The Microsoft MCSA (Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator) course is a recognised route for those thinking of getting into supporting networks. Whether you’re about to join the IT industry or already have knowledge but want to formalise that with an acknowledged certification, you can find the right training.
To achieve certification at the MCSA level you need to pass 4 Microsoft Certified Professional exams (MCP’s). If this is your first entry into computing exams, it’s likely you’ll need to improve your skill-set prior to attempting to go for the first of the four MCP’s. Look for a company with people who will find the right way to tackle your goal and who will get you started in the right place.
Proper support is incredibly important – locate a good company offering 24×7 direct access to instructors, as not opting for this kind of support could hamper your progress.
Email support is too slow, and phone support is often to a call-centre that will just take down the issue and email it over to their technical team – who will call back over the next day or so (assuming you’re there), when it’s convenient to them. This is not a lot of use if you’re lost and confused and can only study at specific times.
Keep your eyes open for colleges that incorporate three or four individual support centres across multiple time-zones. Every one of them needs to be seamlessly combined to give a single entry point together with 24 hours-a-day access, when it’s convenient for you, with no hassle.
Never settle for less than you need and deserve. 24×7 support is the only viable option for technical learning. Maybe late-evening study is not your thing; usually though, we’re working during the provided support period.
There is a tidal wave of change coming via technology over the next generation – and this means greater innovations all the time.
We’re only just starting to scrape the surface of how technology will affect our lives in the future. Technology and the web will significantly alter how we see and interact with the world as a whole over the next few years.
The money in IT isn’t to be sniffed at moreover – the income on average in Great Britain for an average IT employee is a lot greater than in other market sectors. It’s likely that you’ll earn a much greater package than you’d typically expect to bring in elsewhere.
Apparently there’s no end in sight for IT growth in the UK. The industry is still growing rapidly, and we don’t have anywhere near enough qualified skilled IT professionals to fill current job vacancies, so it’s most unlikely that this will change significantly for quite some time to come.
One useful service provided by many trainers is a Job Placement Assistance program. This is designed to help you find your first job in the industry. Ultimately it isn’t a complex operation to get a job – as long as you’re correctly trained and certified; employers in this country need your skills.
However, avoid waiting until you have finished your training before polishing up your CV. Right at the beginning of your training, enter details of your study programme and place it on jobsites!
You may not have got to the stage where you’ve qualified when you will get your initial junior support position; however this won’t be the case if interviewers don’t get sight of your CV.
You’ll normally experience quicker service from a local IT focused recruitment consultant or service than you’ll experience from any training company’s centralised service, as they’ll know the local area and commercial needs better.
Do ensure you don’t conscientiously work through your course materials, then call a halt and leave it up to everyone else to land you a job. Take responsibility for yourself and get out there. Channel the same resource into getting your first job as you did to gain the skills.
An all too common mistake that potential students often succumb to is to look for the actual course to take, and take their eye off where they want to get to. Universities are brimming over with unaware students that chose a program because it looked interesting – instead of what would yield the career they desired.
It’s not unheard of, in many cases, to obtain tremendous satisfaction from a year of studying only to end up putting 20 long years into something completely unrewarding, as a consequence of not performing some quality research when it was needed – at the start.
Make sure you investigate your leanings around career development, earning potential, and how ambitious you are. It makes sense to understand what the role will demand of you, which accreditations are needed and how you’ll gain real-world experience.
Seek out help from an experienced industry advisor who has commercial knowledge of your chosen market-place, and will be able to provide ‘A day in the life of’ understanding of what kinds of tasks you’ll be undertaking on a day-to-day basis. It just makes sense to understand whether or not this is right for you well before the training program is started. There’s little reason in starting to train only to find you’ve taken the wrong route.
Written by Scott Edwards. Visit HERE or www.MCSA2008-2U.co.uk.