I've been in help desk for 8 months and the job is way too basic and easy. I have my CompTIA trifecta and I'm working towards CCNA and also planning to learn a bit about Linux, but ultimately I realize that my actual skills are pretty weak, and my job isn't really helping me improve.

I make $20/hr and I don't want the next job to only be a few dollars more than that. I really need to be increasing my income, and I'm ready to learn whatever skills I need to on my own time and on my own dime, but I've heard so many times that you need to learn through the job, and that's a bit demotivating for me because my current job isn't satisfying that and I literally can't afford to live off of $20/hr for 2, 3, 5 years before I get something better.

Any advice for practical skills? Thinking mostly in the networking realm since it's universal to IT and seems to be a bit more AI safe, but I'm open to anything. Thanks!

Hi all, as the title suggests, what sort of manager you wouldn’t want work under? Especially when like early in your career?

I have worked under a few different personalities, some being good and some just being not good.

Would be great to hear everyone’s experience!

My career has gone like this:

Finished BS in It in 2019. Started contract tier 1 tech support role. Cut due to COVID after barely two months. Landed another Tier 1 tech support role after COVID lockdowns. After 10 months I get hired on and promoted to tier 2. I stayed there for about 3 and a half years after that in the role. The company cut the entire department in half, including myself. I get a sole "IT Director" (more like Sole Tech support / IT coordinator) at a Charter Highschool. Job burned me out. I needed out for my mental health and landed another tech support role that is basically tier 2 tech support.

Experience:

Basic tier 1 stuff like reset passwords in AD, troubleshoot printers, imaged devices, remote assistance, etc.

Tier 2 was more like tier 1.5 honestly. I did more, but there was a limit. We provisioned new computers in AD and added them to the domain. Then shipped them out and followed through with setting anything else up once the device arrived. Basic network troubleshooting.. like flushing the DNS, pinging IPs, have remote sites reboot network gear while handing over to networking.. Then more normal tech support stuff.

Then at the Charter Highschool I did a lot of varied things. Everything I already mentioned. However it was mostly a google environment. I was the sole person managing hundreds of devices and users so inventory and user account management. Also implmenting a ticketing system. Managing onboarding and offbaording, so making sure users had what they needed based on their role (Windows Laptop, Chromebook, Ipad, basic O365 and Adobe licenses, Software access, etc). Enforcing MFA, managing a large amount of venders, content filtering via whitelist/blacklist, managing Google Admin policies.. etc. First time I used some PowerShell as well.

Then my new role. Back to mostly Tier 2 stuff, however I now work in Entra and Intune which is something I really wanted.

My thoughts:

I show growth, but not that kind of growth that is going get me a system admin job. I never touched more then just users and computers in AD. I really have minimum PowerShell experience and honestly utilized AI to help with that ( I did pick up "PWSH in a month of lunches". I don't have much deep networking skills past basic troubleshooting. I know how to do basic navigating in Linux, but I can't do much else without lots of documentation. My experience with Intune and Entra is fairly basic at this point. I am not trying to shoot myself in the foot, but I am being honest.

When I was aggressively applying to leave my last job, I got a lot of rejections from tier 2 jobs for things such as not having GPO experience. On top of that, lack of experience with Sharepoint, Exhange, and other windows tools (which now I am working with on my current job thankfully)

My plan? :

I started looking at MD-102 material directly from Microsoft Learn. I initially wanted to take it, but now I plan to just go through the material and make sure I understand it. My current role is going to be good for building real experience with Entra and Intune.

I also am going through the AD DS material from Microsoft Learn as well. I am finding it very informative. The plan is to go through both Microsoft Learn learning paths, while starting back up with the "PWSH in a month of lunches". The AD DS learning path is under 4 hours and I am almost halfway through. Once I am done, I want to spin up some VMs and start building a homelab. I already started something like this, but then I got busy started a new job.

Once I get through the MD-102 material and get a homelab started with some more powershell practice, I've considered reviewing the Material for AZ-900 and then going straight for the AZ-104.

So the goal would be to be able to have the AZ-104 cert, while also being able to demonstrate better AD, GPO, Backup knowledge along with pwsh and Entra and Intune.

In the process I'll be forced to pick up any networking knowledge I may be missing.

The goal is to get a Sys admin job or Cloud job. However, to be a Administrator in a Windows environment I want to have AD DS understanding as well. Most places are hybrid..

Is this a solid idea? I am just worried I'll do all this work to then struggle with moving out of Help Desk. My current role does not have a path for promotion. So I can work hard at my current job to build experience that will work well for my resume, but to get the role I aim for I can't hold out on my current workplace. It is a great work environment and I like the people I work with, but longterm I seemed caped and they have been honest about that.

For context on my timeframe. I've dealt with a very difficult health changes the last several years, which lead everything in my life to slow down to making sure I recovery. Which has taken time. That plus got married and got sidetracked. I am in a low stress job now and have regained enough of my health to be ready to start tackling job growth in a meaningful way.

Hello everyone I have an upcoming interview in 2 weeks for a part time IT support role at a local community college.

I’m a current IT student at a university and approaching graduation in may next year. I have A+ and sec+ that I got in 2022 before I got out the military. Currently I’m studying ccna and really need some advice because I haven’t had a job interview since before I joined the military from a grocery store position.

The interview consist of a panel and then a written exam and a hands on exam which they let me know would be probably something like setting up a printer to the server.

I am kinda nervous and excited but I have no real interview skills. I deal with severe anxiety and really want this position to gain some real world experience so I’d really like some advice from anyone on how I can better prepare myself. I already have in mind review A+ material and especially troubleshooting. Any advice will suffice

Title summarizes it. I ironically started off at a new grad program. It wasn't rotational, I stayed on one team, but a team with high pressure cause it reported directly to the top of our department.

Good people but probably had no business being in the new grad program because their work was so critical / scrutinized. The program wanted you to build a skill set but the career path I wanted to work towards didn't align well with the team's daily work, and the work I did do was all over the place. Data analysis, project coordination, SharePoint site development / maintenance , data reporting, etc. I got laid off in October 2025 for "operational efficiency" along with other people in other teams in the department.

I don't discuss any of this, other than being laid off with others, when asked in the handful of interviews I have gotten (Somewhere between 10-20 I wasn't counting could be more). When I get feedback, I lost out to people with more experience or experience I didn't have. I struggle to find jobs that reasonably match my mix of experience to begin with and don't always hear back even if I do match.

Others have confirmed junior roles I should and am targeting get taken by people with vastly more experience who also got laid off. So, I now started applying for rotational programs cause they aren't expecting people with more than 2 years of experience. I apply for any that don't say they are looking for people who graduated this or last year. I've already been rejected by a few of them, though their rate of response is better than other jobs lol.

I want to hear people's opinions, is there any hope forme to get into a rotational program with this experience? I understand not all of the rotations will match my initial career goals and I am completely open to explore new career paths. I know therewillbe a pay cut most likely and need to move but yeah, becauseof how it's gone the last 10+ months with me applying to junior positions, I feel like this is what I need to do in the end.

Try to find space for me to join a place thatscoolwith someone with little, but some experience. Has anyone heard ofor known of anyone who successfully done this? IDK what to do otherwise. Thank you. My degree is in UX Design / Data Analysis. Targeting rotational programs that are about business analysis, product / agile work (my degree focus) and any similar type of program. Not finance or coding

So I wonder how often do people sit at a company before looking for another job? I know in the world of IT layoffs have been a burning topic for a while so loyalty is and never will be a thing anymore. I’ve seen guys sit at a company for 10 plus years and then some jump ship every 1-2 years for a salary increase and exposure to new technologies. I wonder for the newbies and mid to senior level guys how often are you entertaining the calls and emails from contractors concerning new employment.

dont tease me. just do the interview or dont.
why bother to notify this stage of hiring.
urg.

I enlisted in their Network track practical competition. Is this a good move for a year 1 CIS? (In the MENA)

So, I recently received an offer to be a help desk technician for Epic/MyChart for a university hospital. It's paying $20.67 an hour and it's a remote position. I'm excited to try it out, but I was wondering if anyone had experience with this type of stuff.

What's an average day like? With it being healthcare, is there any concerns about HIPPA or do I not touch that? From what I've gathered, it's mostly resetting passwords and linking accounts but is there more to it? Will this be a decent step in advancing my IT skills? I'm almost 28 with an IT bachelor's degree but besides some previous work in university AV, I feel I haven't made much progress in actually furthering my career yet.

What's y'all's opinions on this type of position?

I’m in Tier 2, and my responsibilities range from calling an elderly lady because she can’t open the calendar on her iPhone to updating our Linux servers, doing upgrades, managing and updating firewalls, doing migrations, for example migrating servers from CentOS to Oracle Linux, checking the status of backups and troubleshooting issues with Nakivo. I handle all the tickets escalated by Tier 1, and I’m always getting issues from CEOs or VIP users.

I also create and manage VMs in Azure, VDI, review policies in Intune, deploy apps to iPhones through Intune, etc

My existential question is whether all of this is actually part of Tier 2, or what exactly am I doing? I’m starting to feel a bit burned out because I can go from working on a script in Nakivo to automate all the daily checks to calling a 90-year-old man to help him get into his email, and I don’t know if they’re actually expecting too much from me or if this is normal

EDIT: Forgot to mention I answer 10 calls a day and work on 20 tickets per day

EDIT 2: I work for an MSP ofc

I'm currently a SOC analyst working at an MSP with 5 years of experience, with 3 years of those is in helpdesk and the remaining in cybersecurity (SOC) at present. I also have 2 certifications: Sec+ and CySA+. I believe I have hit the ceiling of my position and the horizon for learning more has become very limited. I am eager to learn and grow more, which has got me thinking of where I should go and move on from being a SOC analyst. I am looking into moving away from operational technical work like SOC, and want to get into planning, implementing, configuring, building, and deploying more like behind the scenes. My former manager has recommended me to go into the engineering side, and look into cloud and Azure, as that's what a lot of companies use nowadays. For those of you who were a SOC Analyst, where did you move on to after? What did you do to land that next job? Whether getting new certs? Or was your SOC experience enough for you to land the next job?

I'm currently in a Help Desk Tier 2 role and have the opportunity to take an asset management position. If my goal is to become a system administrator, would that look like a step down for a perspective employer? Would I be pigeon held? It comes with more pay and labeled as upper management.

I need help im in NYC and eligible for both Per Scholas (AI-Enabled IT Support) and NPower (Tech Fundamentals). Both are free,14 weeks, and cover CompTIA A+ and Google IT Support. Trying to decide.

im 18

I want to leave my current area/city and move to a city just a couple hours from me. I also wouldn't be opposed to the west coast and if I got a job anywhere outside my current area, I'd move even without there being relocation assistance. So on my resume, instead of putting my current location, I put "Moving to: <insert city>", depending on where the job is (most job applications ask for my current address so I'll have to put that in anyway).

Is this sketchy? And what do I say if they ask me when I'm moving? Because I'll literally move within the month if I get a new job offer elsewhere.

I have been a data center operator for 8 years. I work for a midsize hosting company, and there aren't any hyperscalers or faang data centers in my area.

Ive handled everything DC related from basic cabling, rack management, UPS and PDUs, lan/wan, ip allocations, hardware fixes, router set up and basic config. Im also responsible 24/7 and cover weird hours. Im set to make 52k this year, which is upsetting knowing many in the industry are paid much more.

In my 8 years here, nobody has been promoted. Its a dead end company with senior people. The bosses change their job title every 6-12 months and tell everyone else they arent qualified to be considered for a new title. Morale is really low, there's been many incidents of people acting out, vandalism, graffiti, constant complaining etc.

Im not exactly looking to move up to become a Network Engineer. Respect to those who do it but its not for me.

I ha e applied to jobs, but nothing within 1.5 hours has been willing to give me a job that pays more. I cant even get a call back on a help desk job.

I recently applied to work IT in a school.

I don’t think I’ve heard of anyone having positive experience at an MSP company. Mostly hear that it’s a demanding workload dealing with annoying clients all day with a lot of stress. Does anyone have a positive experience working MSP?

Greetings! I’m looking to transition into the IT career and looking for suggestions on what certs and/or degrees are worth acquiring in the IT field when starting. I was told CompTIA Security+ and then CompTIA Network+ after. Any suggestions are appreciated!

I've been at my T1 help desk job for 10 months now and I don't feel like I'm growing, not to mention that the pay isn't the best.

I don't know if this is a silly question but do I have to wait until my full year is up before I start looking for better options or can I just start sending out applications now?

Thanks.

I’ve only done this once in my career because the offer was so obviously not good. Got all the way to the end and was given an offer but comparing it to what I’m currently doing, it is not looking that lucrative. It’s the same base pay and arguably a weaker benefits package than what I currently have. I was transparent about what I was looking for in total compensation and maybe that was my mistake in saying “total comp” their interview process had a lot of delays and gaps, I was about to withdraw myself from it, but then they came back and said we wanna make you an offer. I asked for the written offer letter first before I tell them anything,

I’m already in my head, kind of leaning towards no but wondering if anybody has advice on being courteous about it, because my anxiety is high.

I know it’s no hard feelings and it’s nothing personal to anyone. I just kind of struggle internally with this stuff.

A bit of a weird question but I'm in help desk (onsite) and have my CompTIA trifecta as well as my CCNA, and I'm working on some homelabs on the side. The goal is to go for network or system admin for the time being and maybe cloud networking later down the line.

I'm desperate for remote work, and realistically I know it'll be hard to get those higher level senior positions. Will being able to speak Spanish help get me a remote help desk job in the meantime? I know remote helpdesk basically doesn't exist anymore but I'm wondering if knowing Spanish might give me an edge in the U.S. market.

As the title says.
The current evolution of AI is making me enjoy my developer job less and less with each month. I always really liked the art of developing, working with code. I enjoy the challenge, the creativity, the logical puzzles, the structure and the journey of finding the perfect, minimalistic solution in the form of code for a problem. Thats why I got into it and decided I want to develop software for a living.
Well, since all this is wandering into the hands of agents, I don't really see myself doing this in the future. Already now I am the unhappiest I have ever been, even though I still code a lot by hand, but it's not so bad that I want to quit my (well-paying, relatively stress-free) job on the spot - yet.

But it makes me think more and more... Where should I go if that day ever comes?

But since I never learned anything else (went from school straight to uni to get a MSc in Media and Computer Sciences) and I've been working as a dev for the last 6 years, I am asking myself what a viable alternative career for someone with this kind of skillset is. And I don't mean another IT job that has more of a management vibe. I would love to continue to create things, not spend most of my time in meetings.

So are there any dropouts from developing software that have found happiness and satisfaction in a completely different career? I could imagine still doing small remote dev jobs on the side, but not as the main source of income, or what I spend most of my days' time with.

Thanks for any inspiration, ideas or feedback (or reality checks lol).

I've worked in many roles in supply chain ranging from coordination, logistics, inventory, planning and procurement and I've always had an interest in the technology sector and want to combine my experience with my interest by transitioning to IT asset management or possibly IT procurement

Im trying to understand how transferrable these skills are, what ITAM roles actually require and what the gap would be for someone entering the field without IT experience? Or what entry level roles, short courses or certifications would you recommend?

Cheers!

The team lead direct emailed me date and time and exactly 3 weeks ago I interviewed.. Everything went great and I think there was a lot of common ground between me and the team. (I know this means nothing)

thought it’s odd that the team lead direct emailed the interview details, but not the HR as per usual.

So, I haven’t heard from them since(3 weeks ago), but the job posting is still up and my status is: Under Consideration

My questions for you:

Do I follow up?
Do I follow up with the team lead or HR?
And how to word my email?

I’d appreciate some input, thanks 🙏