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The Best (and/or Fastest Growing) Computer Jobs
Professor Snugglesworth
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I always struggle where to put these type of threads in, since it's half advice-related and half-technology related. For now, I think I might get better answers here.
Right now, I'm in somewhat of a crossroads in regards to careers. As of this writing, I'm part of the Government workforce as a CBP Officer, but it's going to at least be another year before I actually get to perform the job (four months academy training, couple more months of OTJ training).
For several reasons I won't get into, I'm eager to succeed in the job, but not 100% confident I have what it takes. To put it simply, I've never done anything like this before, so I feel like a fish out of water.
Which is why, while I still have the time, I'm taking another look at career path I was originally going to take: IT Certification. I tried to complete a basic cert course in college, but dropped it due to a literal roadblock with the material. That was then, though, and I feel fairly confident that if I went back and took it again, I would do a lot better.
Computers is something I'm familiar with, seeing how I'm always connected to one almost 24/7. As far as comfort zones go, I'm certain I could sit in front of a computer all day versus checking in hundreds of people with the mentality that any one of them may go violent. The reason I'm sticking with CBP, though, is the pay and benefits. After a few years, it certainly turns into a salary I can live off of.
But I've often heard computer-oriented careers offer their own hefty salaries. That's why I would like to ask in this thread about the quickest path to a successful career in IT or any other computer-based professions.
To compare, my current salary (Grade 5) is $33,134. After one year, my Grade automatically moves up by two, which gives me $41,043. Year three gives me $50, 204, and so on until I'm making $94, 645 by around six years. That number does not include overtime pay, which caps out at $35k a year, and by then I can move on to other positions within the field.
So with that, I would like to know what kind of certifications I could get within that time-frame, and what kind of money I could be making from that. If it turns out that the salary rate is higher and quicker versus my current career, I may strongly consider seeking that out instead (or perhaps work toward earning the degree while I'm still working CBP; if these certifications can be obtained online, that would make things even easier).
I just want some foresight on the career path I was originally going for before I settle into the one I'm in now. I'd just like to know what my options are.
Right now, I'm in somewhat of a crossroads in regards to careers. As of this writing, I'm part of the Government workforce as a CBP Officer, but it's going to at least be another year before I actually get to perform the job (four months academy training, couple more months of OTJ training).
For several reasons I won't get into, I'm eager to succeed in the job, but not 100% confident I have what it takes. To put it simply, I've never done anything like this before, so I feel like a fish out of water.
Which is why, while I still have the time, I'm taking another look at career path I was originally going to take: IT Certification. I tried to complete a basic cert course in college, but dropped it due to a literal roadblock with the material. That was then, though, and I feel fairly confident that if I went back and took it again, I would do a lot better.
Computers is something I'm familiar with, seeing how I'm always connected to one almost 24/7. As far as comfort zones go, I'm certain I could sit in front of a computer all day versus checking in hundreds of people with the mentality that any one of them may go violent. The reason I'm sticking with CBP, though, is the pay and benefits. After a few years, it certainly turns into a salary I can live off of.
But I've often heard computer-oriented careers offer their own hefty salaries. That's why I would like to ask in this thread about the quickest path to a successful career in IT or any other computer-based professions.
To compare, my current salary (Grade 5) is $33,134. After one year, my Grade automatically moves up by two, which gives me $41,043. Year three gives me $50, 204, and so on until I'm making $94, 645 by around six years. That number does not include overtime pay, which caps out at $35k a year, and by then I can move on to other positions within the field.
So with that, I would like to know what kind of certifications I could get within that time-frame, and what kind of money I could be making from that. If it turns out that the salary rate is higher and quicker versus my current career, I may strongly consider seeking that out instead (or perhaps work toward earning the degree while I'm still working CBP; if these certifications can be obtained online, that would make things even easier).
I just want some foresight on the career path I was originally going for before I settle into the one I'm in now. I'd just like to know what my options are.
Professor Snugglesworth on
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That said, where do you live? What do you know about computers? Have you ever set up a network? Do you know what AD is?
The biggest money in IT is in programming, but unless you already know how to do it you're going to need to go hit college and that's going to throw the whole time/money table off.
If you're doing support and sysadmin-y stuff one doesn't need school, or even the certs, really. That's what I've done. I've spent the last three years doing helpdesk ("Hi, you computer isn't working? Have you tried turning off and on again?") and desktop support (*walks over the the PC in person and turns it on and off again while glaring at the user*) but I've had to do it with contracting companies. You get paid dick, you have shit benefits (if any), and you never know if you'll have a job when the contract is up. After three years I managed to get another role and a different contractor that at least pays ok and is stable but I know I'm not ever going to get a real raise from it. I'm hoping that I can move on from here after another year and go work actually in-house somewhere.
fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
Mind you there is still stress. but not the same kind. Oh, and you mentioned physical block to achieving a certification, or was that mental, wasn't clear?
I don't think you will find a salary path in IT that will match that schedule with your skill set though. I think starting from the ground level in IT to year 6, you might be lucky to see 60,000 if you really build your skills and get some promotions or jump ship a few times. This is, assuming you don't go to school and get some CS or programming experience. I think system administration will eventually pay you well but you will most likely start out as a grunt desktop support tech. Not to glorious and the skills you build here are kinda... degrading. But its a good place to start that doesn't involve terrorists as far as I am concerned.
Oh, and better yet, get some programming chops and stop terrorists with your software. There are some big bucks there I hear.
Paper certs won't help you get employment without experience except possibly at the very entry-level (desktop support or helpdesk I) and these positions have the highest turnover and are hard to break up out of. It seems to me the desktop/helpdesk positions have contracted around mitigating user issues while the rest of IT has expanded to include more roles and responsibilities as more business logic has expanded from the desktop to interact with services. If you have long or deep professional experience then paper certs can help flesh out your resume, but the experience is more valuable than the certs.
While working in IT (or in most any private sector field) you are not going to see significant increases in pay (like you seem to be guaranteed in govt service?) unless (1) you change positions or (2) you have significant responsibility to bring revenue in. I see no obvious path where you can go from $35K at entry-level to $95K with 6 years experience unless you are extremely talented, motivated to learn and apply new technologies, and change jobs (and likely employers) at least 3-4 times over that period. Perhaps in a startup environment where you're given a lot of duties from the get-go, the startup blows up and in the end you're in a development, sales/marketing, or management role?