#CareerAdvice #ITProfessional #RemoteWork #CareerGrowth #CertificationsNeeded
Hey everyone! 👋 I need some career advice from my fellow IT professionals. Here’s the situation: I’m a 29-year-old Senior Sys Admin making 90k/yr, completely remote 99% of the time. My workload is below average, but there’s no room for growth at my current company. No bonuses, terrible benefits, and certifications aren’t valued for pay increases. What should I do?
Here are some options I’m considering:
– Stay with my current company and continue with minimal work
– Start applying for other jobs while working on getting Azure certs
– Talk to my manager about potential growth opportunities within the company
What do you think I should do? Any advice on how to navigate this career dilemma? Let’s discuss and share our experiences! 🤔💼 #CareerAdvice #ITJobs #RemoteWork #CareerDevelopment
Always be looking, if your not thrilled about your job. It is tough out there right now but update your resume and start applying. You should also look at certs that interest you and getting them. Your current job might not pay you for them, but your next job might.
Yeah bro, if you are interested in progressing your career, you should be aiming for a promotion or a title upgrade every 2 years. If you can’t get one, and you wanna further your career, you gotta start applying
For right now, definitely stay where you are. Wait this period out because it sucks out there right now (job hunting). Very seriously, take this time to learn cloud and scripting using Ansible, Terraform, learn how to build a Docker container and use it, learn to read JSON, YAML, XML. Learn Kubernetes (Lightweight Kuber has a good free site). Learn networks. I assume you’re already working or have worked with Powershell and Linux, if not, learn those too. Take this time to build up your wheelhouse and skill up. Depending on where you live, $90k is pretty good. Sit on that until the job market opens up more. May not even be this year, but we’ll see.
>I live in GA, make 90k/yr
If you live outside the Atlanta perimeter, that’s not a bad comp figure for senior sysadmin.
You don’t have to choose just one thing. Look for another job, but be picky about it while your current job is good. Also, work on getting skills.
I’m virtually **always** looking actively or keeping my stuff up to date on LinkedIn. If I am happy with my current job, I don’t talk to a recruiter for anything under 15% higher than I’m currently making, all other things equal.
It also ok sometimes to just chill where you’re at if you like where you are. If your financial future is solid it’s not the end of the world to just do your current low stress job and enjoy your life outside of work.
Start thinking about options away from the technical branch. From my experience and observations, employees who are in the highly specialized technical operations positions are lifers who might be there forever. This unfortunately means very little room for growth for younger people. You can start planning to branch off into management, project management, consulting, or maybe even diversify your technical resume with cloud and security certs.
Certifications are multi-faceted. They mainly represent a continued effort to improve/maintain knowledge of a certain product/platform. These can be used to help supplement your resume/profile as you apply for newer jobs. If you’re not happy with the growth that your current company offers, tidy up your resume and apply to other places, only you can determine what will give you purpose/fulfillment.
I approach my career with a simple philosophy:
If I’m earning good money I’m happy, if I’m learning new skills I’m happy.
I need at least one of those things to be true. If I’m not earning, I better be learning, and vice versa.
I have worked jobs with lots of downtime, and while it’s nice for a while, your skills start to rust. If you are like me then you might even become a little depressed due to the lack of stimulation.
As much as I like being lazy, the satisfaction of having a challenging job is greater than the pleasure I derive from working at a job where I effectively get paid for 2 hours of work and 6 hours of video games.
Decide where your values lay and you’ll have your answer.