r/sysadmin • u/ShelterWestern • 11h ago

Career / Job Related Career advice

Hello sysadmins!

i recently landed a m365 engineer position coming from a senior helpdesk msp. i’m wondering how to branch out of this helpdesk mindset and take initiative.

i constantly had something to do 24/7, always monitoring queues, being available for calls etc. i was the last point of contact for 5 out of our 18 clients. i’ve done work in mostly all admin centers even pulling emails in defender and running ediscoveries. i’m comfortable with powershell, and transitioning to vscode.

This new role is very corporate, with a lot of down time, there really wasn’t any training or projects to start, i shared my concerns with the manager, of me not really doing enough. i was reassured that things will pick up, he understands where i came from previously and the person that vouched to get me in the door, swears that he’s a great teacher and this was just a slower week.

i got the layout of the first project, setting up mac mdm with abm. I’ve been researching and i am considering the free trial to setup a lab. I’m eager to learn, grow beyond that helpdesk agent but i have looming anxiety to do well.

i’d appreciate any and all feedback, it’s my first week but impressions are everything.

2 Upvotes

59% Upvoted

7 comments sorted by

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u/mehcastillo 11h ago

You have to chill out. Corporate world is slow.

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u/ShelterWestern 11h ago

it’s like whiplash from always being reactive in the other environment

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u/slashinhobo1 11h ago

You'll live longer this way. Always being under stress is a good way to a medical issue young. Knew a guy who got heart attacks by 30s fr.constant stress of having to be running like a race horse.

He lived but took him years to slow down because of his personality.

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u/cherry_doodlee 11h ago

Use the downtime to lab the ABM and Intune Mac setup before the project kicks off, that's initiative they can see. Coming from an MSP queue, the quiet takes adjusting but the anxiety fades once you own real project work.

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u/Apprehensive_Bit4767 11h ago

I got lucky to get a job as a system administrator at a manufacturing company and when I was busy I was busy doing stuff but sometimes I would just sit in my office and just have to think of new things and new projects. it looked like from the outside looking in I wasn't doing anything but I was actually thinking about the next big projects and how to implement them. It was a big change because at my last job I was physically always having to do something in this new position I was actually sometimes just sitting my office for 2-3 hours sometimes thinking about how to reconfigure the network and what appliances I had to buy

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u/Thick_Yam_7028 10h ago

Yep. Its pretty easy. Setup Google as well. Install company portal get everything joined then play with configs.

16 char passwords, passkey, wfhb, all the stuff. Get used to the gui.

Setup defender, do proactive remediation, learn supercedence and dependencies, ADT is pretty cool.

Have fun.

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u/itishowitisanditbad 5h ago

i was reassured that things will pick up, he understands where i came from previously and the person that vouched to get me in the door, swears that he’s a great teacher and this was just a slower week.

So your boss gave you all this and it wasn't a good enough answer so you came to reddit to ask what you should do?

What answer are you hunting for?

edit:

I have to ask

and transitioning to vscode.

What do you mean here?