Month: April 2018

Technology is a wide umbrella, but if you are starting a college track or find yourself at a career crossroads, it’s a pretty good idea to try and find space for yourself under that umbrella. Why is this so? Well, there’s a lot of reasons, but we’re going to focus on two: the potential and the spread of the technology field.

Prospects

When it comes to meaningful work, technology is about the best option you can use. Some may find this surprising compared to more human-facing work—but everything has its place. Tech is driving innovation across tons of fields, but also provides a mental fulfillment for yourself.

At the core, tech work is about solving problems, whether it’s making something new or making something easier. Few fields can say that they are doing that the way that tech does. Even if you’re not on the bleeding edge, tech provides constant challenges and tangible achievements.

Versatility

Perhaps one of the nicest things about working in a tech field is that you have more options than ever to actually put into practice what you learn and specialize in. This can extend from vocations (like IT consulting in Miami or cybersecurity for the government) to even the type of technology you work with. In addition, on a personal level, pursuing a tech career allows you support a field you are passionate about while having more job security.

Let’s talk about academia as an example. Becoming a college professor is not only becoming more difficult due to competition, it is also not as lucrative as you may believe. As far as teaching at lower levels goes, you may have more job security, but you still aren’t making much, and some people are cynical about the treatment of teachers. However, supporting education is still a noble pursuit. Why not work in technology and support schools in a different way? This could mean basic IT, , running a managed IT service in Miami or by helping manage various technology systems, such as those used for logistics or other areas.

You can apply this manner of thinking to just about any career path. As tech becomes a more ubiquitous part of our lives, it does the same for the work world. As a result, you can weasel your way into just about any field. In addition, having some tech knowledge may make you more appealing even in other career paths. Publishing is a good example here. Overall, print publishing is on a downslide due to technological competition. But what if you were able to bring a little bit of web design knowledge to help a print titan bolster their digital initiatives? This would make you far more appealing of a candidate than someone who just has print experience to offer.

Overall, many people start learning tech to some degree because they have to, as innovations become key to more and more jobs. You owe it to yourself to get ahead of the curve, and start learning and working in these areas now.

Don’t believe that tech is the land of opportunity? Try these statistics on for size. According to data for the Bureau of Labor Statistics, employment of computer and information technology occupations is likely to grow 12 percent from 2014 to 2024. The number may seem modest at first, but you need to realize that this is faster than the average for all occupations.

“Tech isn’t for everyone, but tech is probably the single greatest opportunity that exists for millennials today,” says Mark Smukler, General Assembly alumni and Co-Founder of Bixby, a rental management platform. This means that even if you weren’t thinking of tech as a potential career choice, you may want to revisit that mindset, and one of the most accessible ways to get into that arena is through IT, or information technology.

The IT Landscape

For those of us who have worked in traditional office jobs most of our lives, it’s very possible that you have a bit of a narrow view of what IT can be. Those are the people you call when your office computer isn’t working, right? Not entirely. These jobs run the gamut from IT support in Miami to other similar technical staff jobs. These include companies that don’t necessarily specialize in tech, but require cutting edge technical tools and programs to function and stay competitive. Who is going to make that happen? Chances are, someone with plenty of job security and a nice salary. These positions are commonly called hybrid technical roles, that come with high salaries and the ability to work on new skill sets. For those who want to work their way up in the world, there will always be the opportunity to improve one’s self and their resume.

Speaking of salary, let’s get to brass tacks when it comes to IT and technology. The median salaries for the nine top jobs in 2016 ranked between $61,000-127,000. The biggest thing is that if you have the knowledge and skill, there is a far lower barrier to entry. To get that type of money, other fields may need higher levels of education, which come with higher student loan costs.

Ways to Get Started

Of course, if you want to enhance your IT skills in formal education, there is a chance to do so. Many graduate programs in IT specialize in areas like programming, tech support, web development, along with software engineering. In other cases, people with undergraduate degrees like math and the sciences may cross over in order to specialize a bit more.

However, the drawback to IT is that compared to other fields, there is constant change. Even for something like networks service Miami, new platforms, new programming languages and more pop up all the time. This means you don’t have the luxury of resting on your laurels. Even if you have formal education, it is important to keep focused on new developments in the field. By staying current and taking advantage of every resource you have, your resume will stay evergreen in a field that is likely to do the same.

If you were to sit down and compile career advice from 1000 success gurus, chances are that you would find some common threads. Chances are one of these common threads would include investing in yourself in some sort of way. There are many different ways to do so, but the details can vary from job to job, including IT, for one. IT is notable because it’s one of the fields showing the greatest amount of growth, but unlike some of the other contenders (healthcare), it’s very easy to work on your own to add value to yourself as a current and future employee. The best thing of all is these practices branch across all IT practices, from networks service in Miami to basic tech support across the country. Let’s see what you can do.

Enhance Your Knowledge

The Internet means that there are more means than ever for the average person to enhance their knowledge of just about any given subject. Technology is one of the biggest benefactors of this. Want to learn a new programming language? There are sites and apps for this. Looking to bone up on your web design? Take a course, then find a cheap or free platform to be your playground. The key here is to find good, authoritative sources to try and steer you down the right path. Following popular influencers on social media is a start, but you can still do more.

Try to join online groups where professionals in your field come together and ask questions.  Consider downloading a podcast from an IT expert and listening to it when you have some downtime. It may even be worth it to look at free course materials from universities (several offer them on their website). Remember, the aim here isn’t to try and break the mold. All you want to do is immerse yourself in relevant information so you can take a more formal leap when it makes sense.

Enhance Your Resume

Now, this begs the question, when does a more formal leap make sense? The answer to that depends, but one of the most common examples is getting a certification. Many people get their knowledge piecemeal, a class here, a job there, some hobbyist work here. Certifications are a way for employers and professionals to get a basic idea that your skill set meets some sort of universal standard. This matters at all levels, even a basic IT support in Miami job. At that point, you can combine this with your past knowledge and experience to give them a complete picture.

You don’t have to be so formal if you don’t want to, though. An equally valuable thing to try and do is create something on your own and maintain it, outside the confines of your day job. This could be a blog, an app, whatever makes sense. This gives you an opportunity to tinker creatively, but it also shows potential employers two things:

1. You are dedicated enough to the craft of tech to work on it in your free time.
2. You have the knowledge to create a working product without having your hand held.

Both things are of great value in a field where things are constantly changing.