My network engineering career journey

The Start of my Career Journey

This is a retrospective of my journey into the I.T. world and how I became a network Engineer. My journey into the world of IT started about twenty years go. I was a teenager trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life after high school. What kind of career did I want? Who do I want to become? How do I want to grow? Those were some of the questions I was asking myself as my High School Graduation approached in 2003.

 

In 1999 my brother bought me my first computer. It was a Compaq Presario computer with an AMD K7 processor with 32 megabytes of ram.  4 gigabyte hard drive and a 16-megabyte video PCI video card I installed. The computer wasn’t fast by todays standards but it was good to jumpstart my interests into computers.

 

I moved back to New York, I was enrolled in a computer repair class and a cisco network academy class to fulfill some technology credits as part of my High School graduation requirements. By taking those classes I found out how intriguing computer repair and networking was. In 2003 I graduated High School. I had a good idea of where I wanted to go but I didn’t have a plan to act upon.

 

After taking 6 months off to work and to think I decided I was going to go to college. In the Spring of 2004 I started taking classes at SUNY Ulster College Community College in Stone Ridge New York to pursue a degree in network administration. Over the course of 4 years I took many technologies related classes ranging from computer repair to network administration. At this time, I took the Cisco Network academy class for the CCNA 640-801 exam and I was extremely interested in the hardware side of networking while.

 

As I progressed through more and more classes at ulster, I excelled at all classes related to Networking from CCNA to CCNP. I learned a great deal of Network Operating systems by taking the Microsoft and Unix classes that were offered. This allowed me to focus on both the Hardware side of networking to the Software the systems utilized at the time such as Windows server 2000 and server 2003.

 

The Beginning of my Career:

In the summer of 2007, while I was still taking classes at Ulster, I had an interview to become a Help Desk agent at Time Warner Cable. I wasn’t offered the job because I was still in school, but once I was finished I was instructed to re-apply. Several months later I was nearing the completion of my classes for my degree and I reapplied to Time Warner Cable and I was offered a job immediately with a start date of February 1, 2008. In December 2007, I graduated with my Associates degree in applied science Network Administration and Computer repair.

 

In 2008, I started my career in the IT Field. I just graduated from college and I was young. It was a new experience to work for a large corporation. At this time, I figured I would spend several years performing a Help Desk job to move on to a network administration job. Boy was I wrong. What started out as a short term goal with bigger aspirations turned into a long term commitment.

 

I was young, naive, and I didn’t know better. Certifications and higher level schooling wasn’t on my mind. As I progressed though the job, it wasn’t till 2010 when I got my first industry certification.  I received my CCENT and CCNA Certification. It was then when I moved up from a Tier 3 Support Representative to an ADSS Representative within the Tier 3 department by 2011. I spent the next 2 years working in this roll with no path of improvement. This is when I decided I needed to grow as a person and by November 2013 I went back to school to get my Bachelors Degree.

 

Over the course of the next 3 years, I expanded on the knowledge of the classes I took in Ulster and learned more. Many of the classes I took overlapped with my associates degree but It was good to learn the updated material and train on newer equipment. I went from an average student in 2004 to an exceptional student in 2013 until graduation. In 2016, I graduated with my Bachelors of Science Majoring in Computer Network Engineering and Communications management.

 

I achieved a great milestone in my life. Graduating with a Manga Cum Laude while working full time to get my bachelors degree in 2016. This has opened new opportunities for me. 1 year after I graduated, I was promoted from an ADSS representative in a call center to a Network Engineer.

 

2017 has been a big year for me. The new job and relocation was just the tip of the iceberg.  My career is started and I am looking forward to all the challenges. I achieved additional cisco certifications. I finished my CCNP Route and Switch Certification and I became CCNA Security Certified. In retrospect, if I didn’t make the decision to better myself I would still be working in the high stress call center environment with lack of career potential. The degree and certification definitely made the different.

Hard work Pays Off:

I took the time and made the commitment. Working 40 hours a week, studying 40 hours or more. My personal time was nearly nothing and the stress levels were high. Surprisingly perseverance coupled with a good support system and the drive to become something better is the key to success. Without that nothing would happen.

 

I am grateful for the experiences I have had over the past two decades. There was many up’s and down’s in this roller coaster we call life. I have had my doubts. In order to overcome those doubts, I manned up and grabbed the bull by horns and I achieved a little bit of greatness. It is knowing not to give up and following through with whatever commitment you have made. Take the risk and reap the rewards is the moral of the story and I can attest that anyone can achieve greatness. It just takes a little leap of faith.

 

I am looking towards the future. It may hold many uncertainties but I am not going to give up. I have many goals and aspirations that haven’t been met. But, I will do what ever it takes to achieve those goals. Sitting by idly won’t do anything. Actions mean more than words and that is what I have learned.

The Future?

2018 will be another big year. I have new goals set and I aspire to do more and become a better person.  There will be more certifications in my future. Hence, I will work on my CCDA certification as well as some Juniper certifications to help me with my job. If time allows I may start to pursue my CCIE Route and Switch Certification. This should  help me move up from a Network Engineer II to II, IV or Principle in the coming years. I am not going to give up or will I surrender. I will continue to carry on for I know I am destined to achieve greatness.