How Do You Move up in IT??

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  Mechz on 23/03/2024 - 20:18

  Why didn't you do any management courses?

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  Jimothy Wongingtons on 23/03/2024 - 20:19

  +2

  Would you say you’re a people person? light hearted read in this thread here about it

  • 

    OzzyBoy1 on 24/03/2024 - 00:25

    This is great. That certainly gives me another perspective to think about…

  • 

    BoltThrower on 26/03/2024 - 06:51

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNuu9CpdjIo

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  bobbified on 23/03/2024 - 20:19

  +2

  And despite having lot of technical experience, it seems hard to move higher up into leadership roles without having any leadership/managerial experience.

  Yep - this is the hard bit. Technical and management skills are very different skills. I knew I would have this difficulty (because let's face it - technical people are not known for their soft skills) so I waited for the right opportunity to show my personality to the hiring people. I got a referral into a different company and asked the referrer to lay down some groundwork internally so they could hear all about me first. I was lucky that the guys that interviewed me were able to see my soft skills and gave me that opportunity (despite a stack of other applicants that had plenty of experience for that particular role).

  I would say that, in my experience, there are not a lot of people with a combination of solid technical experience and also a good personality that can manage a team effectively. The danger of this combo is that they might go too deep into the finer details and lose sight of the bigger picture - which is required in management).

  There are going little pieces of work that are not big enough to be a project (and setup a whole team) but not small enough to "just do". That is a good place to start and show everyone what you can do.

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  mskeggs on 23/03/2024 - 20:35

  +3

  A lot of IT workers deprioritise soft skills, which is the bulk of the job for higher roles.
  If you already have project experience, especially if it is in customer facing roles, you can develop these communication, influencing and management skills.
  You probably also need to map out where you want to go - I want a promotion is undefined, “I want to lead this team of 4” is much more definite and allows for feedback on what is needed to get there.

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  boomramada on 23/03/2024 - 20:57

  +3

  Best way to move up, change jobs.

  • 

    OzzyBoy1 on 24/03/2024 - 00:37

    +1

    Yep..i hear you. That’s how I have gone up. Otherwise i would not be earning this much as well

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  Nillionaire on 23/03/2024 - 21:12

  Make it clear that you want to transition to managerial positions. If your company won't accommodate you, apply elsewhere.

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  coffeeinmyveins on 23/03/2024 - 21:26

  it seems hard to move higher up into leadership roles without having any leadership/managerial experience.

  surprised pikachu face

  Have you acted in any managerial roles before? Mentoring? Are you actually suitable for being a manager?

  Not every engineer can be a manager, and most end up being staff engineers or head of engineering if they're lucky.

  Is it just matter of being in right place and right time and who you know?? How do you slide towards leadership type roles without having any such experience of managing a team without taking a pay cut??

  Yes. Your career doesn't magically end up with being CTO, for 99.9% of engineers it doesn't, obviously. It's about your people skills, strategic skills etc. Way beyond just "I'm a good engineer".

  You should know this by now but the best way to move up in your career is to change jobs. You'll never be promoted into a CTO role at your existing company.

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  AustriaBargain on 23/03/2024 - 23:22

  Grow a huge long beard and start asking for more money.

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  OzzyBoy1 on 24/03/2024 - 00:34

  My concerns stems from the fact that I am unable to keep up with certifications. I am happy to learn things in my own way, but I always like to get hands on experience. I have been fortunate to get some decent experience not only administering technologies but also implementing as part of Project implementation. So if I can’t do certs and let’s say I can’t break into leadership type roles, what next do I do? There are lot of roles in IT. But just can’t seem to think many roles when one doesn’t have experience doing what employers want. I can aim for Senior Systems Engineer or Senior Implementation Engineer, but probably that’s about it. I always appreciated variety of work that allows me develop more skills rather then just doing same mundane things daily. Going into managerial role would need more people and problem solving skills along with being very affable so people can trust you and believe in you. Sounds like I need to brush up social skills and start attending parties every weekend lol. This way I can get into deeper conversations rather than just having few talks here and there..

  • 

    Pcosmic on 24/03/2024 - 11:24

    Project management

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    Indomietable on 26/03/2024 - 06:43

    +1

    Sounds like I need to brush up social skills

    Are you sure you will enjoy working with people, play politics and arse kissing?

    Another option is to make a side segway to software development. Build stuff from scratch instead of glueing stuff together. Maybe start automate your tasks in sexy language (go/rust) and publish it as open source.

    There lots of companies that build stuff highly value people with this ability. Software engineers in Facebook can get $1m/yr with stock options.

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    BoltThrower on 26/03/2024 - 07:23

    +1

    Certs are for others to collect now, and for you to choose those people. You have the skills to select and manage talent.
    You won't be able to keep up with constant training yourself and you'll burn yourself out if you try. Next month there'll be something else that replaces or innovates something you've already learned.

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  CarlNotKarl on 24/03/2024 - 01:28

  You can't have your cake and eat it too. If you want to be a manager, what are you doing to get there? If you want to "move up" what are you doing to move up?

  "Sounds like I need to brush up social skills and start attending parties every weekend lol"
  Brushing up on social skills isn't going to land you a manager role. You need management experience. A common starting point would be via project manager roles, but you will need to study to be a PM.

  "So if I can’t do certs and let’s say I can’t break into leadership type roles, what next do I do?"
  Change to a job that is a step up from your current one…
  Learn skills from people in your current place that you can use to advance to somewhere else….
  Take on projects at your workplace that you can use to learn new tech/products… and then go somewhere else.
  Use any available training at your workplace

  I was a win/unix sys admin for 500 odd person company. They had a project come up to convert over to the latest (at that time) version of SharePoint.. so I learnt it and did the project, then moved into a SharePoint consulting gig nearly doubling my pay.
  After doing that for 5 years, I then pivoted to doing BA and finally now agile BA/product owner/lead roles.

  If your a perm at a company, you should be leveraging all you can to learn, and then move on. (if there is no room for advancement at that company)
  Contracting is a great way to earn better money, but it will be specialised and you will need experience. If you contract with some of the bigger consulting firms, they will usually keep you on their books (if you are good) and you can move around easily that way.