Nick Young

It seems a lot of people in this forum work in the IT industry,and I myself would also like take this route.Im currently studying for my MCSE and on completion wont to then study for my CCNA.I have no experience in the IT field as such(which may cause a problem),although my current job allows some hands on experience.At present im a Network Engineer for telecommunications Company,dealing with everything from transmission equipment to fibre optic/copper cabelling.Ideally I would like to get into the Cisco side of things(Switching/Routing) or some form of Network Maintaining.Please can any one point me in a good direction or let me know of any vacancies for someone with minimal experience.

Regards

Nick Y

Nick Young

Anyone?

Mr.Cookie

Nick there probably all at home, it is the weekend after all and remember the phrase "A mechanic has a run down car, a Gardener has a weed invested backyard..etc". So i think it's quite likely that at the weekend they don't want to even look at a pc

Si
Ps And i'm a chef who never cooks outside of work

ChrisB

A few comments (IMHO) before I pop out..

I personally don't think MCSEs are worth a lot. I'd rather see hands on experience(although chicken and egg syndrome is then a problem). Some companies will ask for MCSE, depends on what industry and other factors.

Cisco is good arena to get into.

Chris.

Chris L

Nick

CCNA is certainly a good place to start. It will give you a broad knowledge of networking (if not that deep on any particular subject). You should be able to pick up a CCNA study guide for about £35 - these normally include a CD with sample exams on it. CCNA is the prerequisite exam for most of Cisco's qualifications.

Once you've done CCNA, you can then look at specialising a little bit more - I'm going to be working towards CCDA (Cisco Certified Design Associate), which as the name suggests means that you are able to design and build fairly complex solutions using Cisco routing and switching gear.

Another alternative would be to specialise in Security (very big at the moment) or Network Management. If you like the security side of things, then I would suggest doing the Checkpoint Firewall-1 / VPN-1 certification courses (CCSE and CCSA). Cisco also do a specialist security course after completing CCNA.

If you like doing the customer facing roll, then technical pre-sales is probably a good area to look at (that's what I do). It is well paid (60K+ packages for full time experienced guys are not uncommon)and in my case I look after 5 clients, working with an account manager to develop networking solutions and advise the customer on expansion and new technology etc.

Although you say you don't have a lot of practical experince, your background makes you a valuable commodity . Find yourself a company that is willing to sponsor you in your training. It is getting more and more difficult to recruit properly qualified people, so companies are increasingly willing to take on less experienced people and train them up (they will probably want to lock you in with agreements to repay the training costs if you leave within a certain time).

Good luck - if you want anymore info, feel free to email me. Have a look at my company

ChrisB

Just had a thought that with your telecomms background, it might be worth looking at the Voice over IP arena (VoIP). Cisco are pushing quite a lot of resources at it.

Chris.

Nick Young

Thanks guys for your response.

Nick

polarbearit

I'll add my 2p,
I don't think I am giving away any big secrets by saying that