Am I wasting my time

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I just have one thing to say to what I bolded above:

This is an absolute in human nature! We humans will do what it is we desire the most. Most of us just never realize what it is we that we desire the most. If you want to know what your real desires are right now, look at what you're doing in your life. Are you doing everything you can to reach what you say is your goal? Or, are you just going along living life and hoping things change on their own? Your desires set your priorities, and your priorities dictate what you do with your time, money, and energy. It's an absolute of human nature.

 

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The last 3 months I have been able to save absolutley nothing, I had a big repair job I had to pay for on my car, aswell as other things I could not ignore.

There is nothing big next month and have a bit of overtime coming my way so I may be able to afford the exams then.

I am also wearing clothes that are old abnout 5 years, and yes I do lie awake at night thinking about getting an IT job and I kick myself everyday for getting into the debt I am in, thats why instead of taking 11 years to pay it has taken me 8 as I have put every penny I have into it.

 

Cheers Sparky, once my debt is gone I will have the freedom to do things I havent been able to do for 8 years such as apply for jobs further away and move if needed.

Thats why I made my debts top priority and stopped looking for IT jobs for a few years, having the debts paid in 8 is better than 11 in my eyes.

I should be around 350 a month better of then if I am still working in my current job, but hopefully I will have found something by then.

 

Sounds like you've had lots of encouragement already - keep going, you've been on the right track so far and its near the end - don't loose the bottle this close to finishing!!

As for jobs, I moved from Swindon (not the worst place for IT jobs) to London as I wanted to have the best opportunity to continue in my chosen career - so far its worked - maybe the move to your "big-smoke" will improve your chances - Leeds/Newcastle pretty big places.

As for Newcastle, assuming I'm still with my current company, drop me a line nearer the time as I know we have a 1st line support desk in Newcastle - don't really know much more than that - but its a on a new client contract so they're just beginning to support the users.

 

cool cheers mate

If it was available now and finances permitted I could commute its only 64 miles and there are regular trains from Carlisle and driving only takes an hour at most.

 

Sorry, GBL. I didn't really mean things the way you took them. I didn't mean sit awake at night and kick yourself because you haven't yet reached your goal. I've been there and done that too. That's wasted time and energy that takes you further away from your goal because it is depressing and robs you of your desire and energy.

What I meant, was does it keep you awake at night imaging what it's going to be like to have the job, to do the work, to think about how you're going to reach that goal because it consumes you....

I meant what I said in a positive sense, not a negative sense.

I think what might be good for you to really light a positive fire in you is to sit down and write out all the things you want to accomplish, how you're going to get there, and how good it's going to feel once you've reached that first step. Then go over those positive things at least once a week. Keep that fire well-stoked with your dreams and ambition. Think on them often and how you're going to get there. That will make the time go by faster, and keep you thinking about new ways to reach to your goals. You might be surprised at what your imagination will come up with if you set it to work every day on the solution to you reaching your goals.

 

I understand now Freddy.

My career goals are as follows:

1: Get into IT either in a support role/or administrator role
2: Get MCDST and N+
3: Progress to a level where by noticed by managment
4: Gain a good understanding of networks
5: Get a Network administrators position
6: Gain MCSA
7: Get Assistant Network/support manager position
8: Gain MCSE
9: Become Network/support Manager

I am truly commited to this happening, its getting there thats the problem.

I realise all that may take years but if it does it does, its is my goal.

 

Some top notch advice there GB. Trust me mate if I can do it , anybody can. just believe in yourself and focus on the task at hand and you will get there that's a promise !

 

That's now-to-long-term. How about your goals to get you to Step 1 of this chart? Break it down into pieces... then every time you take another step, mark it off the list.

How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

 

You've had a massive response to your post, I think this shows how many people believe you can do it.

Time to believe in yourself and get back to it mate ;)

 

Well for step 1 I am sending out my CV to as many places in the local area as I can think of, if nothing comes of that when finances permit I will start sending further a field.

I am also looking on the web too.

 

Cheers mate I just get pissed of because it feels sometimes its never going to happen.

 

I understand how it feels! I have so far applied for about 13 1st Line support jobs with one rejected and other with no reply. I only signed up this forum a while ago and since then I started to study for the A+. I got quite few IT related qualifications like GVNQ, BTEC and ECDL. To be honest I don't feel any academic qualificatons help at all it's very disappointing...after spending nearly 3-4 years at college..

Nearly all jobs I applied require customer service experience which i got none of them. I will keep apply for the jobs for another 2-3 months. If there is no success I think I will have to move on...


I suppose I can only advice to look for something that is relevant to 1st line support like call centre jobs to start with.

 

But there are plenty of things you can list that can help you to really get yourself in a position to get Step 1 going. Like:

• Send out at least 10 CVs a week.
• Study at least 10 hours per week.
• Pay off XXXX card by __month__.
• Pay off XXXX bill by __month__.
• Pass A+ Essentials in __month__.
• Pass A+ IT Technician in __month__.

One bite at a time... set specific, measurable goals, and knock them out one at a time.

 

its sort of what I do at the moment, my bills are set by standing order/ direct debiit so they are gauranteed.
I am sending out quite a few CVs this week (have sent 8 so far)
and if I can't pay for the A+ exams when I get paid at the end of this month I am going to put some away and save to do them.

I will make a proper list this weekend and stick to it.

 

If you have ANY spare time, get a job delivering pizzas. Sell old stuff you no longer need on eBay and Amazon and yard sales. Provide "computer cleanup" services to people you know for a few quid. There are ways, and there are ways.

Real-world examples: I recently sold some old stuff on Amazon and made over $300 after shipping costs. We then had a yard sale and made close to $200. I've got a series of books that could be sold on eBay for about $70 if I'd get off my butt and sell them. I often provide computer help for a couple of eye doctors in the area, and they pay me $80/hour.

 

How does step 1 relate to step 2? I don't see a relationship. You're going to go for an administrator role before you even have a desktop support certification or N+? And, how do these certifications relate to administration? They are technician certs. When you say, support, do you mean call center, or do you mean as a technician?

How do you plan on getting noticed by management? That's easier said than done in a large environment.

Now, I'm not picking apart your goals to discourage you, but to encourage you think about them, refine them, make them a logical step-by-step progression to where you want to end up. Don't be vague about anything. Think it, dream it, plan it, in small well-thought-out steps. If it isn't concrete to you, it won't really affect your priorities, and it won't be concrete to you until you have it down in intimate detail.

 

I have done a few jobs in the area, mainly malware destroying and doing a couple of upgrades for people

I am mainly a hands on person but I don't mind doing either a support role or technicians role, personally I would prefer the tech role but would at (at the moment) accept a support role to get me into the industry.

I like helping and giving people the knowledge I have to help them overcome their problems if I can, but I also like doing the hands on thing too and would quite happily sit in a room all day building PCs and providing software updates and the like.

 

Well, then my advice would be to choose one, and work towards just it. Don't spread your effort out too widely. Narrow it down. Focus on one area.

My end goal in IT is to work network security. I figured that to do that I needed experience in several areas. I needed some programming/scripting background and skills to really understand and recognize how attacks are constructed so I can both recognize them and defeat them. I needed knowledge of the systems most often exposed to the internet, and the most attacked through the network. I also needed to know network packet structure inside and out, and how this is used in attacks. I also needed to know several different OS's, as well as networking protocols such as DNS, HTTP, DHCP, etc....

I'm now working with web servers, database servers, tunneling various networking protocols over ssh, learning the more common scripting languages, know how to use packet sniffers pretty well, understand firewalls pretty well, understand the basics of how crackers are attacking web servers, database servers, and networks themselves while having a pretty good grounding in at least 2 OS's so far. Everything I do, everything I set up is done with security in mind.

All my steps have been taken with one ultimate goal in mind. I'm a systems admin because if I don't understand what I need to protect, how can I learn to protect it? I can't think of a better way to get valid experience learning security than to administer web, database, email, and DNS servers. If I did, I'd be trying to move in that direction.

I'm no security guru yet and don't claim to be one. But, I'm learning. I'm learning what I have to protect, how to go about it, how to evaluate risk in a business setting on the web.

I guess my point is, make sure you know what it takes to be successful in your ultimate goal, and then do everything you can make sure you learn in those areas. I don't see how that's possible without a detailed plan, and a detailed understanding of what you need to know. Don't start off vaguely, you'll end up being vague and never really getting to where you want to go.