Trying to break in to IT infrastructure field

opethdisciple said:
The recruiter said the way to break into this field would be to take a job doing what I do now, but in a company with an infrastructure department, where I could eventually move in to.

There is also a microscopic chance that at my current job I can get involved with what I want to do. But my manager has said he wont let me do anything until I have passed the LPIC exams.
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You can pursue more than one thing at once... ergo you might as well pursue this at your current place and simultaneously keep on applying externally and studying
 
Back to this again.

Do you think my plans are solid? Study for the LPIC levels 1 and 2 this year? If I managed to get this done this year (4 exams) I personally think that would be a good achievement. They are not easy exams and they are very hands on.

After that I want to do the CCNA.

However I don't have the hands on experience from work. I don't do any infrastructure stuff at work at all. My job is setting up new user accounts, mobile setup and troubleshooting, VPN trouble shooting, setting up new PC, mobiles etc..... etc etc etc....

Basically wasting my time. I'm way more talented than this, but it suits them at work to keep things as they are. Because they don't want to do these things themselves. So they get the money and they big projects I get the crap that no one wants to do and no raise.

I spoke with my manager before I left for my xmas break in Dec about a few things.

I was furious! :mad:

At the time I was angry that he wasnt setting me any tasks. He would manage the other two but expect nothing from me.

He set one of the guys in the office the task of writing a script to pull in data from all the printers in the company and create alerts out of the data and display it in Icinga. At the time we found it hilarious as we we're all saying the office manager is going to hate all these alerts going in to her inbox and having to change the ink cartridges. :p Trololol!

HOWEVER, one day he turns to me and says, I want you to be on top of this. :mad:

I was furious. So you dont give me any projects to work on, and now your telling me you want me to monitor the printer alerts and go and change the ink cartridges in the company. :confused: FU!

This would also include traveling between sites. A 1.30hr journey to change an ink cartridge. Other people thought this was ludicrous when they realised what I was doing. For the last 20 years, everyone's been fine changing their own ink cartridges, now they're getting someone who is champing at the bit to do more interesting stuff in IT being tasked with changing ink cartridges..... :confused:

I brought this up with my manager and I told him, listen, this isn't right. There surely is something more important that needs doing than me going to change an ink cartridge. At the time he disagreed but this was the final straw that broke the camels back that got me thinking it's time to move on.

Like I said above we spoke before xmas and I said he needs to start setting me tasks appropriate for my level. He changed slightly, asking me to do some more interesting stuff. Stuff I can learn from.

There is a whole history of odd behaviour with my manager, but it hasn't taken him long to go back to old ways.

He set me a task. Which I have half done. However, we have bumped in to a infrastructure issue. I looked at it and looked at it, but couldn't solve it on my own.

The other two guys, he works with them to solve issues. Me, it doesn't seem he can bring him self to help me. He's gone round my back and given my project to my colleague. :(

He cant solve it either, meaning it's not me being inept. There's a big fundamental issue somewhere, which us as engineers (present company not included, obviously) need to solve. This is also about me learning from the experience.

But no, he's given the project to my colleague and is sitting down to discuss it with him. When it's my project! :mad:

The other guy has got a full plate as well of other stuff to do, whilst I literally have nothing. He took my project away from me. :confused:

Another thing that drives me crazy. I'm the main mobile guy at work. Yet, I have not had any input at all on the new MDM system they are putting together. This is another project I should be doing. And yet, nope. Not your project.

I've been at this company for 8 years now and this sort of thing started from day 1. He had an issue with me.

On the flip side the job is cushy. Come late, loads of girls, slow, we have busy times but generally it's fairly fine.

Oh and I'm being paid 50% less than everyone else in my department and our jobs are about 70% the same.
 
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well he apparently seems to think the other two are better than you

I'll repost what I posted in the thread you made 6 months agao:

don't be scared to move on... it is good practice to put your CV out there and go to interviews even if you're not really looking for a new role - tis good to just get practice and see what you're worth

tis probably better to spend time self studying while in a role you're already comfortable in, so I'd look at self study right now if I were you
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seriously, if you've had issues with the place for a while now you want to get your CV out there with recruiters... when you previously posted the thread I was suggesting it as a way of keeping your options open... half a year on I'd suggest you just get out of there
 
Everything screams leave. Yet you stay. Because its easier.

You've no one to blame but yourself. No offence.

You to take the hard path. It might not work out, but you should at least try.
 
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dowie said:
well he apparently seems to think the other two are better than you

I'll repost what I posted in the thread you made 6 months agao:



seriously, if you've had issues with the place for a while now you want to get your CV out there with recruiters... when you previously posted the thread I was suggesting it as a way of keeping your options open... half a year on I'd suggest you just get out of there
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I went for an interview in Nov for a Linux role (still 1/2nd line) paying a minimum of 8-15k more than what I currently earn. They also said they would put me on a Red Hat course.

However the feed back I got from them was they felt I already had the skills they where looking for, so didn't think they could offer me the right sort of progression. :confused:

Eh? If I've got what their looking for I'm surely the ideal candidate. :confused: Alas I feel I came on too strong for them possibly.
 
Some good advice was once given to me:

If you want to move up, sometimes you've got to move on.

There years later, I'm on twice the a salary doing Linux work that I really enjoy. My advice would be to do the LPIC and get the Sander Van Vugt RHCSA/RHCE books and set yourself a lab up. The Red Hat certs are sought after because you can't brain dump them - they are 100% hands on. The exam is expensive but try to think of it as an investment in yourself, it will pay you back as soon as it helps you get that job you want.
 
the_chicco said:
Move into DevOps. I went from Infrastructure (both Windows / Linux) engineering, into virtualization (picking up storage and networking) and then into Architecture and Strategy. Got bored of that and went to Google for a few years (Big Data, distributed systems, low latency networks). Now back on the market and got 3 solid offers to head up / run a big data team (a financial and 2 data analytics firms). I kid you not the money to be had is ridiculous and you learn an awful lot with the right company.

When I asked one of the analytics what I could offer potential employee's if I started to build a team they just said whatever it takes. I want to poach a couple of guys I worked with at Google (senior DevOps with Hadoop, Spark, Scala and Python) and they didn't blink an eye when I said they may ask for £800+ p/d.

It's in huge demand right now.
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Baby steps first. My big task is making the leap from technical support (1st&2nd line) to a junior Linux admin role, where the only real exp I'll have will be the LPIC1&2 exams.

Will a company take me on is the question and let me gain experience there?

I've been told by a recruiter that the answer is no. That you need exp to be considered and that book learning isn't sufficient.

But someone somewhere needs to give someone a job first for them to gain the exp. :confused:

From scanning the job market, I get the impression that companies would take someone on with a CCNA more than they would with just Linux certs.

This is just my observation from looking at the various job websites. Also I can see that some Linux roles mention that a CCNA would be advantageous. So that's something on the cards for me. But that will be for next year.

I'm hoping I can get a new job after doing the LPIC material and then do my CCNA at the same time.
 
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opethdisciple said:
I'm hoping I can get a new job after doing the LPIC material and then do my CCNA at the same time.
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Why not get a new job now? You have a job doing stuff, get another job doing similar stuff and see if that new company will let you progress internally to the other stuff you want to do.
 
I thought my advice was reasonable. Move to a smaller company where you are the only IT staff member. Then you will end up doing all the projects and everything. Once you work for in that role for few years and do some big upgrades. Then try get another job working in third line or at msp.
 
Is an employer going to offer him a job based on tinkering with a few labs at home though? The majority seem to want years of experience in the sector.
 
Ayahuasca said:
Is an employer going to offer him a job based on tinkering with a few labs at home though? The majority seem to want years of experience in the sector.
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We were recently hiring, more senior position than this guy is after, but certainly what you tinkered around at home definitely made a part of decision... I feel that attitude is as important as technical skills. We can train skills, attitude is another matter.
 
sorry to hijack the thread a bit, for a home lab will GNS3 provide enough of an experience in Cisco and routing for a proper network, rather than buying the equipment that i cant really afford atm. ive done networking and plugging cables in and getting console access to cisco ive done before so thats not something i need to learn, more just the using the command line.

also for a linux lab what vms are the best to use. ive setup zabbix, web server (apache and nginx), database and several others in work both production and lab. ive set up office and data center firewalls, as well as vpn connections etc etc but im looking to build out my own and wondering what to do with it.

thanks
 
Do the qualifications and do some contracting involving those fields. Yes the recruiters are a major pain to deal with but you will get positions where you can gain experience for your CV and very often you get offered full time posts so you can switch if you find something you like.

This route worked for me and I still think it's the easiest way to break out of 1st/2nd line support.
 
the_chicco said:
Get a lab set up. Install a hypervisor (VMware, whatever) on your laptop / home pc. Get some CentOS installs going. Get a decent Linux sysadmin book (I picked up a lot of stuff from Unix and Linux System Administration Handbook, ISBN 0131480057). Break things and fix them. Do scenario based situations as you would find in production.

You are looking at this all wrong I'm afraid IMO.
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I agree with this.

Ars did a good series on how to build a web/email server of your own if you want an interesting 'real-life' type scenario: http://arstechnica.com/series/web-served/

They did it all in Ubuntu, so make a VM and follow through all those guides. Then try and replicate the same thing in a CentOS VM - many of the steps are completely different in this distro so you'll have to figure it out yourself.

Then, install Ansible or Chef or one of the other Devops deployment tools and try to automate the entire thing. Get yourself a portfolio of devops scripts that you can share on Github or something and put a link to it on your CV.

Certs are going to be no good unless they're backed up by working knowledge and experience. I did the CCNA without having any actual network gear to work on and it was a pretty pointless exercise, although it did help me to get a new (non-networking) job.
 
I will be setting up a home lab this month. VM's Centos and Ubunu server.

The reason why I like the LPIC material is it's vendor agnostic, and all the material covered is what the other guys in the office are doing.

It's more rounded than the Red Hat course. I understand that the Red Hat course is more difficult and higher in demand (and more expensive), but I still think it's worth perusing. (what do I know)

The last interview I went too, when I mentioned to them I was going to do the LPIC material, they where impressed. In fact the IT manager there was working through it himself.

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I will update you further on today's shenanigans. sufficed to say, I think it is time for me to leave.
 
opethdisciple said:
It's more rounded than the Red Hat course. I understand that the Red Hat course is more difficult and higher in demand (and more expensive), but I still think it's worth perusing. (what do I know)
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It's worth doing but it's not a multiple choice thing like Microsoft and other exams are. You basically get given a Red Hat VM and are then told to set it up in a certain configuration, then you are graded based on how close you get it to a reference 'final' VM. So you need to get very familiar with the OS before you make an attempt, or it's a waste of £400 and a trip to Farnborough where their test centre is. You can't pass it by braindumping.

e: hang on you were talking about LPIC, got my wires crossed. ANyway same thing applies, get some practical knowledge first or else all you are learning is a bunch of abstract commands that you'll forget after 5 minutes anyway.
 
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