IT employment

[capcom_suicide]

I think the best thing to do would be an ITIL course. It isn't of any use on its own but as a framework for working practices is invaluable.
I will help you progress from the guy doing the job to strategist and how to improve any aspect of your IT infrastructure.
You have already made the right choices in documentation etc so it sounds like there isn't too much firefighting.

Totally agree, I'd be more keen to employ a new employee in the services section if they had experience plus ITIL, rather than experience plus MCITP.

Understanding how a larger department should function under ITIL would make the transition for Billy easier, and when looking for a new job I would also reccomend that he looks for a company that has a professional structure that follows an ITIL type framework.

This would also will dampen any fears a prospective employer would have that you would be a loose cannon, used to being able to work with whatever technology you like in a smaller network, suddenly coming into a larger environment & wanting to "press all the buttons."

The other important factor here is that taking ITIL training is useful, appropriate and important if you want to progress your career to a larger enterprise. It will also help you discover if this really is the right environment for you to develop and thrive in your new workplace. It might be that you would miss the freedom you have today.

C_S

[randombs]

Cheers for the replies, guys, sorry it took a while. So I've been checking out ITIL and it looks very interesting and definitely relevant but I wonder if I should get more hands-on experience with the actual IT stuff first?

Short-term I'm wondering about going for the 2008 Server Administrator(non-enterprise) exams as I could then be more instantly useful in my current job(and could request a raise which I haven't done since my promotion) and I have the equipment to practise on, both at work and at home. It's only about ?60 for the three books and I think it would help me on my quest because most of my expertise is on the desktop side.

Despite the pros/cons of having such certificates, my current company places such great emphasis on them that I'm thinking of taking advantage of that. I'm confident that, had I a few under my belt, my manager would put in a good word in terms of the increase in my value to the company.

Still weighing things up for now. Might try and find a PDF of the first book to see what it's like inside...

[smouty]

If your company values those qualification then insist on instructor led training
You would be a better person than me if you can pass the exams from just reading the books and some hands-on experience.
Even the client exam has a lot of AD, management, deployment etc and only using Microsoft centric tools as you'd expect.
Most companies are not 100% based on MS for everything such as DNS/DHCP, remote access and client deployment but to pass the exam you'll need to know what they'd like you to be using which is hard sometimes.

[randombs]

True.

When I started I discussed training with them and was told they would contribute up to half for the training but would of course expect me to stay on for some time afterwards (I think around 6 months but it depends on the amount they give). I definitely couldn't go it alone but I was thinking of at least getting the books to see what I'm up against rather than paying for a course and possibly getting stuck/bored mid-way. Also, not too keen on how these training companies keep guaranteeing passes...

[k0pp0]

Another vote for ITIL training - although it's offten a boring subject. When I've recently employed people (I'm often the tech expert on the interview) I'll ask as many questions as I'm allowed, ranging from simple troubleshooting to complex design scenarios. If someone's come into the interview off the back of a book without experience then they generally start to fumble around for answers, whereas experienced guys will either know the answers or will be able to have a pretty good guess at a solution, or a way to find it out.

However - I've also started emphasising the processes and procedures regarding ITIL, especially around change, config, incident and problem management. If someone has no concept of change processes then it rings alarm bells instantly..

[Baseley09]

I can relate to the IT sweatshop comments a page or so back, I joined a companies IT on site support team but specifically my role is build merchant, imaging & configing system after system after system in my den. It pays decent and the highlight is getting hold of any bought out equipment to flog, but robotic monotony is really the order of the day.

My actual job title is IT Logistics Coordinator, I do a lot of shipping and goods tracking, my point is there is scope for other working areas within IT that isn't necessarily hardcore on the technical side.