The IT Career Questions/Advice Official Thread, for FAQs, Job Opportunities, Certification Help, Educational Resources and More!

[Deleted member 32726]

I am finally scheduled to take the first part of the A+ exam next Friday. No, seriously. For real.

I have a PDF of the practice exam right here and was wondering if anyone who has taken the A+ could take a look at that and let me know if the actual exam is more-or-less the same as far as how they set up questions.

Click to shrink...

I posted some practice questions for the 901/902 in this thread, and I think those were nearly similar in rigor to my experience. The ""Performance"" based questions I see in the pdf are spot-on. I wouldn't expect too many of those. Otherwise, this is pretty much representative of the real thing. If you got something wrong, then look back at the exam objectives. Everything you are expected to know is on the objectives, and you should be able to give a very high-level explanation of the terms or concepts listed. Technically there's no "scope" to the exam because CompTIA says they're not a "comprehensive listing".

But they basically are. You really only need the "first line of the Wikipedia" level of understanding for most of these. If you got something wrong because it wasn't on the objectives, or because your course didn't get into the specifics for you to know that question, then I wouldn't sweat it. I am sure you will do fine if you've been studying!

 

[SOLDIER]

I posted some practice questions for the 901/902 in this thread, and I think those were nearly similar in rigor to my experience. The ""Performance"" based questions I see in the pdf are spot-on. I wouldn't expect too many of those. Otherwise, this is pretty much representative of the real thing. If you got something wrong, then look back at the exam objectives. Everything you are expected to know is on the objectives, and you should be able to give a very high-level explanation of the terms or concepts listed. Technically there's no "scope" to the exam because CompTIA says they're not a "comprehensive listing".

But they basically are. You really only need the "first line of the Wikipedia" level of understanding for most of these. If you got something wrong because it wasn't on the objectives, or because your course didn't get into the specifics for you to know that question, then I wouldn't sweat it. I am sure you will do fine if you've been studying!

Click to shrink...

Speaking of the performance-based questions, on the practice exam I couldn't even manipulate any of the simulations (except the two where you drag and drop the correct answers). For the simulation about fixing the IP settings or setting up a user's mobile network, the only thing I could interact with was a tiny box in the bottom that said "Your Response".

Nobody in the office knew what you were supposed to do or input there. Does the exam look for keywords or something? How does it determine if what you type is considered an acceptable answer? Is this how it's supposed to be for the actual exam?

 

[Deleted member 32726]

Speaking of the performance-based questions, on the practice exam I couldn't even manipulate any of the simulations (except the two where you drag and drop the correct answers). For the simulation about fixing the IP settings or setting up a user's mobile network, the only thing I could interact with was a tiny box in the bottom that said "Your Response".

Nobody in the office knew what you were supposed to do or input there. Does the exam look for keywords or something? How does it determine if what you type is considered an acceptable answer? Is this how it's supposed to be for the actual exam?

Click to shrink...

That.. is still pretty accurate of PBQ's. They can be janky. I wouldn't worry about it, they tend to be easier and there aren't as many on the test.

 

[SOLDIER]

That.. is still pretty accurate of PBQ's. They can be janky. I wouldn't worry about it, they tend to be easier and there aren't as many on the test.

Click to shrink...

And they're only worth 1 point like the multiple choice questions, right?

Still, I am curious if there are any websites out there that have free simulations based on the performance questions. Anything like "change the settings on this mobile phone" or any of the other questions where you have to input the required information.

 

[denx]

Hello. Probably a dumb question, but I might as well ask it. I'm studying Networking and already set up subnets in my workplace through VLANS as part of an assignment. They're working perfectly as intended, but I'm still a bit confused about what PVIDs are and what they actually do, even though I got them setup on the switches. Any help is appreaciated, thanks!

 

[captive]

I've been in this field for little over two years and I still feel like I don't know jack shit lol.

I'm going to be on my own for a week and a half at the end of October and am dreading it.

Any tips helpdesk Era?

Click to shrink...

so 1) no matter how long youve been in IT you always feel like you dont know much
2) just keep calm and google. Rest assured that you're *not* the first person to come across a problem.

 

[onyx]

WGU should be at the top of the list.

Click to shrink...

Yeah , WGU is great. I'm going for the IT Management degree, which doesn't come with any certs :( . I got my ITIL foundations cert before I started and plan on getting the CSM to help compliment my degree. Really need this degree to help move my career forward. I'll likely work my way up the ITIL and Scrum Alliance cert ladders too.

They provided discounts on Comp TIA certs too so I might take some their business related certs as well.

 

[Fezan]

Does anybody have spare Microsoft certification coupons here? I used to get them in university but at that time didn't had any time

 

[sca]

Passed the CompTIA Project + exam after failing once for my BSCS at WGU. If anyone is attending WGU, access to Pluralsight comes with it. The videos aren't amazing, but the practice tests are from Kaplan and I found them to be much better than the ones given by UCertify

 

[nextJin]

Passed the CompTIA Project + exam after failing once for my BSCS at WGU. If anyone is attending WGU, access to Pluralsight comes with it. The videos aren't amazing, but the practice tests are from Kaplan and I found them to be much better than the ones given by UCertify

Click to shrink...

How much overlap is there between Project+ and ITIL? I take Project+ next term and just passed ITIL a few months ago.

 

[sca]

How much overlap is there between Project+ and ITIL? I take Project+ next term and just passed ITIL a few months ago.

Click to shrink...

I honestly have no idea. I did find this link http://www.myitstudy.com/blog/2013/05/distinction-between-itil-and-pmbok/ and a lot of Project+ had to do with PMBOK

 

[Deleted member 41178]

I am finally scheduled to take the first part of the A+ exam next Friday. No, seriously. For real.

I had to take the practice exam first with my academy in order to qualify for the free attempt of the real thing. Since the rules on the practice exam were quite lax (no time limit, open book), what I decided to do was answer all the questions without looking them up, then review all of them before I hit Submit and change the incorrect answers. Since you have to wait 24 hours to retake the practice exam, I chose instead to get this done with so I can move onto the real thing.

Frankly, the practice exam the Academy put up is what delayed me from getting this shit done about three weeks ago. Even though I felt mostly ready after the numerous practice questions I keep running through, the one that these guys set up was the hardest by far. A lot of oddly-worded questions with answers where more than one result seemed valid. They did stress that the actual exam would be different, but this ended up affecting my already-low confidence.

I have a PDF of the practice exam right here and was wondering if anyone who has taken the A+ could take a look at that and let me know if the actual exam is more-or-less the same as far as how they set up questions. One of the things I've overthought with this whole thing is whether I am wasting time on certain practice exams/lectures that otherwise have inaccurate/irrelevant topics compared to the real thing.

In any case, my hope is I'll pass the exam next Friday so I can immediately watch Meyers' lectures for part 2 and hopefully get that done in a shorter timeframe than I've taken with part 1.

Click to shrink...

Just wondered how the exam went?

 

[SOLDIER]

Just wondered how the exam went?

Click to shrink...

650 out of the required 675. If I had just gotten two or three more questions right I would've passed.

Disappointing, but I still get a second free attempt and I've already rescheduled it for next Friday. I know which areas I lacked in so I'm confident I'll ace it next time. I was really hoping to get the first part done yesterday and then try to earn the second part within two weeks.

The part that's really funny? Despite looking at a whole bunch of different practice exams, it turns out the practice exam the school sent me was 99% of the actual questions the A+ exam used, down to the same performance questions. If I had just focused solely on that I probably would've done perfectly. They did say the exam shuffles questions each time, but considering that the practice exam they sent me had at least 180 questions and the actual exam had 80....well it seems a good bet that their actual exam also draws from the same question pool.

So yeah, I'm sure to get it next time, but this experience really makes me want to hurry up and get the second part done so I can finally get certified. I'm wondering if I should lightly start looking at the material for part 2 while I brush up for the second attempt for part 1.

 

[Croc Man]

So I've got a new job supporting a companies (android) mobile phones. It will include building them with apparently is mostly just scanning a QR code these days, showing people how to use them, password resets and some tech support/trouble shooting etc.

They'll be giving full training and don't expect me to know much technically but any recommended resources I can read before I start? Best practices as much as anything.

Also I have an Itil v2 foundation certificate which is obviously a bit dated, any websites beyond wikipedia for an overview of what's changed since?

 

[Interested Observer]

Would anyone happen to know anything about the Sales Analyst position at Google...?

 

[lupin23rd]

If a company has multiple positions open for a similar role (eg. software engineer or qa engineer), is there a best practice for whether / how to indicate interest in more than one specific position?

I'm eyeing a new QA role, and one company I'm looking at has 3-4 roles that I would be qualified for and interested in (I'm sure this applies to many of the larger companies as well). Doing up a cover letter for the role I have at the top of my list but wondering whether I should make it specific or make it more general to the company as a whole and actually apply for multiple positions at once.

 

[SOLDIER]

While creating a new study guide for my second attempt at the 1001 exam, this popped up on my YouTube feed:



This seems to be the entirety of all the questions that could conceivably appear on the A+ exam. I recognize a great deal of them from last week, so I've been sticking to this video (with the audio off as the robot voice is more annoying than helpful), using my iPad to take screenshots of questions that I still don't know the solution for off the top of my head.

Hopefully that will be enough. I wish I could find something similar for all the performance-based scenarios, but I was only asked about 2-3 of those last time and I already researched what I got wrong on them.

 

[SOLDIER]

So....funny story happened to me yesterday as I was taking the exam for the second time.

Midway through the exam, the computer froze on a loading circle. Same thing happened to the person sitting next to me, who was taking a SQL exam. The rep told us to wait a few minutes as it was a network issue, and we'd be notified when we could resume. No progress lost, countdown timer stayed where it was.

While waiting for the issue to get fixed, me and the other person were chatting it up. I had jokingly told him that part of me hopes the issue doesn't get fixed so I could try again next week with a bit more confidence: as I mentioned before, my grant with this academy allows me to take certification exams for free up to two attempts: after that, the third attempt will cost half the price of the actual exam, and all other attempts will be entirely out of my pocket. Incidentally, the gentleman hoped for the same outcome as he felt certain he was going to flunk his respective exam.

The computers work properly again and we're back to it. I've got all the questions answered and are just taking my remaining time to review the flagged questions, i.e. the ones I wasn't 100% certain of. I reach the end of the flagged questions and slowly hit the submit button to end the exam....

And then the computers freeze again. The same rep shows up and tells us it'll fix again, but this time a message pops up on my screen that indicates that the computer has to shutdown. She tries to pull it back up, only to eventually tell me that the progress has been lost and I'll need to reschedule.

And I was....pretty relieved.

My head wasn't in the right place this week. I overly stressed about this second attempt and started fearing I would fail again. I couldn't tell you for certain if I would have passed or not....I ran into many of the same questions as before, including the ones that stumped me initially.

I think my big problem is that I focus too much in trying to learn too many questions instead of specifically focusing on the questions that stump me personally. That video I linked above had over 400 questions and almost none of them actually showed up on the exam. I constantly try to remember all the port numbers when maybe two questions at the most were about port numbers last time (and there weren't even any this time).

So the good news is that I've jotted down those specific questions and am going to try and find their solutions online so that this time I'll be 90% certain I'll pass the exam. I consider the computer freeze a blessing in disguise, as it essentially allows me a free additional attempt. Plus it's only another week or less, so no big deal for me.

 

[Doom_Bringer]

nm

 

[GARlock Spiral]

I've graduated college with a Bachelor's in IT, however i'm too stupid to get the Network+.

With that, and the fact that IT has too many customers for my tastes, what sort of jobs should I be aiming for? I'm likely done with IT, but I don't have any passion for anything aside from extreme hatred for customers.

 

[ElNerdo]

What are good types of entry level jobs for someone with an A+ and Net+? It would be nice to find something that would be okay with someone not having much experience but is a quick/good learner.

I don't know where to get real world experience if it's not in a job. :/

 

[SOLDIER]

What are good types of entry level jobs for someone with an A+ and Net+? It would be nice to find something that would be okay with someone not having much experience but is a quick/good learner.

I don't know where to get real world experience if it's not in a job. :/

Click to shrink...

At least with my experience, signing up with local recruitment agencies have provided me the most callbacks and opportunities.

Even a temporary stint with a company like Univision significantly improves my resume and has been the thing a lot of recent interviews have called attention to. Think of it like sidequests in an RPG, where the exp rewards make them worthwhile.

On the subject, seems it might take a couple more days for the Academy to sort out the issue with their computer freezing during my second A+ exam attempt. Might have to wait until next week for the third try.

In the meantime, I was wondering if anyone was familiar with a specific performance-based question. This one popped up on both exam attempts, so I want to learn the proper steps to completing it in case it shows up a third time.

The question is a scenario where an office lady can't connect to her company's WiFi while sitting on her desk. The question has a button to look up the WAC of the company, which reveals that the 5GHz range doesn't reach her office. This stands to reason that you're supposed to have her connect to the 2.4GHz connection, but I'm unsure of the exact settings the scenario wants you to do.

I'm not sure if this violates any rules, since it's a question I've already come across and may or may not make a return, but if you don't feel comfortable just listing the solution here than feel free to PM me.

 

[TheSix]

I have an interview Monday with a company, fresh out school, with prior knowledge but I've been out of the office for three years. I was told I'd be doing a meet followed by a multiple-choice test and then, a live test of my abilities. It is a junior position as a help desk techand I'm a bit rusty.

Are there any things I should review before this? This is a job I'd really want to have and it's everything I want in a career starting fresh.

 

[Mcfrank]

If anyone is in the AV side of IT in the Los Angeles area and looking for work, hit me up.

 

[eclipze]

Has the difficulty increased in the A+ exam over the last 15 years? I took it because it was free after taking a college course 15 years ago, but thought it was fairly easy. I don't need to re-up my cert as I'm a lead developer now, but I'm curious.

 

[Android Sophia]

Going for the hardware side of my A+ (220-1001) next week. Already got the software side. I'm kind of excited because I feel somewhat confident about this due to my good grades in my class. >_<;

 

[FaceHugger]

My boss is slowly making me take over this application we used to have two app owners deal with, but they both quit. So now I do automation and virtualization (a little coding), a mix of system and network engineering for all manner of things, and am soon to also be an app owner three times over (I already pretty much am the go-to guy for Exchange and HP Systems Insight Manager - Windows and Unix/Linux).

At least I got a hefty raise six months back. *shrug*

The advice: when you guys join IT, don't let it happen to you. Find a speciality and change it every several years. I'm just a sucker. I let this happen to me like a dummy.

 

[Violence Jack]

I'm still trying to get out of help desk support. Got my A+, Network+, Security+, but there's nothing out there for me outside of basic support roles. I want to get into security or system admin, but my job won't promote anyone that's in my role for reasons unknown. I make way too much for what little I do, but I feel trapped and have no idea what other skills I can learn to get me out.

 

[captive]

anyone here at MS Ignite?

 

[Android Sophia]

Going for the hardware side of my A+ (220-1001) next week. Already got the software side. I'm kind of excited because I feel somewhat confident about this due to my good grades in my class. >_<;

Click to shrink...

Annnnd I've got my A+ now! Feels goood. Not sure what we're doing next term in my class, but possibly the Network+? Either way, the job search starts now.

 

[SOLDIER]

Third time's the charm, I suppose: I passed the 1001 exam today for A+.

I meant what I said before about being in the right headspace for this: I felt confident today, going in with this feeling that I would nail it. In fairness, it did help that I knew most of the questions already, and barely even read through all the ones where I already knew the answer. I passed with a 695 out of a required 670.

Now I need to pass 1002, though tomorrow I start the training period for a new job that makes me unable to take the exam for at least four weeks. While I've only briefly looked at the material, I feel 1002 is more or less the same and I feel pretty confident I'll be ready for it come four weeks from now.

It will still be regretful not doing this earlier, as by the end of this year I'll be inelligible to take the exams for free with the academy I'm signed up with. I'll try to request an extension when I get to that point. Since they were funded by unemployment, perhaps me getting a new job will let them compromise?

Either way I'll be glad to finally get A+ certified this year, at least.

 

[Deleted member 32726]

Third time's the charm, I suppose: I passed the 1001 exam today for A+.

I meant what I said before about being in the right headspace for this: I felt confident today, going in with this feeling that I would nail it. In fairness, it did help that I knew most of the questions already, and barely even read through all the ones where I already knew the answer. I passed with a 695 out of a required 670.

Now I need to pass 1002, though tomorrow I start the training period for a new job that makes me unable to take the exam for at least four weeks. While I've only briefly looked at the material, I feel 1002 is more or less the same and I feel pretty confident I'll be ready for it come four weeks from now.

It will still be regretful not doing this earlier, as by the end of this year I'll be inelligible to take the exams for free with the academy I'm signed up with. I'll try to request an extension when I get to that point. Since they were funded by unemployment, perhaps me getting a new job will let them compromise?

Either way I'll be glad to finally get A+ certified this year, at least.

Click to shrink...

Congrats! I know it's taken you long time, but if it makes you feel better: I took a lot of longer than I wanted to for my A+ as well. You will get a hang for studying for certs as you progress in IT. Also, you seem to be getting way more experience than most other people with an A+. In my area, an A+ is near worthless but you seem to be getting experience already.

 

[Spinluck]

Any pentesters on ERA?

My career path took the weirdest turn and I'm in a position to be promoted as a threat analyst at my current company.

They want someone who can pick up some Powershell scripting and get acclimated with some open source vuln scanners. They might be implementing a SIEM and want someone who can pull logs from EPS tools and sort out the garbage.

Got Kali on my computer and am probably gonna dive back in tonight. I have a couple of ideas where to start but I'm hoping to not fuck this up.

 

[B4mv]

Any pentesters on ERA?

My career path took the weirdest turn and I'm in a position to be promoted as a threat analyst at my current company.

They want someone who can pick up some Powershell scripting and get acclimated with some open source vuln scanners. They might be implementing a SIEM and want someone who can pull logs from EPS tools and sort out the garbage.

Got Kali on my computer and am probably gonna dive back in tonight. I have a couple of ideas where to start but I'm hoping to not fuck this up.

Click to shrink...

That's something I've always wanted to explore. I'm taking over our IPS at work, so I guess this is my first real step in that direction. Congrats on the promotion!


In other news, Pluralsight is doing a free weekend starting this Friday, everyone should take some time and learn something new!

 

[Metalix]

Any pentesters on ERA?

My career path took the weirdest turn and I'm in a position to be promoted as a threat analyst at my current company.

They want someone who can pick up some Powershell scripting and get acclimated with some open source vuln scanners. They might be implementing a SIEM and want someone who can pull logs from EPS tools and sort out the garbage.

Got Kali on my computer and am probably gonna dive back in tonight. I have a couple of ideas where to start but I'm hoping to not fuck this up.

Click to shrink...

I've hoarded some free ebooks in my day (that I haven't gotten to yet as AWS training is absorbing all of my time atm), these may or may not be helpful:

Kali Revealed 1st Edition
Powershell Notes for Professionals
Windows Powershell Tutorial for Beginners

Offensive Security offer a free course in Metasploit as well.

 

[Spinluck]

That's something I've always wanted to explore. I'm taking over our IPS at work, so I guess this is my first real step in that direction. Congrats on the promotion!


In other news, Pluralsight is doing a free weekend starting this Friday, everyone should take some time and learn something new!

Click to shrink...

Thanks. I'm equally nervous and exciting.

I've hoarded some free ebooks in my day (that I haven't gotten to yet as AWS training is absorbing all of my time atm), these may or may not be helpful:

Kali Revealed 1st Edition
Powershell Notes for Professionals
Windows Powershell Tutorial for Beginners

Offensive Security offer a free course in Metasploit as well.

Click to shrink...

Greatly appreciated, thank you.

 

[clay_ghost]

https://www.shodan.io/home

shodan lifetime membership is only $1.


What is Shodan?

Shodan is a search engine for Internet-connected devices. Web search engines, such as Google and Bing, are great for finding websites. But what if you're interested in measuring which countries are becoming more connected? Or if you want to know which version of Microsoft IIS is the most popular? Or you want to find the control servers for malware? Maybe a new vulnerability came out and you want to see how many hosts it could affect? Traditional web search engines don't let you answer those questions.

 

[Interested Observer]

.

 

[captive]

if anyone wants to learn azure, a bunch of us are doing videos in december. https://azureadventcalendar.com/

completely free, videos will be on youtube.

 

[Merv]

I'm losing my mind right now with a client.

I have worked for this MSP for 2 years now. It's actually a pretty great gig for the most part.

We have a client that is upgrading their servers past 2008 finally and trying to go straight to 2019 over a weekend.

The biggest sticking point is a 2010 Exchange Server. They have a Sr. System Admin, that can't be bothered to do the minimal amount of research and keeps coming to me for answers, even though we aren't "technically" supporting this upgrade.

The CEO of this company sent us their proposed upgrade timeline, that was completely non nonsensical. Like one step was create Windows 2019 Server and install Exchange 2016, which can't be done according to Microsoft's own documentation, which I linked to several times in emails.

They want to go to 2019 DCs for pretty much no reason, even though it's making everything more difficult. I think the ultimate problem is the "Sr" Admin at the client just doesn't know anything or is stretched incredibly thin.

 

[bmdubya]

For the last month I had been interviewing for a sys admin job that would have been an absolute dream job. Spent a total of four hours interviewing, and two of those were in person, which was in a town an hour away from where a live. Got the rejection email this afternoon. I'm so disappointed.

I can't think of anything I should have done differently. I got along great with everyone I interacted with, I had good answers for the technical questions. Even on a few technical questions the director of IT responded with "oh we don't have anything like that here, I'd be interested in implementing that." During the whole process the way they talked to me made it seem like I was the leading candidate. And then boom, "we've decided to go in a different direction."

Looking at the timeline of how things went down, I'm guessing I was always the backup person. I was emailing the VP of HR on Friday, and today got the email. It just sucks to be led along for a whole month to not get it in the end.

I am trying to look on the bright side though. It was good interview experience, and making it this far means I'm learning the correct things in my current position to make it to the next level. But this was legitimately a dream job, work there for 10, 15, 20 years type position. It just fucking sucks.

 

[Soulnado]

All of those who transitioned to IT and got a job, how old are your coworkers? I had a job where almost everyone was younger than me by a few years, and then another where people where like 20 years older than me.

 

[FinFunnels]

Looking at the timeline of how things went down, I'm guessing I was always the backup person. I was emailing the VP of HR on Friday, and today got the email. It just sucks to be led along for a whole month to not get it in the end.

Click to shrink...

This was probably it. At all of the tech jobs I've had so far, they always post job listings and interview candidates even when they already have someone in mind for the position. Sometimes they'll offer those candidates other positions instead.

All of those who transitioned to IT and got a job, how old are your coworkers? I had a job where almost everyone was younger than me by a few years, and then another where people where like 20 years older than me.

Click to shrink...

It depends on the job. When I worked at a tech company that supported public and private schools, I was one of their youngest full-timers... and I was around 29 years old at the time. Most of the senior techs were in their 50s and 60s. Some of the temps were in their early 20s, though.

Now I'm 31 and I work at a game studio and I believe I'm the oldest non-senior employee at our office.

 

[bmdubya]

All of those who transitioned to IT and got a job, how old are your coworkers? I had a job where almost everyone was younger than me by a few years, and then another where people where like 20 years older than me.

Click to shrink...

Just depends on the environment. In my current position, our tier 1 IT support is essentially an entry-level position, so the other IT employees are close to my age or younger. Our director of IT and another senior member of IT are about 8 years older than me, so not too bad of a discrepancy. I think if you get a job at a bigger tech firm, you'll have IT employees that have been there for 10+ years, and they'll usually be on the older side.

 

[vegohead]

if anyone wants to learn azure, a bunch of us are doing videos in december. https://azureadventcalendar.com/

completely free, videos will be on youtube.

Click to shrink...

THANK YOU

I was given MS Azure Intune responsibilities at work and never worked with Azure before this.

I really want to get into mobile device management (MDM) now but I'm not sure how much experience I'll need to get my foot in the door.

 

[Akronis]

Any pentesters on ERA?

My career path took the weirdest turn and I'm in a position to be promoted as a threat analyst at my current company.

They want someone who can pick up some Powershell scripting and get acclimated with some open source vuln scanners. They might be implementing a SIEM and want someone who can pull logs from EPS tools and sort out the garbage.

Got Kali on my computer and am probably gonna dive back in tonight. I have a couple of ideas where to start but I'm hoping to not fuck this up.

Click to shrink...

not a pentester but an engineer for a SOC

PowerShell is such a good fucking language, enjoy it. Also recommend diving into a bit of .NET as you can use practically all of .NET within PowerShell and it GREATLY enhances what you can do

 

[moneywoes]

Is Programming included in this thread? I

If so, could anyone kindly give some feedback on mine?
Tldr of my background is that I'm a international student without real experience. Would love any advice! https://imgur.com/a/fmypoyH

 

[Doomburrito]

Hey ERA, probably a longshot, but if anyone knows agencies in Chicago looking for a project manager (focus on web dev but a background in media and marketing too), I'd love to talk!

 

[captive]

I'm losing my mind right now with a client.

I have worked for this MSP for 2 years now. It's actually a pretty great gig for the most part.

We have a client that is upgrading their servers past 2008 finally and trying to go straight to 2019 over a weekend.

The biggest sticking point is a 2010 Exchange Server. They have a Sr. System Admin, that can't be bothered to do the minimal amount of research and keeps coming to me for answers, even though we aren't "technically" supporting this upgrade.

The CEO of this company sent us their proposed upgrade timeline, that was completely non nonsensical. Like one step was create Windows 2019 Server and install Exchange 2016, which can't be done according to Microsoft's own documentation, which I linked to several times in emails.

They want to go to 2019 DCs for pretty much no reason, even though it's making everything more difficult. I think the ultimate problem is the "Sr" Admin at the client just doesn't know anything or is stretched incredibly thin.

Click to shrink...

everyone thinks they're special

For the last month I had been interviewing for a sys admin job that would have been an absolute dream job. Spent a total of four hours interviewing, and two of those were in person, which was in a town an hour away from where a live. Got the rejection email this afternoon. I'm so disappointed.

I can't think of anything I should have done differently. I got along great with everyone I interacted with, I had good answers for the technical questions. Even on a few technical questions the director of IT responded with "oh we don't have anything like that here, I'd be interested in implementing that." During the whole process the way they talked to me made it seem like I was the leading candidate. And then boom, "we've decided to go in a different direction."

Looking at the timeline of how things went down, I'm guessing I was always the backup person. I was emailing the VP of HR on Friday, and today got the email. It just sucks to be led along for a whole month to not get it in the end.

I am trying to look on the bright side though. It was good interview experience, and making it this far means I'm learning the correct things in my current position to make it to the next level. But this was legitimately a dream job, work there for 10, 15, 20 years type position. It just fucking sucks.

Click to shrink...

yea sucks but it sounds like you were the backup plan. But dont fret, it coudl still work out. I once got a job because another guy failed the drug test.

All of those who transitioned to IT and got a job, how old are your coworkers? I had a job where almost everyone was younger than me by a few years, and then another where people where like 20 years older than me.

Click to shrink...

it varies wildly.

At once place i was the youngest person on the server team by 7 years and younger than everyone on helpdesk by minimum of ten years.

 

[captive]

Hey ERA, probably a longshot, but if anyone knows agencies in Chicago looking for a project manager (focus on web dev but a background in media and marketing too), I'd love to talk!

Click to shrink...

i work for a company based in chicago, send me your resume if you want ill forward it.