Need urgent advice

flibbage0

flibbage0

flibbage0

Soldato
Joined
6 Jun 2010
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So I've applied for an IT support position and I've got the job offer, it's around 17-18k.

I'm starting to have second thoughts, I'm almost on triple that at the moment in a healthcare profession, live at home, low outgoings.

Is the career pathway for IT still good? I'm starting to hear it's saturated, is this right?

Ultimately I would like to get into cyber security or pre sales. Would this position be the right starting point and more importantly how long would it roughly take to get to that sort of position?

Got to make this decision quickly
 
I couldn't go from being on over £50k to that, regardless of my outgoings. It'll be slow progression to get back up to what you're currently on.
 
Yeah i'm not sure i'd want to do that either but ultimately it's your choice and here must be a reason you applied for it.

Similarly, i assume you've built up a decent savings pot if you're been taking home £3k whilst living at home. I presume that could supplement the low salary.

As for how long to build back up, it depends on the career opportunities at the place you've applied. For everyone who quickly moves around there's probably 5 who get stuck in IT support for a long time.
 
Where is this (location) as where we are our 1st line roles go for over £23k at least. Why would you cut your salary by that much to start all over again. Would take you a long while to get to that salary again.
 
That's quite a drop OP but good luck - it took me 5 years and some luck to go from £21-£50k doing a career change into IT with no previous experience apart from building my own gaming pc.
 
I work in IT but without any real qualifications and I earn about that, you'd be very silly to cut your wage by 1/3, are you not saving towards a house or anything like that?

If you're serious about getting into the industry, then start towards getting the relavent qualifications first because the pay if terrible if you dont.
 
Is this a career change from health care to IT as that's different as if you want to start in IT might be the best option. If not I changed recently from one IT job to another and accepted it but wasn't really sure and regretted it, luckily I got the chance to go back to my old job but look back on it a s a learning exercise. So IT to IT you have to think is the job better, it's not always about the money
 
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That is a stupidly large drop in income, is it really going to be a liveable wage in the South East even if you are still living with parents. Don't they want shot of you at all ?

Better to keep the current job and invest some of the extra money you are currently earning into training in the skills for the sort of IT role you want. Support is the bottom of the rung and you can easily be outsourced to India, Philippines etc. Learn some more and join part-way up the ladder.
 
I would follow the advice to get some qualifications while doing the actual job, them try to start at some mid level. Small jobs meanwhile so you can get experience. But the drop of income for me would be a no-no. I could do one step back to allow me to do few forward, but reducing your income that much would put you a lot of stress, even if you don't believe that now, but after few months, or even few years, unless you're 100% sure, I would stay put and try qualifications and some experience before jumping.
 
I planning to change my career path soon but I would not take a big pay cut. Focus on getting some accreditations and emphasise transferable skills.
 
No chance I'd go for that. You could ultimately earn more in IT but it would probably take you 5 years or more to get there during which time you'll have probably cost yourself over £100k in lost earnings compared to current role. And then it will take you longer to catch up again due to the tax equation i.e. once you've overtaken your healthcare salary you'll be forking out 40% tax on all the extra earnings.
 
You are crazy if you drop from ~£50k to £17k.

Not only that but that's a very low starting wage for IT. I started on £18k fresh out of uni and my first ever full time job which was IT support, 10 years ago now.
 
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