects and field teams, ahh. Not sure what I got myself into now.
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May 20, 2016 13:47
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H110Hawk posted:Have them start making infrastructure diagrams, this forces them to slog through all your terrible life choices and draw them out. We use OmniGraffle for this task and it's working pretty well along side a large format spool-fed printer. Sit them down and get their ideas on what they would improve if they had a blank slate and a pretend budget. They are a fresh set of eyes on your year(s) of tunnel vision and it is worth more than you can imagine. Ask hard questions, but overall trust their advice. Make sure the room has a whiteboard and a fresh set of markers/erasers. Yeah they are fairly easy to manage in the sense that they are great guys and have good work ethic. One needs to be directed but once he's on a task he runs very well. The other is a self starter but does things bit slower. I'm hoping to keep my role as the most knowledgable technical guy on the team, while still managing our time. Not sure how realistic that is but the technical is what makes me love this job. With their help I think its possible to both and have them handle most of the day to day while still having them investigate and discover new technologies and processes on their own. Might be a pipe dream.
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May 20, 2016 16:44
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