Career progression from an I.T support role...

WrigleysExtra

Hi All,

I'm currently working in an I.T support role providing software support, building PC's, installing/configuring software, internal support for sales staff, configuring/installing wireless access points etc.

I have been doing this role for around 2 years, in which the first year was mainly spent learning. I'm pretty bored with the job and there's no real career progression (I will always be I.T support)

My question is where do I go from here? The money is currently not great and I don't really know what direction to take. I see most jobs now are looking for developers/programmers but I didn't choose that route which was maybe a bad idea although I was never any good at it.

Rossin

most people start off in IT support on the oul helpdesk, for me it went on to becoming and a field support engineer,then a network admin,then sys admin. The last 2 pretty much being the same job only one seems to pay more!

well that's how it was for me anyway! I might have a chance to get into development soon within the company im in so considering it.

you could maybe get some certs or what not behind you(although i never bothered!)

MarkR

I went from something similar to another support job with a small company. Started installing servers in remote sites and maintaining them. Then started doing some sql. Now I'm managing our support.

Start looking for jobs now, send in some cv's to those that sound interesting.

Is there definitely no scope for a change or addition to your role where you are? Speak to whoever you report to, maybe you can upskill and get some more responsibility or more varied tasks.

I am pie

ITIL certification is definitely worth looking at. An example of a less technical and more service management focused career path might be:

Helpdesk > Helpdesk Team Lead > Helpdesk/Support Manager > Incident Management > Service Management

After that, if you find yourself in an organisation where you focus on 3rd party support (i.e. supporting external clients) there are potential routes out in Account Management. As other's have mentioned you might take a more tech focused route, rather than a service / account management route. I would say immediate pay prospects might improve quicker but you might hit a career ceiling sooner. These are of course fairly long term career paths and definitely not set in stone.

Support/Helpdesk is a popular entry point outside of the traditional graduate programs and to stand out and move to the next level of responsibility (and therefore pay increases) you need to take responsibility rather than wait for it to be handed to you. That's a pretty general rule of thumb for many IT career paths.

Good luck.

Mr. Loverman

You could go down the *nix route.

I know loads of lads who went from *nix sysadmin to developer.