[Thermodyne]

I’m a network specialist with a state government agency. I work with almost nothing that I covered in school. Its 90 percent picked up on the fly as you bump into the hardware/software. Right now it’s a state wide domain migration, but nothing close to what was covered in any of my courses. After that it’s IP security cameras and building access control. Then we move to IP trunking (all of which we are testing as we now). Then toss in 300K worth of new desktop systems for December and another 50K for January along with an Exchange Server upgrade and an Office 2003 deployment just to make sure we stay busy. Also toss in a couple of new office setups just to make sure that no one makes all of their deadlines.

If you want to break into this line of work, study WAN IP data systems. Frame Rely and PVC know how will get your foot into a lot of doors. VOIP or IP trunking skill will some times get you hired on the spot. If you want to work server side, then being able to develop scripts is becoming a must have skill. Not to mention that a few good scripts can turn an 80 man hour project into a few hours of easy work. And if you are in school, stay there and get your Masters. Do an internship some where, anywhere, even if it’s unpaid. It’s getting imposable to break into this line of work. A company I work with advertised a 28K a year Helpdesk trainee position and got 1500 apps with about 20 percent of them being people with master’s degrees. And incase you don’t already know, first tier helpdesk sucks big ones! In this line of work everyone has to do some of it, but it is not something that most people will want to do 40 hours a week.