Did EVERYONE start at helpdesk?

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ThePracticalCISO@reddit

Hello! Honestly, yes - most senior system, cloud or network administrators all started in either a help desk or support style role. In this current market, businesses are looking for technicians who already have a wider array of experience, and since the market is already saturated - they can really have their pick.

An alternate route is to focus on solutions architecture, either in the cloud or networking. Because cloud specialization is rarely helped by general IT knowledge, there is more wiggle room in these roles. You will still need to bring knowledge of networking, servers and proprietary cloud services (specific services to each cloud provider) to be valuable in these roles but you are more likely to make larger salary increases earlier in your career if you are able to both deliver strong results and have a little bit of luck.

Good luck!

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Ayy4K@reddit

I technically didn’t start at Helpdesk but it was my first role after my IT apprenticeship. I know that the knowledge to be learnt is still way way deep. I’ve gone from in house IT to Helpdesk to IT in an Engineering based org.

You can pick up skills as you go. You just need to know the fundamentals. They can take you very far.

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LeadingFamous@reddit

Desktop support > sysadmin > security analyst > security engineer.

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PhillAholic@reddit

They’re hiring “security analysts” as entry level now. It’s an absolute shit show. They don’t know what they’re talking about. Seriously probably could be replaced with AI.

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SeatownNets@reddit

https://www.dropzone.ai/

Yea they're coming for entry level SOC lol, and tbh when a lot of the job is mass parsing logs and crash dumps, hard to say AI doesn't have a place.

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PhillAholic@reddit

Yea I mean I expect this to come right from the EDR software though. There are so many useless detection logged that I fear important ones are going to get lost.

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SeatownNets@reddit

EDR is complex, any changes to reduce visibility also reduces the chance to spot an issue. Always a tradeoff.

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unprovoked33@reddit

So true. My company has 3 security analysts with no prior IT experience and 1 with prior IT experience. The 1 with experience is constantly cleaning up the messes made by the others. He’s also the only one not constantly on a power trip.

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PhillAholic@reddit

Mine are opening up tickets for user's going to Potentially malicious websites which are so obviously ad networks on regular websites that users aren't knowingly going to. Hundreds of tickets with users having no idea wtf they are talking about or worse just saying they did something generic and the team making it as complete. It's the boy who cried wolf. The day we get an actual attack, no one is going to be take it seriously.

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poipoipoi_2016@reddit

You can start in SWE and migrate towards "platform".

But uh, good luck with that in 2025. Microsoft fired 17000 Americans and it's not even July yet.

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TwilightKeystroker@reddit

There are plenty of businesses who can't afford those highly experienced MS-Only techs. Also, every business I've ever worked with has products made by other vendors. Of those 17,000 Americans, how many want to troubleshoot Forti-anything, or fix issues with .

OP will be fine if they are dedicated and have a higher work ethic than average.

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davy_crockett_slayer@reddit

A lot? Networking and vendor specific skills are common.

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poipoipoi_2016@reddit

I will say that I would have very little idea how to setup VLAN's in PfSense.

DHCP and route tables yes, but VLAN's I'd be working on.

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davy_crockett_slayer@reddit

If you can set up DHCP and route tables, you can set up a VLAN. Use a subnet calculator, and that's about it. If you've done the Cisco coursework on your own or in college, it concepts will come back quickly.

https://docs.netgate.com/pfsense/en/latest/vlan/configuration.html

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whatever462672@reddit

Pfsense is really well-documented tbh, unlike many other vendors.

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Ssakaa@reddit

Of those 17,000 Americans, how many want to troubleshoot Forti-anything, or fix issues with .

When there's 17k people competing? Quite a few. Feds lost a good few IT folks so far this year too.

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poipoipoi_2016@reddit

Especially once the money runs out and you have a mortgage.

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c4nis_v161l0rum@reddit

This was what happened last year as well.

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Mr_Compliant@reddit

And zero Visas?

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Atrium-Complex@reddit

6 months in a callcenter before I found my first real gig in a medium sized manufacturing plant. Small team, my official title was 'IT helpdesk tech', but I did a lot of sysadmin and netadmin related tasks. Eventually evolved and my job title reflected that.

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Purple-Ad-6976@reddit

It’s absolutely possible, I made the leap myself right after graduating. That said, there were a few key things that helped me land a SysAdmin role early on:

I had 5+ years prior help desk-style experience, including working directly with clients and doing hardware repairs and troubleshooting. That hands-on, customer-facing work is crucial, it shows employers you can handle end-user issues and have a solid grasp of fundamentals.
I also had personal and school projects that aligned well with SysAdmin tasks, which helped me stand out.

While it's not the most common path, it's definitely doable if you have the right experience and initiative. It’s a competitive jump, but not an unrealistic one.

Even after getting the SysAdmin role, I spent about a week shadowing the help desk team to understand their workflows. That helped me support them better and strengthened our working relationship. If you skip help desk entirely, I’d still recommend something like that.

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BabyLinuxAdmin@reddit

Yep yep

Help Desk -> Service Desk 2 -> Junior Sys -> Linux Sys Admin -> Devops Engineer -> Now with my new gig ive jumped down to Systems Engineer / Cloud Engineer. Much more enjoyable

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Bamboopanda741@reddit

I did, but that doesn’t mean you have to.

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Cerril@reddit

HD is the standard path and exceptions are absolutely exceptional. My first gig was a combo of back end support tasks that didn't include much helpdesk because I was working for a tech startup where everyone was expected to at least handle the basics, and I spent most of my time doing server setups and maintenance. My second job was project and user support, but my prior experience got me put on mostly server side tasks over more senior techs. So it's possible to avoid a significant stint on the front lines but it's more something you fall into than manage intentionally.

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lucky644@reddit

I was self taught in IT and I became a IT consultant, over 25 years experience in IT now. I was able to leverage that experience into an enterprise sysadmin role. I still do consulting as well. I have zero certs and nobody has ever asked me for them before. I currently have a IT director/ops role as my day job.

You need some kind of prior experience before stepping into a sysadmin role, I skipped ‘official’ helpdesk but I sorta did the same thing.

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plump-lamp@reddit

Internships are your only chance at a sysadmin role out of college. Graduates just aren't taught actual proper hands on skills you need. Most have never touched AD, DNS, GPOs, installed an operating system, joined to a domain, know the difference between security/distro groups. Sysadmin is a broad title for different roles but this and basic networking 101 are lacking

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davidm2232@reddit

Most have never touched AD, DNS, GPOs, installed an operating system, joined to a domain, know the difference between security/distro groups

What? That is the absolute basics and is taught second year of most IT colleges.

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plump-lamp@reddit

Taught? Sure. Hands on real world? Very rare. Also ask any cybersec grad

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davidm2232@reddit

I mean, you are setting up an entire network from scratch on real world hardware. You have to configure the switches, routers, and connections to the servers. Then load both server and client OS's, create a domain, join several devices from it, apply GPOs and prove they work. We also had to do a fully functioning Exchange server. Firewalls, VPNs, ACLs. Server hardening. WSUS. Heck, we had to build an image through WDT so that we could boot an entire functioning OS of PXE boot with only allowing two key presses until you got to a log in screen.

And that was at what I consider to by a crappy state school that really didn't teach us much.

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plump-lamp@reddit

That's an extremely rare case for colleges. I interview hundreds of candidates a year and none even come close to that

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davidm2232@reddit

Are they getting a degree in network or system administration? I have seen several different college programs that are even more in depth. Even my local community college 2 year degree has you setting up a basic AD domain with virtual machines and networking with Packet Tracer.

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ThePoliticalPenguin@reddit

Your experience sounds like a rare one. It's definitely great that you got the experience that you did. I can only speak for my state, but we have nothing like this outside of community college programs (which are, ironically, far better because they're more hands-on).

The large state universities are too busy lumping IT into business programs and teaching kids accounting instead of networking. I've spent a large amount of time working with universities to improve this, and I can tell you its a huge problem. Im not exaggerating when I say that kids do not know the difference between a public and a private IP address.

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davidm2232@reddit

That's scary. I feel like my college was so bad and we barely learned anything. It was a technical based college though. While IT was lumped in with their business school, it pushed hands on very heavily. Their main majors were automotive mechanics and agriculture, so hands on was the norm for all majors.

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ThePoliticalPenguin@reddit

Yep, it's really unfortunate. I was talking to some of the cyber seniors recently, and several of them didn't know what Active Directory was.

So, I'll soon be doing a mini lecture/talk with some labs at student organized club, to help where I can. But there's only so much I can do without systemic change.

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Nossa30@reddit

Can confirm, same experience. Cyber grads are clueless beyond reading logs. I'm really not surprised as cybersecurity is only a small slice piece of the whole pie. To spend a whole ass 4 year degree on it IMO is not a good idea.

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davidm2232@reddit

Cybersecurity is not anywhere near a sysadmin degree

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IDontWantToArgueOK@reddit

You aren't going to be spinning up new environments when hired. You're going to be navigating an already existing environment that wasn't properly set up, not properly maintained, and has a million caveats to navigate.

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davidm2232@reddit

Sure. But that's typically easier than starting from scratch

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IDontWantToArgueOK@reddit

Hell no it's not. There's documentation for building from scratch.

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davidm2232@reddit

Maybe I was spoiled, but I had decent documentation on how things were set up. I left much better documentation when I left

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IDontWantToArgueOK@reddit

That's pretty rare in my experience.

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5panks@reddit

Cybersec definitely, we had two interns for cybersec this year and neither had more than logged into Active Directory when they started.

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siphoneee@reddit

Indeed rare. Hands on real world is the key here. Yes, you can do labs while in school to try and emulate what is in the real world, but what is taught in those labs is different from is in the real world. You really have to get your hands dirty.

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timbotheny26@reddit

IT colleges

That's a thing? I know there are "X Institute of Technology" universities, but I don't think it would be accurate to call them "IT colleges". Plus, for the average person, they're expensive as hell and very difficult to get into.

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Nossa30@reddit

Taught and practiced are 2 different things.

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davidm2232@reddit

I mean, you get to practice it in the lab. I built at least 3 separate domains, one with multiple sites across VPN links

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Rawme9@reddit

In this job market without experience it will be difficult to get a sysadmin job directly. Not impossible but very unlikely

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Bmw5464@reddit

Yeah. I imagine it would almost be frustrating. You’d probably find a company just barely big enough for in house IT person and you’d be stuck doing a shit ton of work (on top of the admin shit) and probably make on the lower end of an average sysadmin salary.

I will say OP, it doesn’t hurt to apply at all. I was in the same spot and my only reference was my dad’s business I worked for (IT field) which people didn’t like cause it was my dad. I applied for all kinds of jobs and got interviews for several high level help desk roles but none stuck. If you nail an interview you never know!

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Ashix_@reddit

Funnily enough that's exactly how I ended up. Minimal experience, straight into system administration for a smaller company. While it currently is the lower end of a system admin salary, it certainly isn't bad, and I have enough faith that it'll increase the longer I stay.

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picudisimo@reddit

learn and learn and then learn some more while you are there.

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Ashix_@reddit

That's the plan!

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picudisimo@reddit

Also poke around and find out when growth is coming, then ask for more compensation right before the growth start.

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ResolutionDefiant352@reddit

this is where i'm at in my role started as support tech 1 and now im the sole sys ad with one tech under me lower end for where im at but if i stay longer it should all work out

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5panks@reddit

It definitely doesn't hurt OP to apply, but I feel like he's going to get the same answer. I think most people really did start out as helpdesk or some kind of crap junior role at an MSP.

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JvstGeoff@reddit

This is my life. I work at a church as "Tech Solutions" but it's everything from sysadmin, network engineering (I completely overhauled and replaced everything after we fired our MSP, who was awful), help desk (we don't use a ticket system or anything formal), and basically anything else that any staff member needs help with on any computer or other device. As an organization, we're right on the cusp of needing an additional IT person, based on how many staff members we have and everything that I am required to maintain. We are working with a new MSP to balance out the workload.

I got in because I knew a lot of people. I was in building maintenance for a long time, but they knew I had a lot of experience. I worked at Best Buy for 4 years (not really an indication of knowledge), was an intern at said church for 5 years with the audio production team, built my own computers & managed my own homelab, and had a couple (meaningless) Google certs. I still had a lot to do to really prove I knew what I was talking about in the interviews, but it helped that I knew the last 3 guys in that position.

What I'm trying to say is knowing the right people, the technology, maybe a cert or 2 (or degrees), and being confident in your abilities can outweigh job experience. I wish you the absolute best of luck in your job search.

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Moist_Lawyer1645@reddit

Been a sole sysadmin for a small business that absolutely could afford a team of 10. Never again.

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ExcitingTabletop@reddit

I'd always hire a sysadmin with help desk experience over a sysadmin without help desk experience, unless there is a very compelling reason otherwise.

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Nossa30@reddit

I would honestly question alot any sysadmin who hasn't been in the trenches like the rest of us. I'm sure its possible to be an admin having never worked helpdesk. I personally have never seen it.

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ExcitingTabletop@reddit

I have. Snagged mountain of certs, used that to land a sysadmin job out of the gate.

He wasn't very good.

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ocabj@reddit

I work at a higher ed for 25+ years and I was a student employee in IT at the same university.

I encourage students who are remotely interested in IT to get an on-campus student employee IT position in help desk, computer lab support, sysadmin, dev, AV / classroom tech, etc. We have quite a few student employees and it helps with experience. I worked for all four years of my comp sci under grad (minus one quarter).

Ever since we’ve been hiring student employees in SecOps, all of the former employees got a job secured before they graduated.

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ocabj@reddit

I work at a higher ed for 25+ years and I was a student employee in IT at the same university.

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hoax1337@reddit

No, I just started as a "devops engineer" after university.

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sir_mrej@reddit

If you're a student, I don't think your projects will be enough actual experience to get you a sysadmin job. But maybe you interned somewhere?

Even still. The best you can hope for is to find a small place that combines helpdesk with sysadmin, so you do both and get experience in both.

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patbarron@reddit

Everywhere I've ever done sysadmin has always included help desk in the sysadmin role - we all always had to take our scheduled turns on the phones, and triaging incoming issues. (Heck, my first full time job, I was technically hired as an applications programmer, but even there, the software engineers all had to spend time doing sysadmin and help desk work. That was a long time ago, though, I know that's rare these days...)

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drunkenbabyshaker@reddit

I think that the most important thing is to simply get your foot in the door, in whatever capacity you are able. If that means suffering through 6 months in help desk to build some cred, don't hesitate to do that! Wishing you an amazing future in this industry! I look forward to working for you in a few years.

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mochadrizzle@reddit

My advice is to always start some sort of desktop or help desk roll why you are in school. Something part time and not associated with the school. Like a locak hospital or something. It really helps. Schools do a huge disservice when they promise the world.

To answer your question I started even lower than help desk. I did purchasing for a large IT department. I impressed the team enough for them to let me do desktop part time and as a backup when people called out. From there I move to full time desktop. The sys admins there were not going to leave for awhile so I moved to a different company as a sys admin. Then a different company as a more senior sys admin. Then one day they said he guess what you are the director now not optional (this is after I passed on it once). - _ -

My advice to you is do stuff to get noticed. Do the junk no one wants to. Some people say hard work and going the extra mile does nothing for you. But in my experience thats the exact opposite of what I have seen for me and all my colleagues. I swear the only reason I became director was when there was a power outage at the company I work for. My director no showed (he said he was sleepy and knew I would take care of it) and I showed up when I found out he wasnt there. It was a bunch of directors planning what to do and me. A few days later he was gone and they put me in the role.

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Flabbergasted98@reddit

If you're just starting. you take what you can get. It's more important to start building that resume for your second job in your career now while you're looking for your first.

I started in IT before even leaving university. It was very much a right place at the right time situation.

If you see an opportunity to start building your carreer, you take it. But the important thing is to do it with an exit plan in mind.

Most businesses who take the kid fresh out of school with no helpdesk experience are only doing so because they want to pay their IT guy help desk level wages. (or less.) If you find something thats not helpdesk thats interested in you, be prepared for red flags.

Either way, the part most people don't realize is. Have your exit plan in mind. Do whatever you can find, but give it a hard limit of 2 years. after which, commit yourself to handing out resumes again as you try to move laterally to other companies.

I'd argue helpdesk is actually better, since you have a variety of situations to try to solve and you're surrounded by skilled workers you can learn from. by the end of it, you'll be better equipped for other positions, and you'll have a clearer idea of what roles exist within an it infrasturcture and be able to set a goal in mind in which direction you want to specialize in.

Other roles that might be available to new IT will likely be less diverse, and you'll have fewer resources available to learn from.

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jeenam@reddit

TLDR; If you're serious about this, making the sacrifice of a low paying help desk job can pay huge dividends in the long run.

Started out at the equivalent of Help Desk doing support for ATTO Technologies (you may have heard of the ATTO disk testing tool before) supporting their storage devices (HBA's, Fibre Channel/SCSI/iSCSI and disk arrays). I was paid around $10/hr. Daily responsibilities consisted of no more than 4 hours of actual work so I had plenty of free time to learn whatever I wanted to focus on, and they had plenty of hardware sitting idle for testing. This was back in the early 2000's and I spent the majority of my time learning Linux. IRC was a huge help in learning (#linuxhelp on EFnet). After 1.5 years of that I made the jump to a Sysadmin role in an enterprise environment for the US Department of Labor on a large team and never looked back. The primary reason I was hired on that team was my background with storage since it was, and still is, so specialized. However, I had worked for a small IT shop for a few years prior to working at ATTO and had plenty of familiarity with Windows. ATTO products were supported on Windows, Mac (one of their specialties at the time), *nix and BSD so it helped to get exposure to numerous OS platforms.

The thing with being a sysadmin is there is a very long tail of knowledge and it's not something someone can accrue in a short amount of time. Yes, you can focus on getting certifications, but IMHO, those aren't doing anyone much good when it comes to actually being competent. When I joined my first enterprise gig with the DOL there were numerous folks on the team who had various Microsoft certifications and I was running circles around them because of all the fundamental knowledge and understand I'd acquired learning Linux. I can recall one major disruption with DOL where the backup system and tape library cluster had gone down and was out of commission for over a few days. We had multiple people on-site from CommVault and HP trying to figure it out, to no avail. Eventually I jumped in to have a look and realized the CommVault installation had been installed onto disks that weren't part of the cluster, so every time they attempted to failover the backup services to a different node the logical disk with the CommVault install would disappear.

The best decision I ever made that set me along my path working with computers was taking that low paying job that gave me the opportunity to learn.

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Nossa30@reddit

I would agree with your opinion. I don't think it's possible to train a person to become a sysadmin. You arrive there after many years of building, breaking, and fixing.

There is no 100% clear pathway to becoming a sysadmin in the same way you would say a doctor who has a very laid out, clearly defined path of undergrad > Med school > Residency > etc and you can't skip any steps in that path.

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tankerkiller125real@reddit

Not always required, but in my experience the best sysadmins started at help desk and rose up through their shear curiosity and willingness to try things under the supervision of an experienced admin.

I only did "help desk" for 2 years before basically getting shoved into a solo IT admin role due to company situations. In the end it all worked out, but for those first 2 years after I became the solo admin I really wish I had gotten more experience in help desk with some mentoring to rise to a sysadmin level.

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Parking_Trainer_9120@reddit

I see this advice a lot in this channel. I get that the job market is shit so take whatever you can get, but help desk is generally not a great path to higher level jobs.

Generally speaking, your CS degree buys you entry to much more lucrative opportunities. At my last few companies 1st yr SWEs were getting close to $200K or more. Offers are still being handed out at these levels (we just hired a bunch of URs), but I get times are hard and there are fewer jobs in general. I would shoot for something above help desk (sysadmin, dev ops, etc) and take help desk as a last resort.

Also, and this is based on my experience as a former IT Manager, very few departments want to grow their orgs via help desk transitions. Help desk is seen as low skill and not really a place where IT departments are looking to up level their organizations. That is just from my small sample size as someone who has worked in enterprise OT at several large companies. Conversely, I spent time at a smaller company and didn’t see the same hesitation to help desk hires.

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Alaknar@reddit

I'm in the field for... Well, just shy of 20 years. I've NEVER met someone with a degree in a sysadmin role. I've also never met a sysadmin who didn't start as T1/T2 support.

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timbotheny26@reddit

IT administration and infrastructure degrees barely even exist anymore. Besides, CS degrees are for if you want to learn programming to become a software engineer or something. To my knowledge they don't teach you a damn thing about networking, hardware/infrastructure, security, troubleshooting, etc, or at least not in the US they don't.

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Ok-Juggernaut-4698@reddit

Yeah, no. I was arrogant like you, actually went back to get a degree in network administration, and I can tell you, there's a lot of shit that you don't know.

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timbotheny26@reddit

I was arrogant like you

Huh? What are you talking about?

I'm just saying that based on every breakdown I've looked at in college/university course catalogues, and every CS graduate I've talked to, Computer Science degrees aren't the thing you should be going for if your interested in the infrastructure or networking side of IT because they don't teach you anything about that stuff. My other point is that you also almost never see any kind of IT/network administration degrees being offered anymore unless it's a specialized technical college/university; it's either computer science or computer engineering and nothing else.

Obviously there's a lot of shit I don't know, I'm still doing prep for the A+ so I can get into help desk and work my way up from there. I literally gave myself the flair "IT Neophyte" because I'm a total newbie; I wanted to make it clear to everyone here that I'm not a subject matter expert, at least not yet.

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WWGHIAFTC@reddit

I've replaced two CS masters holders at two different companies over the years because they simply could not do the work.

That's my anecdote, for whatever it's worth.

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National_Ad_6103@reddit

Back in the day, I failed an interview at IBM for help desk but they called me back a few weeks later and offered a server admin role on OS2 Lan server.. was a junior position but they liked my drive to learn.

Did not do any end user support until I moved to a MSP as my second job

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panicloop@reddit

"Help desk is seen as low skill and not really a place where IT departments are looking to up level their organizations"

Dumbest shit Iv read all day, and probably will read all day, and I havent even talked to any end users yet.

"CS degree buys you entry to much more lucrative opportunities" - Because clearly you arent looking for anyone smart enough to avoid putting themselves into debt.

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mcmatt93117@reddit

At a previous job, way too long ago, while still in helpdesk, the director of the infrastructure team would have every single hire come and sit down with the helpdesk their first two weeks, no exceptions.

Looking back, it without a doubt was the best way to learn a company. Sure, you'd have to sit through the random BS helpdesk has to deal with, but, as someone that was going to be managing those systems the users were calling about, was a great way to hear the problems users had with those systems, watch access get set up, and just get a general feel for the work culture.

Best helpdesk person we hired was 19 I think at the time and had come from working the genius bar at Apple. Zero actual experience in an enterprise, no college, nothing. But it's easy to pick up on the people who are almost giddy about their desire to learn more and poke at tech until they break it (in test, obviously) so they can learn how to fix it.

I did helpdesk for...3 years? 4? I forget, been awhile, but without a doubt I'm appreciative for the experience I got, and I'm definitely far more understanding and better at dealing with users, on the much rare occasions that I have to, than if i never had been.

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19610taw3@reddit

At my previous org, I worked my way up from analyst > helpdesk > sysadmin.

It made a lot of things very easy.

Starting out at my current job right as a sysadmin .. steep learning curve.

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kable795@reddit

I firmly believe if you somehow skip the help desk phase, you will never be a great tech in most cases. Part of getting out of help desk in my opinion is having the motivation to self learn. If the only time you learn something new is when someone forced your hand then you aren’t curious and likely will have subpar solutions or just keep doing the same thing because you just want life to be easy and the paycheck to keep rolling in.

And hey to each their own no judgement, but when a young kid who’s hungry to get out of helpdesk and speed runs your knowledge in a year or two that took you a decade to amass, don’t wonder why your salary isn’t going up by the tens of thousands.

I hated help desk, so I got the Comptia trifecta and ccna so I could land an entry level networking role. Once I had learned everything I could, I started learning to code so I could automate some of my network configurations. Nobody has to tell me to do it. Did it on my own to make my life better. I turn down more job offers than ever these days.

I’m going to get my CCNP, it is unlikely I’ll ever work for a company that actually requires that level of networking knowledge, but I’ll get call backs from everyone else and I’ll determine whether I’m coming on site or not.

Most people who have degrees in IT, (whatever that is) think they have already learned it all and deserve 80-100k out of school. I’m here to tell you you don’t. You’ve never had the pressure of the entire company being down on your shoulders. Not even a fraction of it. You don’t deserve anything above 50-60k until you’ve had the late nights doing upgrades followed by mornings filled with troubleshooting and a director+ breathing down your neck cause desktop support thought they had a good idea. You passed a degree that for 2 years taught you deeper math concepts than any of your actual “IT” courses. Go get a help desk job.

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reelznfeelz@reddit

Nice. Trying to plug my buddy into a possible remote help desk role at a company that’s actually not shit and he isn’t even going to send a resume because “it’s customer support”. It’s like dude this is your foot in the door to doing the shit that I do, ie get paid over $100 an hour to wrote code and fix shit while in my sweat pants at home. But you gotta start somewhere.

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DefinitelyNotDes@reddit

OH HELL NO! We were warned in college that call center or help desk is a toxic, dead end, career ending nightmare to put on your resume that will tell everyone you're a talentless script-reader whether it's true or not.

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Ginsley@reddit

I think a lot of people myself included start in help desk but the important thing is to remember it should be a stepping stone. They will never pay a comfortable wage to L1 or L2 help desk. Chill there for a little while, use the company to pay for some training and certs and move on.

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doctorevil30564@reddit

Started as a Computer repair technician for an asset management company. The company bought used equipment pull outs from large companies, so I would go through pallets of equipment to triage and repair the computers to be resold. It was a fun job, but man it got hot in that warehouse during the summer.

I got first dibs on stuff for my own personal usage at cost. I had a Minuteman XRT-1000 UPS at home that could power my gaming PC, DSL modem and monitor for 4 hours if the power went out. That UPS used a separate huge battery pack with a connector similar to what is used (or used to be used) for a battery powered forklift.

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Ok-Juggernaut-4698@reddit

This is how we get sysadmins that can't do basic things in a command line.

It's really sad.

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mrkesu-work@reddit

I've met a few people who were hired straight from school into enterprise IT sysadmin positions (even very recently), so it's definitely possible.

Has any of them been good? No. I can honestly say they have been some of the worst IT people I've ever had to deal with and horrible coworkers in general. Absolutely no fundamental troubleshooting skills at all and they are completely lost without any interest\desire to figure anything out by themselves, and to top it off there is a fundamental lack of compassion for making the lives easier for "the lower level" people (like helpdesk), "meh so what if they get some extra calls, that's what they're there for."

So, yeah you might find it, but I hope you don't. Good luck brother.

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VulturE@reddit

For like 3 months. Then FRS failed between the DCs and an emergency project had to be done to fix group policy and migrate to DFSR, nobody on main team was available for a project, and I knew more about group policy anyways.

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too_fat_to_wipe@reddit

I would never hire a level 2 up to senior role with just a college degree/certs/etc. You must have experience. In the IT field, a degree means literally nothing other than the fact that you can set a goal for yourself and achieve it. Good for you. It doesn't mean you know anything about the role you are getting into. The IT field changes so quickly that by the time universities develop curriculum, find professors, get it accredited, and actually start teaching it, it is out of date already.

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Sufficient-Class-321@reddit

I'd argue that helpdesk experience is also a really good way of someone showing their "soft-skills" such as:

- Not crying at absolutely insane workloads ("Fast-Paced Work Environment")

- Dealing with absolutely awful people and not snapping at them ("Providing Great Customer Service")

- Being able to explain technical concepts to morons ("Explaining Technical Concepts to Stakeholders")

- Being on-call 24/7 and having no life ("Going Above and Beyond")

- Being able to learn certs/homelab in your spare time, despite not wanting to be near a computer any longer than you absolutely have to anymore ("Self-Learning")

Realistically, if I'm hiring someone I'm going to want to hire someone who survived helldesk, even if only for a year or so. If they can survive that, then they can certainly take anything I'm going to throw at them day to day

Probably an absolute stereotype, but it is what it is *shrug*

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Main-ITops77@reddit

I know a few folks who skipped helpdesk by showing solid Linux skills and getting their RHCSA. It’s not the norm, but it’s definitely possible if you can prove you’re job-ready.

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quack_duck_code@reddit

Shut your yapping and do it for a year. Understanding how to support a userbase is important even if it is nuanced.

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Certain-Zebra-789@reddit

Consider field technician/engineer. Everyone needs someone going around to keep all this shit together. Get you some experience while on the road. While you're doing that, build yourself a home lab to learn how to build, modify, and break things. Follow this path grasshopper and someday you shall be chosen for the glorious Nirvana of the title, systems engineer.

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PermitMinimum2690@reddit

yeah unfortunately its the only real pipeline into being a sys admin.

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MegaByte59@reddit

Not to say that you couldn’t be a sysadmin or network admin right out of the bat… but it’s not a normal path I’ve seen. I learned how to be a sysadmin/network admin by starting in helpdesk at an MSP and getting massive amounts of experience and getting the leash slowly extended as I gained my bosses trust to do more important work/projects.

Could I train someone to be a sysadmin without doing helpdesk tho? Absolutely and same for networks.

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jakejones90@reddit

Short answer.. yes

Long answer help desk -> sys admin -> help desk more money -> sys admin

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Proof_Potential3734@reddit

I never worked help desk, got pushed into managing one for a few years, but got away from it as soon as I could. I started out as a database guy and moved to be a sysadmin.

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Odd-Sun7447@reddit

Basically...yes. Working a help desk job teaches you more than the technical skills, all kinds of stuff that you aren't going to learn to do in college. In Help Desk, you will learn to de-escalate a frustrated customer, to work on an issue while you distract the upset person on the other end of the phone, you will develop your thick skin as you come to the realization that in IT support, you basically deal with a never ending string of people who are upset, frustrated, stressed out, and lack the ability to resolve their issue on their own.

This is amplified in an MSP environment. I always tell new people looking to get a job in IT...start at an MSP...it will be the best-worst job you'll ever have, it will be the best because you will learn more in 2 years at an MSP than you will at the same job in 5 years while in-house, it will be the worst job because they pay shitty, they regularly have awful clients, and the benefits are probably going to suck. That said...if you want to grow fast and GTFO of Help Desk...doing 2-3 years at an MSP will get you out of help desk with the same skill set you'd develop in 5-7 years at in-house or in education IT.

When I interview 2 people, if all else is about the candidates is similar...if one has an MSP background and one does not, I almost always hire the person who came from an MSP.

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StarSlayerX@reddit

Started at Help Desk and worked my way up. I would NEVER hire a fresh Sysadmin because I barely trust fresh Help Desk with Local Admin privileges without PAM.

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yo_mono@reddit

I was very lucky when I just started (at 17), they needed a sysasmin in a company that provided IT services to small/medium businesses. While in my last year of highschool I took two night courses in a university (networking and general IT services, pc repair, etc) Apparently that was enough to show them I was proactive and I wanted to learn. 6 months after I started, the "main" sysasmin left. I caught up quickly so I was suddenly the main sysasmin in the company, I was in charge of many clients, had to learn to propose projects, convince them to spend money, etc. (so, not just technical stuff) I was very lucky, I learnt a lot in a span of 2/3 years and I ended up leaving and opening my own company after that

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BreadfruitDue63@reddit

IT Intern (that mostly did help desk/sys admin stuff for $10) & also a Computer Repair position

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KickedAbyss@reddit

It was April 20th, 2009. Sure, I'd done a stint at Geek Squad as an agent, then did a contract job configuring some Cisco equipment, but it was that fateful 420 day when I was handed an AMD Athlon tri-core HP workstation, a 15" LCD Monitor, and told that the desktop probably had viruses on it so I should just wipe it with a fresh OS before taking my Connectwise training for my first Help Desk job at an MSP...

Within half an hour I had to awkwardly ask for a bigger monitor because the training videos wouldn't display on a 15" LCD Monitor 🤣

Within a year I was managing the help desk team, and by 2013 I was running projects and architectural designs for SMB clients.

Shifted to datacenter engineering around 2015 on top of sales engineering. Got fired in 2017 from the MSP (first time being fired and it was extremely good as I was blind to the absolute train wreck and toxic work environment of MSP work, and would have stayed otherwise) and entered the Enterprise where I've progressively gotten farther and farther away from end user support.

But I don't regret it. In my opinion, everyone should start at the help desk. Even if you hire senior engineers, I feel they would benefit from help desk work at a company even if for only a week or two.

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waxwayne@reddit

I started as sysadmin intern taking care of AIX, UNIX and NT systems. I did many different positions over the last 25 years but never sat at a help desk.

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Glue_Filled_Balloons@reddit

Started my career repairing slot machines in a casino. Moved on to surveillance working on the network and cameras. Got some certs and went on to get a sys admin job. Experience goes a long way. I never got a degree, just certs and experience.

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TelevisionPale8693@reddit

I started at a small outfit managing just a handful of back end systems while doing my primary day job as a pre-press artist (Back when that was a viable career...)

I slowly became more and more involved in the IT side and eventually built up enough experience to because the sole SysAdmin at a slightly larger place and then on to joining teams in much larger orgs.

I learned as much networking, storage and Linux automation as I could and that has allowed me to slowly move up the ladder.

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Kahless_2K@reddit

If you can skip the helpdesk, great. Don't expect it though.

I was only helpdesk for 6 months.

If possible, find a helpdesk job support System Admins, not one supporting end users. I support disk storage arrays and Solaris. My wife supported AIX and TSM.

This type of helpdesk job is worth the time you put into it. You will gain years of sysadmin experience in months.

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Downhill_Sprinter@reddit

Started as a PC Tech, which I believe is an equal level role at many companies. Starting at a sysadmin level seems to be jumping some levels though, right? While not impossible, I don’t know what job would actually have a tier-two or three position filled with someone who has no experience. While you may learn things in school, and be passionate about the position, your resume would show me that there is no reason to bring you in for an interview.

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MisterIT@reddit

No, but my career would have taken off sooner if I did.

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itmgr2024@reddit

If you are able to do it, you probably won’t have as good a career in the long run, thats my opinion. Being successful in infrastructure often means understanding client and server (and network) at least to some degree.

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SnugglyPython@reddit

It seems like that's definitely one of the only straightforward ways left. I started in the shipping department for my company. I got close with local IT and once they had an opening one of my buddies gave me a recommendation and I got hired. Pure luck

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aisop1297@reddit

Started as a field network technician.

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XtraSpicy_Bibimbap@reddit

I did not start as helpdesk out of school, but I did start as a field tech while in school and shifted to sysadmin at an entirely different company during my senior year.

If you can, try to get your foot in the door during your senior year doing ANYTHING relating to tech. It will give you a leg up when looking for further progression after graduation.

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Interesting-Smoke728@reddit

the sys admin II at my company was on helpdesk for 4 years before he got into his role. right now i am on track of going into desktop engineering or sys admin at my company with only 2.5 yrs here. total of 3 years of IT experience still with no degree or certs done. it was already hard enough trying to get my foot into the door for a HD role with no experience, degree or cert. it wouldn't be impossible to get a sys admin role with certs and projects but it will be hard with no experience

if you're okay with contract roles, i would apply to sys admin roles through recruiting company such as robert half, insight global, apex system. the list goes on.

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Expensive_Finger_973@reddit

I started by doing temp work for the community college I was going to for my associates degree. It was just the grunt crap like unboxing stuff, setting up computer labs, wiring IDFs, etc.

But it got me in the room with people in the field so I could pick up some of the lingo and what not. Then went from that to desktop support when a full time position doing that for too little money opened up, reporting to the higher level support Analysts.

I tend to tell new folks looking for this kind of advice that it is a good idea to start somewhere on the lower rung service side of the industry for 2 reasons.

It teaches you to see how the more user/customer facing parts of IT work.
It tends to put you into direct contact with the people that IT supports and maintains services for.

As you move up in your career you tend to get more and more obscured from those 2 view points. So starting out having a frame of reference for how the people that are impacted by things that come down from the more senior parts of the IT org tends to ingrain some empathy and unspoken wisdom.

Perhaps an overly verbose way of saying that the pay for those support roles tend to be shit by comparison, but doing a year or 2 in one of them before looking to start moving up tends to pay off in less tangible ways that can make you stand out to future prospective employers in ways someone that jumped right to the Sysadmin position right out of school might have missed out on.

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GAP_Trixie@reddit

There is no way you jump into a sysadmin role straight outa school. At least not here in Europe.

I too ended up in a servicedesk (helpdesk) for 2 years before moving on to another role in a 2nd Level Helpdesk with way better pay and more interesting topics than reseting passwords. It also helped a lot with building up some tech knowledge which certainly helped build my problemsolving skills to the level needed.

All in all I spend around 5 years in helpdesk duties for smaller to mid size companies. Took a year off because I got burned out (happened because back then I took work home mentally with me and couldnt reset). Was lucky to find the right fit for me as a sysadmin since I figured I wanna move up the ladder and since I did work with a sysadmin at my last job I picked up quite a lot from them.

Couldnt imagine going back to helpdesk. Its so much more refreshing to be challenged with managing small IT Projects that I can pick myself.

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Razgriz6@reddit

I started as a printer install guy at an insurance company. Literally it was just replace ink and clear paper jam. That's after getting my B.S. in Network Engineer. That start off was rough man!

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Wonder_Weenis@reddit

I don't really care about your certs.

I want to know wether or not you can solve humans and the technological problems.

You kind of have to cut your teeth on that, via helpdesk. It's impossible to prep you for the kinds of stupid problems users find themselves in, and I want to know whether or not you can listen to a user's problem, comprehend how they're wrong, and then help them solve the problem they're actually trying to solve.

Too many newbs get caught up in trying to resolve the request at hand, it takes practice to question whether or not the task is even relevant to the business op.

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PhillAholic@reddit

I wish I could upvote this twice. I need to add this to my CV. Fix the problem you’re really having, not the one you’re asking about. It’s so important to think outside the box and understand the real problem. It’s 99.9% experience.

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safalafal@reddit

This is my stump speech to new IT staff; define what the problem actually is in terms of the business not what the user says is the problem.

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baked_bads@reddit

Always fun to run into an XY Problem.

https://xyproblem.info/

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safalafal@reddit

This is wonderful, thank you so much for sharing!

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az-anime-fan@reddit

bingo. when i hire for IT your degrees and certs are only glanced at to see where your experience may lay. I made my decision based on the interview.

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UrbyTuesday@reddit

and the judgment on borderline cases - do I take this up the ladder for an operations change or just let this ride today and go for the short term fix because we have much bigger fish to fry today.

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wight98@reddit

Couldn't agree more

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gex80@reddit

Times are different but no technically I did not. In college, I working in geek squad for almost 4 years and then joined an MSP (2013) as a jr network engineer which I ended up drifting towards the sysadmin side of the MSP.

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CryptosianTraveler@reddit

It depends on the actual role. If most of your day is handling escalations, then yeah HD experience would help and/or probably beat you out for the job. If it's a field services team where you're all about servicing third parties, then no, it might not matter as much.

I actually went from being an admin to phone support for a product. Admin work was just too monotonous and drove me a little nuts. So I went and took a job where I answered a phone with admins all over the world begging for help, lol. It was a lot more interesting, and the days went so much faster. Not to mention a huge ego boost when someone calls "WE GOT 40,000 DOWN, HELP!" and you can honestly say because it's a known issue "Gimme 5 minutes", after which everything is running fine.

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theknyte@reddit

I started as a "Network Operator".

I didn't talk to or deal with users. I simply monitored all the servers, monitored and scheduled the backups, and escalated to the correct people when there were issues. Worked for a large manufacturing company, and there were 3 of us keeping the office running 24/7 during the week, and we traded off on-call and dial-in duties for the weekends.

That job had a ton of downtime, so we were encouraged to further our studies and trainings. One of my co-workers got an online degree almost completely from just doing the courses and such while they were at work.

It was a good place to start, but the pay wasn't great and there was really nowhere to go, unless you had a degree to apply for any LAN, WAN, or System Admin roles that occasionally opened up. The only place I could go, would have been to Help Desk, and no thanks.

Now, I'm a full admin in a team of 4 who run the entire IT department for a smaller regional company.

Though, there are some days, I miss the lax duties of that old job. I mean where else could you get paid to play videogames? My boss early on told us, when we covered Graveyard, he didn't care what we did, as long as we could stay awake and alert to respond anything that came up. So, I just set up audio alerts for everything and played games on my laptop until something broke, or I needed to swap out LTO tapes, or whatever.

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Dave_A480@reddit

Everyone starts at something menial.

Helpdesk, Desktop Support, or Field Service Tech/Cable Monkey.

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xpkranger@reddit

A long time ago in a different career, I was a freshly minted park ranger about to start my career as an Assistant State Park Manager in an unnamed state park system. Day 1, Hour 1 - I was handed a mop and and broom and told to go clean the bathrooms, that the maintenance ranger (that I was supposed to supervise) was out today. Wasn't the only day I had to do it, either.

All that to say, education and training are great to get you in the door. Once you're in the door, do what you have to do and keep looking for that next step up.

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SPOOKESVILLE@reddit

Definitely not everyone started in helpdesk, but not everyone had the same start. Nowadays, starting in a helpdesk related role will make things way easier, just don’t get complacent and make sure you’re always learning. And you wouldn’t have to start at a tier 1 helpdesk, you’d be able to start at a high end role in helpdesk depending on your experience. The job market is rough man, always be on the look out but make sure you keep an eye out for red flags. If something seems too good to be true…take a deeper dive into the company.

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techdog19@reddit

Started retail. Worked at Egghead Computers way back in the day. Went from clerk to tech to management during my time there.

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Janus67@reddit

Started working as an IT intern/student-employee at my university (in the medical center). Then, when I graduated, an opening was available for a technician/jr admin position that I was fortunate to be able to enter in the team I was already on. Stuck around with that for a handful of years before moving to a SysAdmin position at another college.

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Mehere_64@reddit

Pretty unrealistic these days. Go start at the helpdesk role and move up. Build labs at home that actually have some use to them.

If your school has internships consider doing those as well.

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woodburyman@reddit

No. Yes. Maybe?

I worked at a "Ma and Pa" computer repair store for 8 years. It was in a horrible location in a downtown run down city. We also did semi-MSP like work for a few small companies. Pretty much saw every desktop related physical and windows issue, and dealt with literally every type of human being on this planet earth in the process.

It prepped me for diagnostics and logical problem solving. It also taught me how to deal with humans.

Karen screaming at you that her Zoom isn't working when she just muted herself doesn't seem so bad when you've literally had people screaming at you threatening violence and brandishing weapons. I had to call the police at that job more times than I can remember. Didn't help my old boss used to rip people off too. On the plus side, I got to see my cousin a lot, he was a cop and usually was assigned our area.

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LocoRojo@reddit

Not sure how things are in the US but I find most students that start in our company know Jack shit, yes you know what dhcp does and that's cool but every brand of switch, firewall, Nas, San whatever is different and does things differently so the only real way of getting experience with them is working with them, depending on the company you start at this could be Hp, Dell, Cisco, and even then all of these brands have sub brands for small business like Cisco has Meraki, hp has aruba, and most of the time if you start at a company that has enterprise grade stuff like Palo alto, fortiinet they usually have even more stuff they do their way.

Most schools also don't do print management, O365 user management, the licensing for all of this also changes each year so I doubt they teach you about that.

So the only way to start learning without having to much responsibilities is helpdesk.

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Its_0ver_9000@reddit

Helpdesk gets looked down upon, but it’s one of the quickest ways to get up to speed on how a company operates. Invaluable in my experience. I went from helpdesk > sys admin > sys engineer > sr sys engineer > sr security engineer > security consultant. Everyone’s path is different. Take the opportunities you’re given and make the most of it.

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Imdoody@reddit

I always say, everybody starts in IT digging trenches. Then you move up and on from there. It's great experience, dealing with both people and the technology.

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YourPalDonJose@reddit

It's often the only place that is hiring. You do your time and then move up when your boss retires or changes companies.

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rocketpinch@reddit

I started in Tech Retail. I still think the emphasis on customer service is what differentiates me from a lot of other candidates. I’ve found in my experience that communicating about the systems has been equally as, if not more, important than working with them.

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karlsmission@reddit

You might find a Jr. admin position.

I'm a hiring manager (no I don't have any open positions) and honestly I don't even look at somebody's education, I always look at their work experience. What they teach in college is nearly worthless. a few years ago, I had an intern who was getting their CS degree, and couldn't tell me the difference between a NIC and a server GPU, Being able to tell what general hardware components are is pretty critical in my opinion.

You say you have certs and projects, what kind of projects? how big of projects? do you have a home lab where you've tested stuff out on?

Do you have other, non related, work experience? The last thing I want to do is teach somebody in their 20's how to work. I've had to do it a few times, and teaching somebody to shower/put on deodorant, show up on time, be prepared for work, communicate needs and when you're lacking something... That's stuff you should learn in your teens.

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WWGHIAFTC@reddit

Most of the 'good' ones did that I've worked with.

Me? I moved from warehouse to helpdesk in 6 months, helpdesk to systems administrator in 6 months. Got lucky, right place at the right time. This was literally in 1999/2000 and things were much different then. 50k to learn helpdesk in 1999 was a TON of money for a 21 year old.

I can't imagine anyone able to successfully handle a sysadmin role without prior IT experience of some sort.

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gruftwerk@reddit

So people retire in help desk? Asking for a coworker 🥺

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Daritari@reddit

I would recommend trying to get in as a front-line support at a managed service provider. You'll get valuable experience across multiple types of environments. From there, you've made yourself more marketable.

One way I've seen some of the fresh graduates compensate for the lower pay is by advertising side gigs. It's not ideal, but grind it out, and keep applying for those elevated roles, regardless, of your qualifications. You'll get there

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t0ny7@reddit

I started as a temp contract working on a project deploying thin client computers. Basically just hooking them up and removing the old PC. I original stood out because I could complete basic tasks without screwing it up.

Some of the people they originally hired were... something else. One guy who I will call Doug had a hard time remembering remembering how to get back to his car which you could see from the exit of the building. He was a nice guy but drank away his brain.

After that I slowly worked my way up to a server engineer position.

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Wizardos264@reddit

I started out at as a Field Support+ technician. At the time my colleagues and i where responsible for physical hardware for users including pc's, printers, IP phones, mobile phones,... We had to manage AD user permissions, Fileserver permissions, print server and printer setup, software lifecycle management with SCCM and a few other things. Looking back, i probably should have moved on sooner to other rolls but i learned something very important I wouldn't have otherwise. E.g. How users think, how changing permissions/configurations directly impact the workflow of users, what kind of feedback/issues to expect from users when rolling out new software or major updates or configuration changes, how to guide non tech savy people and so on

Everyone i met or worked with that skipped a similar role, had issues in one way or another when it comes to basic understanding of how users interact with hardware/software, basic understanding of how domains and permissions work, how DNS/DHCP works, some of them even lacked basic networking knowledge simply because they never had hands on experience. All of them regretted it at some point and told me that they wish they had started with a helpdesk/field support role to get better basic understanding/overview of how everything interacts with each other.

Of course this might not be an issue for everyone, but working for at least 1 or 2 years in a similar position will teach you very valuable skills you probably won't learn any other way.

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lewiswulski1@reddit

Yep, help desk apprentice...

Wasn't meant to be there. I was meant to be put into infrastructure services but due to some monumental cockup by some management I got thrown there.

Changed over to infrastructure eventually after arguing my case to management eventually got sent over a year and a half later. Definitely worth it though

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lmow@reddit

If you don't have real world experience such as internships or working in the field while in school it's hard to get a good job. Helpdesk is fine. You may have to live with parents for a couple of years or roommates but you'll get to a nice cushy job eventually. It takes time. College is just a starting point. Life is a marathon, not a sprint.

As a side note, be conservative with your money and do not rely on the credit card. I've seen too many people fall into the trap of buying something on the credit card they can't afford and can do without, make minimum monthly payments and just get deeper into the hole.

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lmow@reddit

RHCSA is good, I have it. But I'm not sure if anyone who hired me actually cared that I have it tbh.

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lmow@reddit

Oops forgot to add. If you're going into Linux Admin set up a home lab. Like one vm running Apache on Debian for example and another Mysql. It can boost your resume.

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phillymjs@reddit

I did, but I was a college dropout who merely had an aptitude for tech and insatiable curiosity. I had no choice but to start at the bottom and work my way up. Fortunately it was the mid-90s and starting at the bottom was a lot more easily done because offshoring first-line support hadn't become a thing yet.

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SoonerMedic72@reddit

I’m of the belief everyone should have some helpdesk experience. Even if it’s just 6-12 months, understanding how end users see things will make you a better admin in the future. Even better if you can find a spot that is the right size to have the helpdesk people also be jr admin. Think small banks with like 100 employees with 3-5 IT people. Or other small/mid businesses that have technical products and needs. That way you can get help desk experience while occasionally working on backend projects too.

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siphoneee@reddit

Agreed. If you never see or do the helpdesk side of things, you will never full understand why users have such issues.

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SoonerMedic72@reddit

SwiftOnSecurity had a great Twitter thread a long time ago about implementing a security change and having to reach back into their helpdesk bag while troubleshooting a user issue. Broad strokes was the user was kicked up to them because the user reported an issue with cut and paste right after a security app deployment. After reviewing logs and thinking it wasn't an issue with the app, they started with basic troubleshooting and quickly figured out that the user was handicapped and had a specialty mouse with cut and paste functions. The mouse had been replaced, but not reconfigured. They reconfigured it and solved the issue. It is amazing how many deployment "failures" you can head off by doing stuff like this.

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EvandeReyer@reddit

It gets you focused on what problem you’re trying to solve rather than HOW to solve it.

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AMDIntel@reddit

I did, though it very very quickly morphed into a quasi sysadmin role. Then after 5 years I got a proper sysadmin job.

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Kashzor@reddit

Having been in IT for 10+ years at this point. I wouldn't consider hiring anyone straight out of university into a proper sysadmin position.

At best, a junior position that I would expect you to pick up quickly with a view to move from there, as school proves you can learn.

No disrespect to your effort but when it comes to business systems your certificates don't carry a huge amount of weight when it comes to actually doing the job, they exist to get your foot in the door, then you prove you can back it up.

Real world experience working in business is not something you can bypass with school.

I started as a general dogsbody IT guy for a small company who had an external contractor, i was the go-between until the contractor just one day declared they were no longer servicing us as we didnt need them 12 weeks later and I had to deal with it. It was very much a trial by fire.

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Tonkatuff@reddit

I did

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Nickisabi@reddit

As a CS student you have a unique opportunity and position in the IT field. I went to community college and got my AAS in Network & Systems administration, and worked helpdesk at the same time. I was able to jump into my first Jr Sysadmin role at my company shortly after graduating with my degree and have been working as an admin here ever since.

It's very difficult if not impossible to get a role as anything above the helpdesk when you don't have any experience, degree aside. I'm not a CS major, but it's my understanding that you guys learn more about the fundamentals of how computers work and the principles behind software design and implementation. If I was you, I would take advantage of your knowledge and learn how to code and learn how to apply that to more complex IT roles like DevOps, while working in a help desk role. It is technically possible to get a role above helpdesk out of college, but you're better off biting the bullet and getting into the helpdesk as soon as you can instead of waiting on the possibility of scoring a higher role.

I'm almost envious of you, not because you're starting from scratch, but you went to school to learn things that I'm now super curious about and want to use to upskill my career. I can still learn those things of course, but it's now about work-life balance and finding time to do that between spending time with my kids and getting things done at work. I went to school specifically to get in a program where I would learn those hands-on skills that would help me get into an admin role, and that's part of why I'm here right now. However, I don't know too much about how computers work under the hood, and having little experience with CS principles and development, I'm feeling like I have to start over again to keep up.

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work_reddit_time@reddit

A CS degree doesn’t really prepare you for sysadmin work.

It’s like learning anatomy in a classroom versus being a paramedic – CS teaches theoretical concepts about computing, but sysadmin is hands-on, practical work keeping systems alive under pressure.

If you want to go straight into sysadmin, you’ll need real skills with servers, networking, AD, and virtualisation. Certs and home labs can help bridge that gap.

You’ll also need to develop strong soft skills – communication, prioritisation, and staying calm when things go wrong are critical in IT operations, and you won’t get that by studying CPU pipeline optimisation.

Basically, focus on learning to be the paramedic, not just studying the anatomy textbook.

Ultimately, they’re very different things.

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Recalcitrant-wino@reddit

I did.

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unkiltedclansman@reddit

It's not just the technical side of things that you will be missing if you skip the daily grind of a helpdesk style role. It's the soft skills. Conflict resolution, de-escalation and general politics aren't skills that can be picked up in a homelab. They are however skills you must posses as a sysadmin when things go wrong, or you need them to go your way.

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siphoneee@reddit

The helpdesk role taught me so much. It gave me so much understanding of the support side of things and how to deal with very diverse end users ranging from folks who only touches the computer and only know how to check their paystubs to power or self-sufficient users. It also taught me how end users use or interface with different systems and why they have such issues.

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Travasaurus-rex@reddit

A lot of people who call are already mad or at their wit's end to begin with, and it can only go downhill from there...

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BarefootWoodworker@reddit

Sure.

There’s a special skill to listening to someone vent, calming them down, making them feel heard, and then having a happy interaction.

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Princess_Fluffypants@reddit

I wish I could upvote you harder.

Soft skills are what’s really going to control career progression, especially as you get to senior roles.

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EvandeReyer@reddit

This is it. It’s glaringly obvious among my colleagues who did the time in the trenches and who didn’t. Technically they can be excellent but if they cant do the soft skills they are missing a trick. I find that the helpdesk people who are keen and interested very quickly shine through and their name gets known among the more advanced techs. I’ve got all the time in the world to help those guys as payback for the ones that helped me progress and learn.

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Glittering-Eye2856@reddit

Nope I was a computer operator slinging old school mag tapes.

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Roanoketrees@reddit

I did. 7.50 an hour at an ISP.

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demonintheteahouse@reddit

Yup, I started out contracted through Randstad supporting tax software during the tax season. Tier 1 helldesk work. I had breezed through the Google IT Support certification in 2021 and landed an interview like a month later.

Fast forward, now I’m a cybersecurity engineer at the enterprise level.

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LaserKittenz@reddit

I started in tech support.. I'd say 3-5 years is the maximum I'd do tech support.

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EldritchKoala@reddit

Get an internship. Maybe that'll help you bypass support desk, but realistically, experience is king in IT. At least in the NOC/SOC/IT Support space. Support pay sucks. And this is not the advice anyone wants to hear. The one thing I can say that'll give you hope is MAYBE something like an ITMSP would grab you with certs + degree and low experience as a train-up situation.

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Unexpected_Cranberry@reddit

Or a large consultancy firm. Don't know about the US, but here it's fairly standard practice that large firms win large contracts by going "we have x number of people with y cert". That's a fairly common starting point over here at least, as a junior consultant at one of the big firms. Depending on the current contract you might get thrown in the deep end at some customer implementation. There are quite a few guys I've met over the years who earned their stripes when our capital rebuilt most of their server and client platform back in the day. I've yet to meet an end user that thinks he end result was an improvement, but the project was deemed a success...

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EldritchKoala@reddit

That is definitely true and can be a road in depending on where you live in the US. Middle of nowhere Dakota might be harder (obviously) but if you're near even a moderate-sized city, there should be IT firms that probably need to meet a "show & tell" metric.

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linebmx@reddit

As someone who went from Helpdesk->Sysadmin->SOC Analyst->Incident Response Director, I learned absolutely the most and my foundation from being in the Helpdesk. I often advise folks entering into infosec to spend time on the Helpdesk to learn the “glue” behind what makes up enterprise IT environments.

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Wishful_Starrr@reddit

Very hard to do, I started as a configs tech went to help desk, then onsite, then sysadmin. Might be able to get a Jr Sysadmin role under someone else but I wouldnt count on it.

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Free_Conference6766@reddit

I started at the Help Desk doing Tier 1 support. 2 years later, I’m a System/Network admin that works on servers/VMs, endpoint management, scripting, switch configs, and a whole bunch of other stuff on a daily basis. I’d highly recommend starting with the Help Desk so you can learn the workflow and basics of troubleshooting and ITSM fundamentals.

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friedcat777@reddit

I started in desktop. But that was a long time ago. We still have some young-lings show up in desktop so I can only assume they are hiring entry level folks.

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Dont-take-seriously@reddit

I started as a PC Repair tech alone in a small shop. My coworkers hired me as the secondary tech, but the lead tech was never in the shop. 🤗

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davidm2232@reddit

I started helpdesk after college even though I had 3 years internship experience as an assistant sysadmin. I worked there a year and a half before getting a sysadmin job.

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ispoiler@reddit

Yeah dude. Everyone starts somewhere. Gotta pay your dues and eat some shit for a little bit but it's going to teach you waaay more than you're going to realize.

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az-anime-fan@reddit

yeah, you're not getting hired as a sysadmin straight out of college without experience. please get a job in IT as either helpdesk or onsite IT support for a company. that type of thing on your resume will turn your CS major into a functional one. without that type of experience i fear you'll struggle to find work.

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Illustrious_Net_7904@reddit

You’ll learn 100x more from hands on experience with tier 1-2 help desk than your degree. So imo yes, and it is a necessary evil

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DoubleDee_YT@reddit

I started in cable running. But help desk was an eventuality

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coalsack@reddit

I think you need to reframe your thinking. Don’t compare help desk salaries to other IT roles.

Your biggest hurdle is getting in the door. Take the help desk job and grind. Improve your skills, provide value and look for opportunities, jump into new things and be eager.

You’re young and the field is competitive, don’t get bogged down comparing yourself to others. Get out there, work hard, and show your organization you’re destined for things higher than help desk.

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LemonRust6@reddit

You need to find an internship if you want to get ahead. In 2019 I received a total of 3 internships (2 from same company as I came back after the 2nd internship).

2019 - Internship 1, 2 3

2020 - Helpdesk Lv 1 with Company from Internship 1+3

2021 - Promoted to Level2 support around late summer.

2022 - Left to be a sysadmin at a different org. Still there.

I have a lot of friends from university who did not get internships, did not homelab, and just used the degree for leverage and I know of several who never even got their foot into a helpdesk job because of lack of drive. If you are motivated you will get in the door, but it's especially difficult to get a sysadmin role out of college. The org I work for requires a Bachelor's and 4-5 years experience in IT to be a sysadmin here, but only certs/degree for helpdesk.

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antons83@reddit

16 years in IT for the same company. The IT infrastructure's like snowflakes - everyone's is different. We might use similar tools, but how they're incorporated in an environment varies. Starting at L1 gives you the basic foundations of the company's specific layout. More importantly, it gives you an insight on who does what. There's a line in The Godfather movie where one of the characters talks about Don Corleone, "keeping these politicians in his pocket, like nickels and dimes". Over time you create these relationships with staff from different departments in IT. Sometimes if you need them to do something, it's a simple conversation, rather than any sort of official request. Vice versa, they now have free access to you. You exchange your skills like currency. I did 12 years of L1 and now I've taken over for the sys admin that retired after 23 years. I never thought I would ever make it to this point, but here I am. My advice - if you're in a large corp, start at L1 and work your way up.

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cowprince@reddit

Mostly.
I worked for a small local ISP in high school and in college where I started to work on WISP stuff as well.
I then worked as a college co-op for state govt. and made a deal with them to stay on part time while I went to school for 2-3 more years. I was mostly helpdesk, and did a bunch of grunt work, toner replacement, support calls, door access card creation, later on user account creation, report maintenance and also did a large office remodel and wiring job.

First job after that I got a Jr. admin job, but I had all the above experience and a 2 + 2 degree, Network Administration and IT. And while doing the IT degree, there was a deal that one of the professors made that if you passed the A+ cert, you'd get out of the computer hardware class. So I did that, so I had that cert as well.

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ChoreaticActor@reddit

I started out as IT Support Spec. So basically, yes

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loupgarou21@reddit

I didn't start on help desk, but my first IT job was still really low paying. I was doing part time IT for a small private school. I supplemented that with doing one-off gigs, and installing security alarm systems.

If you want to bypass something like help desk, try getting an internship somewhere. If you're interested in sysadmin work, you could also look at a smaller MSP, maybe around 8-10 employees. You'll probably start out doing desktop support, but you'll usually have an easy path to working on a lot of other tech, just show interest and you'll probably have a little bit of everything thrown at you. Be careful of burnout working for an MSP though (honestly, be careful of burnout working for anyone.)

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meowtu@reddit

Started as a Field Engineer but a technician who handle POS
Internal IT
Sys Admin
SCCM Admin (thank God I was handling SEP / SCEP / MBAM) which helps me lateral to Cyber.
Cyber Security
Security Architect

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Mrhiddenlotus@reddit

If my boss hired you into a sysadmin role with no help desk experience I would be pissed

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Ivy1974@reddit

MSP for me. Primarily printers. Was cheaper to fix them back then.

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Wide-Style-3474@reddit

The pay is not always ideal, but I think the skills you learn working on the Service/Help desk is something everyone should have to do at least once in their IT career. There are skills you learn doing that role, that you wouldn't get from a systems role off the bat. I find most of the people in this profession lack communication and social skills, and it was a great role to help break out of the uncomfortable nature of phone anxiety, as well as learning ways to de-escalate end-user situtations. If there is a specific company or industry you are trying to get into, don't overlook the help desk role. It's a great way to get your foot in somewhere, get some experience on the resume, and network/learn what other roles are out there by talking with your coworkers within the IT Department there. You are never married to any job, but don't undervalue the help desk role and what it could lead too. It's going to be hard for anyone to want to hire someone right out of college, without any professional experience, into some engineer/senior level type role (which many employers mask as a generic "sys admin" posting).

I am a sysadmin that started as an intern/help desk role. This is my testimony lol

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nastynate0079@reddit

Oh yeah, 4 years on the help desk. Where I work you have wait for someone to leave before getting a promotion.

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CLA_1989@reddit

Unless you have connections, it is the best way to start

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AlexisFR@reddit

Well yeah, not doing that is like trying to be an electrician without doing some kind of assistant technician job first.

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nicholaspham@reddit

Yes, no degree or certifications. I started as help desk which got my foot in the door and proved my knowledge over the course of a year

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aintthatjustheway@reddit

A good help desk will teach you a lot, very quickly, and you'll realize its usually sink or swim.

There are senior people there you can get experience from.

MSPs are also a good way to learn a lot, very quickly, but it is trial by fire.

That's how I got my start.

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indigo196@reddit

I did not start at the help desk. I started out as a desktop technician who went on-site to resolve issues. I was a network/systems administrator within a year.

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MyUshanka@reddit

If I was in charge of hiring, I'd rather hire someone with no degree and 4 years of experience than a 4 year degree and no experience. The most I ever used my degree in my IT career was to get in the door at my first job.

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BeardedJayK@reddit

I did 6 months service desk as my internship, followed by infrastructure admin and now information security engineer.

While I fit into the camp of starting on service desk, it wasn't very long and the expectations where low since it was an internship.

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HelpDeskKay@reddit

Nahh, I somehow got blessed into a tier 3 IT Technician job at a hospital. My next goal is to get a System Admin role

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Fancy-Asparagus-888@reddit

I started as a network support analyst on a internship

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FarceMultiplier@reddit

I did, 30+ years ago, and the best sysadmins I've worked with all did because it taught actual customer service skills.

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Smiles_OBrien@reddit

I tell folks all the time: My A+ didn't get me my first IT job...my teaching degree and experience got me my first IT job. Technical stuff is easy to learn. How to talk to another human being, or write an intelligible email? Much harder to teach.

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Easy-Window-7921@reddit

Sure did…

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Familiar-Seat-1690@reddit

I moved over from software development not help desk. Ironically in this job market with 25 years experience this is my first time doing any help desk work. Kind of enjoyable to be honest loving the zero oncall after so many years of oncall stress.

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Freakin_A@reddit

I started in a NOC instead of helpdesk. If I started in a helpdesk I doubt I would have continued in IT. But I’ve always preferred solving problems of scale rather than regular sysadmin stuff. If a server is giving me issues my preferred approach is to destroy it and deploy it from known good state. If it’s still an issue it probably isn’t with that specific server.

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BitteringAgent@reddit

It's not impossible, but highly unlikely. Everyone I have worked with except for one person worked their way up through helpdesk. The one person who I worked with that didn't work their way up through helpdesk was drowning. They had a masters in cyber security and was a Jr. Security Engineer. He was bright, but just lacked a lot of experience and it showed via his ticket notes, troubleshooting skills, and how he managed his projects. The CISO had a few talks with me asking if it's worth keeping him on or not because he was drowning so badly. End of the day the guy worked there for a few years gaining more certs and experience and moved onto another security role.

So yes it's possible and never disqualify yourself. But I'd be applying to any and all jobs that you feel you're qualified for, this will include helpdesk roles if you're not already in an IT role. Take whatever you can get to gain experience and a paycheck. Even if the paycheck is low, what are you making now? With your current role what is the ceiling of pay?

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Moist_Lawyer1645@reddit

See if you can find junior sysadmin roles, faling that id always look at a degree apprenticeship over standard degree if you dont want to start in a support role.

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Neratyr@reddit

test

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New-Junket5892@reddit

No. It depends on your focus. I started as a programmer. I’m not a fan of certifications but if that’s necessary to get your foot in the door then get it. The ideal position is difficult to get. Be as patient as you can.

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homelaberator@reddit

No. Never worked helpdesk.

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LeTrolleur@reddit

I'm of the opinion that working helpdesk makes you a better future sysadmin.

It gives you a lot more respect for first line staff, and makes you a lot more empathetic when dealing with them.

It also teaches you how to talk to people, and when I say that I'm talking about really good communication skills, whether that's showing an understanding of a client's frustration, or the ability to explain complex subjects to those without knowledge of them.

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evetsleep@reddit

Everyone's starting point is going to be kind of different. It'll greatly depend on what resources you have available to you (networking and such) and what kinds of skills your bringing to the door (to get into it). I would look at internships if you have them as an option and basically taking any work you can when starting out to get some experience and to build up your resume. Starting out in IT is not glorious and it may take a bit to find your groove, but if you stay focused on learning and networking you'll be fine.

In my case I started on the graveyard shift helpdesk at an ISP back in the mid-90's...so my entry will be very different than yours. What I will say is that the early parts of your career will likely be quite fluid as you learn and grow. Looking back at how I started out...the thing that made the biggest difference is knowing that I didn't know shit and that I spent a TON of time reading, learning, and trying new things. IT, in general, is a field where you should always be learning something new. If not you risk falling behind and not being very marketable. That's ok if you want to be one of the 5 people in the world that can maintain a mainframe of as400 banking system, but baring that you'll want to be really be comfortable spending a good percentage of your time growing.

My 2 cents.

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Wizdad-1000@reddit

Our best admins were all helpdesk staff first. Its good exp. Closest option might be MSP tech as they do everything so you are clients admin but also helpdesk. Talk to current admin team and be in friendly terms, stay current on skills. Apply at other companies if needed. gl!

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Relevant-Funny-511@reddit

My current job is my first IT role. I'm technically above help desk. I work in person and help desk is remote (read outsourced to foreign labor). I handle all the in person IT stuff that can't be done remotely.

I had no certs and no degree, but I was internally promoted at a company I already worked at.

I will say, I don't regret it in terms of getting to skip the lower pay, crappier work, etc. But working help desk probably would've taught me some valuable skills / lessons and developed me better.

So no, you don't have to start at help desk.

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TransportationNew215@reddit

I hire for entry level cybersecurity jobs. The young people that progress the furthest, fastest — always come from a year or two on a tech support desk.

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Wolfram_And_Hart@reddit

Only if you were part of the wizard group of the early 2000s and were forced into it.

Some would say we all never stop being Helpdesk.

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Few-Pressure9581@reddit

1-2 years to learn everything about technology support and customer support. Sounds like a good start

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christophercurwen@reddit

easiest way in. Yes.

Just dont sit too long in the job. 1-2 years tops. Then jump up to 2nd line Then you need to decide onprem or cloud as your next step

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natefrogg1@reddit

I have never done helpdesk work, I feel like I would do so poorly in that kind of environment. Some of the most patient people do helpdesk work, I envy that and their skill in breaking steps down for so many different types of folks to understand.

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shaddaloo@reddit

Nope.
I started as human interface adding new data to telco company database completing all their info about their whole network (cables, equipment, service numbers, service details).

Then I started my Cisco Networking certs. Done CCNA and part of CCNP and I moved to Network Operations Center

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illicITparameters@reddit

No, I started as a pc repair tech, then moved to helpdesk.

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WillVH52@reddit

Yes was help desk but only for one job that lasted eight months at that the beginning of my career. After that been doing 3rd line mainly.

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skeetd@reddit

In this market shoot for MSPs. They atree growing and the range of knowledge you will get is huge.

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Olleye@reddit

No, as a SYSOP, I was responsible for allocating computing time (CPU time) and releasing the pen plotter (for example) for drawing large output formats such as diagrams, plans and technical assembly diagrams; this was at a science university. During idle times, we sorted punch cards alphabetically, which was also a nice activity with great philosophical potential.

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UnoriginalVagabond@reddit

Nah I started at a call center, it's much, much worse.

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tuxthepenquin@reddit

i started 3rd shift by myself sitting in a datacenter on a helpfesk

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IsaacJB1995@reddit

I started my IT career as a Help desk apprentice at the age of 17. Mostly just answering phones, logging tickets and eventually I was able to start getting hands on with servers (with supervision) and starting to fix some of the easier tickets in the queue

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Barrerayy@reddit

Never done helpdesk, I went from a data science role to mid level systems engineer, then moved to senior systems engineer after a year. I basically still now nothing about administering Windows based environments, but it doesn't matter as my industry basically always uses Linux workstations + Macs

CS Degree -> Adv. CS Masters -> PhD in Computer Vision -> Data Scientist at a defence company. Then into IT.

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AtarukA@reddit

I started as a field tech, got uquickly upgraded to helpdesk/sysadmin after 2 months when I proved there would be a major discrepency between the field techs in terms of skills.

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kitkat-ninja78@reddit

Sort of...

My first job with IT responsibility was as a printer admin (mapping/unmapping, turning on/off printer queues, etc).

My first IT job (after the above) was an IT Software Technician, where it was a rolling rota of helpdesk, field tech, and workshop tech.

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MidnightAdmin@reddit

Nope, I started at an IT team as a general IT worker, failed the probationary period, got another job at an IT servicedesk, worked 12h shifts alternating day/night on an irregular schedule for 4,5 years, then got in to a proper IT team where I was the equivalent of a 1-3 line technician, great gig, worked there almost 8 years, and now in a more advanced role on a general IT team.

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Princess_Fluffypants@reddit

Yup, I started on the helpdesk and PC tech roles for quite a long number of years before making the jump to jr sysadmin and eventually net admin stuff. And my career has continued to climb from there.

There is no substitute for experience. In fact, in many ways a CS degree kinda holds you back because you’re spending time (and money) in college while other people are out getting direct work experience.

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selfishjean5@reddit

I did not, they put me in charge of implementation/POC /building servers straightaway.

Pro: I know how to build , migrate decommission, etc.
cons: no idea how to do administration, (only knew the basic)

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serverhorror@reddit

I don't know the current market, I started as a SysAdmin right away.

It's not unrealistic, from where I am, where I live and who I work for.

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looney417@reddit

Just curious. If you're a CS major why are you going into IT? Don't CS majors feed into other roles and adjacent fields, not IT?? Like software development or making the chips and technology of the future?

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Obvious-Water569@reddit

Kind of.

When you say "helpdesk" I assume you mean full on churn 'n' burn 1st line phone jockey at an MSP or some company that operates like that.

Some of us do start that way but a lot, including myself, don't.

However... Most of us will have started out doing a job with at least a helpdesk element involved.

For example, my first job was as an IT junior, doing basically anything from support, AD admin, backup routines, printer maintenance... the lot.

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SDG_Den@reddit

I did, even in my current function im technically "helpdesk", but our company is structured really flat and our helpdesk personell also pick up the less intense sysadmin work so our senior sysadmins can spend more time on the more.... Headache inducing problems.

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Drakoolya@reddit

I would not start anyone in the Sysadmin role. A big component of the role is having all that power. Managing the impulse to hit the go button comes with experience don't care how much you have studied. At the most you will probably get a Solo Sysadmin role that probably contains Helpdesk duties anyways.

Trust me when I tell you no matter how much u study as soon as you are given the key to the kingdom that Imposter syndrome is gonna hit you hard and yr going to freak out.

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aprimeproblem@reddit

Yep, started out as the guy installing Windows 95 on laptops, well what we used to call laptops back in the day, more like mobile desktops with tiny screens. Automated the whole process in three months and got noticed. Moved to server admin after that. The whole history can be read here:

https://michaelwaterman.nl/career/

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Vicus_92@reddit

You need to understand a typical user in order to build a network for a typical user.

You learn what a typical user is through helpdesk.

If you get lucky, you can skip it, but I wouldn't recommend it. You'll be missing valuable experience.

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leaflock7@reddit

as long as I have certs and projects to back up my skills?

many certs are just reading material and nothing else. Some do require the person to have some actual experience in order to pass them.
Projects from where? if you already have projects , that means you have experience , which means you worked somewhere even if it was for free. So that is experience.

So how do you have your experience/projects done if you never worked before in a helpdesk/sysadmin role?

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ledow@reddit

I started building websites after graduating, when websites were still quite "new" so any old junk was passable. Then set up a business. Then someone said "I don't suppose you know anything about..." Within a year I had too many clients and was doing everything for them. Then moved into network management.

I have no certs at all. Not even one. My degree is in maths.

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SumErgoCogito@reddit

You are always someone’s helpdesk.

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Travasaurus-rex@reddit

So bloody true!

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SAugsburger@reddit

There are other entry level positions out there. e.g. Data center tech, field techs, etc. Some form of help desk/service desk though is a common starting point for IT. CS degrees are not intended to prepare for development jobs, but in the current job market a significant percentage of CS grads may never land a dev job or it may take years before the SWE job market rebounds enough for many recent grads to have much chance.

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radioszn@reddit

Yes I did. Had to with the limited experience that I had.

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BlockBannington@reddit

Absolutely

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joshghz@reddit

It depends on a lot of things, largely your attitude and practical knowledge. It tends to be a common route because it gives you business and general work experience.

That said:

I'm a college CS student about to start senior year ... cost of living where I am is very high and salary for helpdesk is quite meager compared to other IT roles

At the end of the day: a job's a job. You're going to have to eat somehow. You can either have $HelpDeskSalary a week or you can have $0 a week until you find a Junior Sysadmin job.

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stillpiercer_@reddit

I’d consider myself fully qualified for a Jr Sysadmin position and I’m fully convinced they do not exist, at least in my LCOL area. Very few IT postings whatsoever, and those that are hiring want a one-man team with 10 years of experience.

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SeatownNets@reddit

Jr admin isn't usually a posting.

I've found some places are willing to take a shot on at least an interview with someone with no sysadmin exp if they have IT exp and a tight budget, but they list it as sysadmin anyways wanting 5+ years exp. some places are overeager with demands to filter out total chaff, but don't get anyone overqualified and have to lower standards or leave it unfilled.

A good resume and an app on first day of the posting helps, but realistically, if you're not in a large metro, it's hard to find decent work period. Experience cloud engineer, sure u can find something remote, but the intermediary career steps you're gonna struggle to beat ppl out for full remote and need to be where the big businesses are.

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dHardened_Steelb@reddit

You are correct they dont exist anymore

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Advanced_Vehicle_636@reddit

To add onto this - most people don't expect Helpdesk folks to stick around long... So don't feel bad if you resign after 6-12 months because you found a better paying job.

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TwilightKeystroker@reddit

To add onto this, if you grind it for that same time period you may find yourself at a Tier 2 or Jr Admin level at 12-18 months.

So, don't feel bad if you grind it out longer than others, either.

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bearwhiz@reddit

There's usually a good reason why the phones at a helpdesk have the "Hold" key right next to the "Drop Call" key...

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Majik_Sheff@reddit

Officially I started in facilities because the college didn't have an IT department yet.

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Alone-Loquat-9609@reddit

No I lied that I knew what I was doing as a sysadmin and just figured it out. Lucky for me I learn quick because otherwise this would have failed spectacularly. I’m now known as an “expert” which still mostly involves best guesses, intuition, and luck.

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rollingviolation@reddit

I started way back, but no, I never worked on the helpdesk.

Now that I'm a supervisor, my team is about half direct hires and half I "stole" from the helpdesk.

IMO, helpdesk "soft skills" are nice to have, but being able to troubleshoot without google and without a script is what separates a sysadmin from helpdesk. (not that you shouldn't have both, but when things break "weird", you may be the guy 'first posting' on r/sysadmin)

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I_ride_ostriches@reddit

I did. When people didn’t, I can normally tell, which is 100% confirmation bias.

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SeatownNets@reddit

No reason to avoid help desk, if you have good projects, sharpen your skills and have a bachelors in cs, you should be able to leverage 1-2 years of exp in help desk tier 1-2 into a decent position.

If nothing else it'll help you understand the roles you'll depend on in the future, and plenty of help desk jobs pay enough to get by as a young grad. You can stop in for an A+ then go straight into RHCSA or azure certs or whatever sysadmin targeted stuff right after.

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ItsNotGoingToBeEasy@reddit

Work for a small company that is about 50-100 employees and the answer is you will do it all and learn so much.

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PrimeskyLP@reddit

Depends on where you life, like in Germany there is nothing like HelpDesk only, you need a tree year education that you get from the IHK. You can start whitout that but you will get payed way less.

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TheCollegeIntern@reddit

It’s possible if you can get internships that are out of support and into the field you want. You’re cs though so if you’re not doing IT, you can land a cs role without help desk. Help desk is not a path for a software engineer really it don’t hurt but traditionally not a path for cs majors

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fresh-dork@reddit

SWE here. i started as a scrub tech. build computers, troubleshoot random problems and make the boss look good. tell the secretary her boob was mashing the shift key without offending her. i know a lot of theory, but the messy nature of customers was valuable

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NaturalHabit1711@reddit

I did three month helpdesk it sucked so I decided to go back to school. Got some nice degrees and went on to be a junior dus admin at a smaller company.

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monsieurR0b0@reddit

I'm my experience, only the truly best IT folks started in Helpdesk roles, unless they spent time in the military training heavy on more advanced stuff

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Finn_Storm@reddit

Not impossible, but probably difficult. I enrolled in to an msp consultancy job straight out of school and it's done me well so far. Unfortunately nothing is better than years of experience, because lessons in school are almost always outdated.

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michaelpaoli@reddit

Did EVERYONE start at helpdesk?

Hell no. "helpdesk" is just the ~~lazy~~ efficient response. Way less typing/explanation, e.g. r/ITCareerQuestions and here.

college CS student about to start senior year
I know that helpdesk is a smart move to get your foot in the door

Oh really? 3 / 4 years of college, and ... that's the best you can come up with? And what's your plan to not get stuck there for a decade, still only making about minimum wage, because can certainly find many folks, e.g. over on r/ITCareerQuestions complaining how they've been stuck 2/3/4/5/... years at helpdesk, barely making above minimum wage, and some that spend 3, 6, 9 months, year or more, and can't even land any IT job at all (though of course often they're only applying for helpdesk, and often only for positions that are 100% remote).

totally unrealistic to jump into a sysadmin role post-grad

Depends how solid your sysadmin chops are. So, been in college 3+ years or so, besides all that college stuff, what else have you been doing and learning regarding a sysadmin role and pertinent knowledge, skills, and experience? Could cover a whole heck of a lot of that in 3+ years. Sure, college keeps you busy about 30 to 80 hours or so per week, give or take, but what about all the other hours in the week and time between academic terms? Heck, I've seen kids as young as 12 that know more about Linux and Linux sysadmin than half adult candidates I interview for Linux sysadmin positions. So, the information is out there, the knowledge is very attainable ... for those that will put in the time and work, and have the capability.

as long as I have certs and projects to back up my skills?

Meh. Certs or not, one will generally be quite evaluated on one's relevant knowledge and skills. Of course experience also greatly helps, but it doesn't necessarily even have to be work experience. These days, anyone can be a Linux sysadmin at about zero cost - download or otherwise obtain ISO, boot it on PC or laptop, install or install to a VM - congratulations - now a sysadmin ... now learn how to well and properly use that power and access. So, yeah, as I oft say, "certs, schmerts". I want to well evaluate what the person knows of relevance, their skills, etc., and as feasible reasonably asses their relevant experience. Though some certs are rather to highly noteworthy, some really aren't much more than short-term memory exercises ... if even that. E.g. 3 certs I obtained in less than 90 minutes each - mostly short-term memory exercises. Another I got for merely attending 3 days of training - no test whatsoever required (yes, it was good training, but any warm body in the class for 3 days ... and ... certified - no test at all required). Other certs are highly non-trivial (but almost never get mentioned on r/ITCareerQuestions or here - e.g. some certs require not only utmost level of demonstrated proficiency and knowledge, but having consistently maintained that for 10+ years). So, anyway, some may pay some/more attention to certs, others pay little to now attention to certs - might also quite depend too, what cert(s), and if they have any particular reason for asking for/about them or requiring them (e.g. some "certified partners" of certain vendors, and stuff like that, may require certain staffing levels/% with certain vendor "blessed" certs, to obtain/maintain such vendor "certified partner" or "authorized dealer" or the like designations).

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LeeKingbut@reddit

Being in any customer service helps in any job. You learn to interact with both clients and office politics .

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trippedonatater@reddit

I started in software testing. More boring than help desk, but also less interaction with the dumbest people in the company. So, different, but not really better.

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Dadarian@reddit

I don’t trust anyone who hasn’t done lots of customer facing helpdesk. None of those people know how to actually understand what a user experience is like and make decisions totally devoid of user impact.

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xoxoxxy@reddit

Yeah, I started in helpdesk four years ago. I'm in my fifth year in IT and have reached a salary of $120K. I keep getting certifications and show intention to advance through hard work.

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zatset@reddit

Unless you start in ISP with side hustles in repairing computer equipment and designing small networks.

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rcp9ty@reddit

Why are you going after the system admin world with computer science as your degree. Computer science people are better suited for dev ops or programming jobs. System admins are usually two year trade school degrees with certs. Now I have a four year degree in MIS but I rarely use that knowledge compared to what I gained from my associates degree in computer networking.

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RokushoTheBlackCat@reddit

Helpdesk is useful for getting used to customer service if you haven't really had any experience with it. At times you can get very upset (either rational or irrational) customers or even colleagues and learning how to diffuse their stress and frustration can be very beneficial long term for your own mental health but also for career progression. The meme of the server room goblin is a thing for a reason, being the opposite of that carries you far and makes you a desirable member of helpdesk teams and also helps your name get around within wherever you're working.

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cat_bacon_upvote@reddit

Started fresh out of college as a CS major at a small university in a small town, made 35k salary (2020) for 7 months, ended up finding a higher paying helpdesk job in a bigger city nearby and climbing back up the ladder since then. All of that to say, if you want the title badly enough right out of college, it can be attainable but may not be worth it, good luck on the hunt

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kabrandon@reddit

Data Center Technician is also a pretty good starter role.

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HeligKo@reddit

No. At least not exclusively. I started part time as the only IT guy at a small, but multi national engineering and manufacturing company. Help desk was a part of the job, but so was server management, network management, phones, and direct desktop support. It grew into full-time.

I left that job to finish my degree and took over the operations of an ISP that did dial up and ISDN service. That job was phone support, server management, network management, telecom, and office management. I had 1 high schooler as an employee and about 400 customers.

After college I was hired as a server and application admin at a government data center.

You have to get experience and help desk is a good place to start. Small business can be good as well, but they tend to be meat grinders, because they don't have the budget for so they what to do. They do give you a broad amount of experience for the resume though. Just don't get stuck there.

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Drassigehond@reddit

Why would you want to skip an in my views essential step in your career? I mean if you want to learn the piano, you also need to learn the basics first. It wil help you in the long run. Otherwise youll get stuk quickly

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UltraChip@reddit

My first IT job was as a field technician, but that's basically just helpdesk that makes house calls.

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73DarkStar@reddit

My first position was straight to upper level server team. I was fresh out of basic training, barely 18 years old, only took 1 week of Unix training in tech school, and showed up to my duty station. USAF simply assigned people based on their AFSC without regards of how much they actually knew. AF had a slot assigned to them so they slotted it to me (we were in a TS/SCI mixed environment of civilians and military). So my first day was on the top level Unix/Linux server team. I knew like 8 unix commands.

Coworker: "Can you look at server175? NFS is acting up"
Me: "Sure, absolutely.....wtf is NFS?"

That said, it accelerated my work path exceptionally quickly by necessity. By the time I left that shop 2 years later I was quite comfortable on a server team and by year 5 or so of my career I was senior/architect level.

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0xD34F@reddit

Honestly, someone should’ve been telling you to do internships sophomore / junior year to establish a relationship with a company as a CS Major. Kick ass at those internships you’re almost guaranteed to skip helpdesk phase.

If you do have to go helpdesk kick ass at it, stress in the interview that you want to do says admin projects/ help on them to eventually establish a relationship with that team and make the move.

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Jimmynobhead@reddit

Even if it's just for six months - do helpdesk. Preferably in a team, where you learn both the customer-facing skills as well as the inter-personal relationship/politics skills that being a member of a team brings. Ideally an on-site role but I recognize that they may be harder to find by.

I promise you, if you do six months (a year if you can afford/bear it) in a helpdesk role, the jobs you'll have at your disposal after that will make it easily worth it over 2-3 years.

Any sysadmin role you get straight out of college with no experience isn't going to pay you much more than helpdesk, and getting a job for a company that would hire sysadmins straight out of college "for the churn" may well put you off the field entirely.

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Palmolive@reddit

I did 3 whole days on helpdesk then moved to field tech!

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butter_lover@reddit

I’ve seen my company take interns and good entry level guys as junior admins. Pretty sure the pay is the same the service desk though.

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secret_configuration@reddit

I recommend starting at a small MSP. Stay for about 2 years. You will be overworked and underpaid...but you will learn a ton in a short period of time. It a great stepping stone to an in-house gig later on.

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Regular-Nebula6386@reddit

I was a programmer before I became tech support, and moved to be a sysadmin. Believe it or not, programmers were dime a dozen back in the day and tech support would be a step above.

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CountGeoffrey@reddit

No, not if you have a bachelor's in a technical field and esp not for CS.

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momentum43@reddit

started as a contractor doing web2print wysiwyg implementations for b2b marketing portals. moved into DR implementation in the critical document industry, employer promoted me into tech from warehouse but wouldn't match my freelancing rate. left to be a PM in the industry, press op asked me to talk to HP since they were going away over their head, diagnosed the issue, regional supervisor was called in to fix, asked what cert/degree I needed, started a few weeks later. spent two years as a field support engineer, now a sysadmin/dba in private hosting. only took me like 6-7 years, but never worked helpdesk. only cert I've got is my CASP+ /SecurityX, and I've just gotten that in the last 6mo. might go get my AZ fundamentals for shits and giggles.

just bust your hump, do what's asked of you and excel at it. make sure leadership knows you're hungry and looking for any opportunity to take lead. ask to ride shotgun on projects. don't be afraid to fuck up - you'll do it 100x before you succeed once, so get comfy being uncomfortable. a teaspoon of talent is outweighed by a bucket of try. if someone isn't giving you opportunities, don't be afraid to find someone who will.

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mfinnigan@reddit

My first job was as "IT Support" at a small company (120 employees) that had outgrown a single IT guy. It was a combo of first-line support plus assistant sysadmin. The other guy gave me projects and expected me to grow into it. I was there for 4 years, my next job was as a sysadmin at a contractor for a global pharma company.

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BoofPackJones@reddit

I got super lucky and got an intern position(wasn’t even in college) and prior I was doing a call center job. Kind of help desk kind of not. Got hired in a few years later.

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Breaon66@reddit

I went from Customer Support to engineering QA to IT. Round about way, but been here 20+ years now.

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gentlemanl0ser@reddit

With a RHCSA and some homelab experience, skipping helpdesk is definitely possible.

This kind of goes against your question, but see if your university’s desktop support team has any student worker positions. Having some professional IT experience will help you get a better position post grad.

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bearwhiz@reddit

Possible... but you're not gonna get hired at a great company. People who get a degree, a cert, and think some homelab noodling makes them a sysadmin are people who have a lot of bad habits to un-learn, because they didn't have a mentor to show them... well, tons of stuff that's not in the books or random wikis. Those people are more likely to be hired by people like them, at a company with a fairly dysfunctional IT department because they're all discovering stuff the hard way...

Part of why entry-level SAs get the scut work and the help-desk duty is so they can get mentored and learn. Every support call you field where you've got to go find a senior admin and ask them for the answer is a chance to be taught real-world SA work.

Stuff like: books and courses don't teach you that revision control is your friend. Revision control means you can undo when you screw up a config file. Revision control comments means an answer to "what the hell was I thinking four years ago when I made that change?" And it doesn't have to be GitHub or even Subversion; hoary ol' RCS is fine for this and probably already installed on every corporate system you'll encounter...

Or the fact that there are such things as "don't use root" days, and being able to recognize when your mental state is "it's a don't-use-root day" and listening to it... but that usually takes at least one major screwup that takes days to fix (especially if you didn't use revision control)...

Or the wisdom that you never. make. changes. on the Friday before a three-day weekend. No matter how trivial you think they are...

(Thanks, John, if you're out there, for all you taught a sophomore thirty-odd years ago...)

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eatont9999@reddit

Nothing new after 2 and read-only Fridays!

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dpgator33@reddit

I came out of the military with very good training as a network and system admin for basically three years experience. I was CCNA level as a network admin (knew the book front and back but back then $100 on a test wasn’t worth it with my pay) and Windows and Exchange server admin experience, building entire networks from the ground up several times a year and maintaining in difficult environments, lots of weird troubleshooting etc. Then right out of service I got the crown jewel MCSE certification and started job hunting.

My first job was as a low level MSP tech making barely $30k. Then a one man shop at barely more than that, then a larger shop at $50k-ish. This was 6 years in from that first real job.

That’s when I finally was proficient enough to gain real “system admin” status and pay. $55k became $75k pretty quick.

I did sacrifice some for a few years when my wife went back to school (worth it) but have always had work and never had to really worry about money for a long time.

I could probably make more but never wanted management so I’ve stayed at senior/lead level for a while and do pretty well.

Experience is key. And you have to like it. People who get into IT but don’t enjoy it never last, and are easy to spot. If that’s you then find something else.

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No_Promotion451@reddit

I started at helpdesk but aim for the moon and you'll get the stars at least

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dodgy__penguin@reddit

Do you race formula 1 with a theoretical knowledge of driving?

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Spiritual-Leek8667@reddit

Stayed 6 months into helpdesk before I started my job as a network specialist. It doesn’t have to be long as you’re looking and don’t stay complacent.

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SilenceEstAureum@reddit

Jumping into a proper sysadmin is very unlikely. The best most people can hope for, as far as bypassing helpdesk goes, is going into a slightly more specialized technician job. It’s a step or two above helpdesk, depending on the employer, but it bypasses a lot of the “have you tried turning it off and back on again” nonsense you deal with as a basic helpdesk tech.

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nick99990@reddit

I started as a field tech for an ATM/Point of Sale manufacturer. Took every offer for specialized training (Cisco, Dell, high end large format printers). Involved a lot of sitting around letting smarter people do their thing, and I always told them I was looking to move into their specialization and would ask them what they were doing.

Before I knew it I was collecting certifications (A+, MCSA, N+, CCNA) and got out of the field work and moved into an office job.

Basically, I wasn't help desk, but might as well have been as it was a lot of live, in-person, specific troubleshooting. Any experience is good experience though. Get a job and keep learning.

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Professor-Potato281@reddit

Yes. You won’t know as much as you think, at the same time knowing more than you think.

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2_dog_father@reddit

Nope, old guy here. Started with html coding, went to scripting languages, Java programming, added operations, then systems/solution architecture.

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djgizmo@reddit

depends.

what do you know?

what does your resume say about you?

what does your homelab say about you?

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astronometrics@reddit

Nope. After 10 years in an unrelated field I went to University studying computer science. Got a job right out of University as sysadmin, no certs or anything.

My experience was 10 years doing something else I could market as soft skills, and a lifetime of mucking about with computers from Linux wifi drives in the 00s to raspberry pi self hosted things in the 2010s.

In the interview they asked a little about my degree, what certain subjects had covered etc but they were far more interested in the skills i'd gained fiddling with linux kernel builds, my zfs file server and the shitshow of how i setup my self hosted stuff in containers.

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razorback6981@reddit

I did. Did 6 years on our help desk. 3 years in our PC shop and now 11 years as a Sys Admin.

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sylenth@reddit

I bounced around shitty tech support jobs at ISP/mobile phone corporations and hated it. When I started my first service desk job in 2014, that's when it clicked. I learned AD, Exchange, MDM, etc. and busted my ass for years because I actually enjoyed what I was doing. Last year I got promoted to SysAdmin and it's been great starting a new chapter. I always loved computers but didn't go to school for that. I had an unrelated degree, so if you don't have the IT credentials then I would say help desk/service desk experience is a must.

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Nitramite@reddit

Glad to see comments showing how good starting at Helpdesk can make you.

I changed careers at 28, went to school in IT Support as I had a knack for computers. Got an internship at 29, they didn't want to hire me afterwards, even though I tried. But then someone left and they called me few months later.

I started Helpdesk, hated the lack of information and how everyone just gatekept the information they had. Wrote my own documentation, shared it across teams. Year later I was Senior Helpdesk. Then L2 Desktop Support, then Lead L2, then L3, now System Engineer. I fix the shit the Senior guys are doing with the SCCM Images or Intune policies/configurations.

I've been in meetings where the Senior System Engineers were bashing on Helpdesk and whining about not knowing what the helpdesk was being ranked on... They get cushy ass positions with 2x the salary of Helpdesk and don't even know the kind of software this company uses, how it uses it, what users expect. Having done helpdesk as helped me understand the priorities of this company and what software they need, how they use it, the policies that will help or hinder production.

Helpdesk is a must honestly, and I think even if you get hired in a higher position you should work helpdesk for a month or so to see what is going on.

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CollegeFootballGood@reddit

Yes, I did

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reserved_seating@reddit

I started helpdesk but it was about 15 years ago and I have no professional experience and only a four year degree (not IT related).

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BuoyantBear@reddit

I have two non-relevant degrees and got lucky to be hired to the help desk 8 years ago. Nowadays it seems like a CS degree is practically a requirement to get on the help desk of many companies.

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rickAUS@reddit

CS and or a dozen certifications. Feels like the 2000's all over again.

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Ssakaa@reddit

Not sure if you mean right up to the 2000-1 line, or further along at the 2007-8 line... and, hey, no chance at all that rampant speculation on "AI" might be another cycle that looks just like this again, right?!

https://blog.codinghorror.com/welcome-to-dot-com-bubble-20/

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Rx-xT@reddit

If you consider a Tier 1 IT tech working the phones at an MSP's help desk than yessssss.

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PaidByMicrosoft@reddit

I wanted to jump straight into higher paying jobs right away, too.

I wouldn't ever hire a person fresh out of school for a higher level position. Businesses never have the perfect systems you experience in college and in lab projects. They're cluster fucks that have grown over years and decades. Service desk positions not only ease you into learning these complex systems and how to fix them, but also how to deal with others in a professional setting, how to go to work as an adult, and how to see a variety of issues from the mundane to the complex. I can't tell you how often I run across an issue and have a flashback to my service desk days, even if it's not a direct fix. Maybe I was in a situation sort of similar at one point and used that experience as a starting point.

It's a lot easier to break things at scale as a sysadmin. Staff should gain experience before they're exposed to that level of permissions.

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Waretaco@reddit

If you do end up interviewing for entry level positions, be sure to ask about promotion opportunities and your long-term IT goals to see if the position aligns with your long-term goals. It could potentially aid in having to seek a new employer when you're ready to move up the ranks.

I've personally found being in the trenches of the entry level to be extremely useful regardless as it gives you a bit more empathy for the end users and the Level 1/2 technicians.

Best of luck!

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chesser45@reddit

I went HD but colleagues have gone school to programmer to dev Administrator / cloud ops.

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11CRT@reddit

Kinda? When I started there wasn’t a helpdesk, people just walked in, called or sent me a text. Didn’t matter what it was, I did it, until I “shudder” went on vacation for the first time in three years. Then they approved a new hire…who then took the calls, and what he couldn’t solve, booted it to me.

So yes. I started at a help desk.

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robbzilla@reddit

I've never worked level 1. I started at Best Buy before Geek Squad, fixing computers, and went straight to Level 2 from there.

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neoncracker@reddit

I went in tier 2 field tech. We have 110 schools. Tier 1 is school level tech. Help desk was in the next office over.

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eatont9999@reddit

There are many lessons you learn when you start from the ground up. In the Help Desk world, mistakes are generally not impactful to the business as a whole. A Senior Systems Engineer, for example, is not expected to make elementary mistakes because at that level, you are talking about systems that the entire business depends on. If they go down, it can have dire consequences not just for you and your business but also customers or patients (if in the medical field). What I have described is called experience and that is why it is highly coveted in the IT world. I have seen many college grads start at the help desk level. If you are good, it is usually noticed and you don't stay there long. Sometimes customer service is more desirable than technical ability - I have seen that as well.

In my experience, a degree comes in handy if you want to venture into management; especially if you have a Business Administration minor. C-level folks tend to strongly favor those with advanced degrees for any position directing or managing IT. What IT managers really like to see is certifications. Some companies will only hire someone if they have a certain cert. It opens a lot of doors that would otherwise be closed from the start.

If you want to make really good money, you either need to be in management or choose a specialty. If you are an ace Linux admin, you are going to make more money than the "jack of all trades, master of none." Same with other engineering roles like programming or advanced scripting. Automation is huge and so is AI. Master one of those and you can find a job that pays well. I rode the virtualization wave from the start all the way to now. Look for large organizations like fortune 500 companies. They are the ones that hire specialists because they probably have an entire department just for that specialty. Mom and pop shops are good for cutting your teeth but they rarely need/have the money for specialists.

Another good rule of thumb is to make a progressive change upward at least every 3 years. You don't want to be stuck in the Help Desk for 5 years. As sad as it is, in IT, you often have to move out to move up. Don't get complacent if your goal is advancement.

Take it as you may but these are my experiences over the last 20+ years in IT. I started out changing toner in printers while working on an Associate's Degree. Today, I am a Consulting (above senior) Platforms Engineer for a fortune 100 company. The title is not intuitive but basically think of it as a Data Center Engineer role.

Best of luck!

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FreeAnss@reddit

Cs? My condolences

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jeffrey_f@reddit

Get your foot in the door, get some experience and after about a year seek to move up or move on. As experience increases, so does the pay. You can earn decent pay in help desk as you get into the higher tiers .....

Level 1: call taker and triage agent, ticket creator

Level 2: Hands and feet response to the ticket and resolving issues. You may be at the desk or remote, but you fix the issues.

Level 3: If level 2 can't fix it, this is where L3 techs step in.

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UncleToyBox@reddit

Started doing helpdesk in '93
Somewhere along the way, through multiple promotions, I ended up in charge of our sysadmins.

Has been an amazing ride and the best stories are all from my helpdesk days.

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infinitepi8@reddit

...just the good ones.

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EhRanders@reddit

At my company, we send people who were hired out of college above the help desk to work with end users as much as possible for their first 2 years.

So your options are help desk for a year or 2…or we throw you to the end users with the hardest problems the help desk couldn’t solve for 2 years. Either way you’re going to speak to many stupid people with issues they can’t describe well, a fundamental skill to hearing “requirements” from the incoherent ramblings of non-technical product owner.

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madclarinet@reddit

I didn't - but I started in IT in the 1990's before it was so ingrained everywhere.

I worked in the finance department but I was one of the few who heavily used a PC (most people used green terminal screens). I also was the one who often fixed most of the minor printer/computer issues. When the IT department expanded, I got in that way. There was no helpdesk 'position' - we were helpdesk to engineers, I would reset a password then go back to configuring routers or deal with keep the unix servers running.

Best bet would be to get an entry level IT position at a school district as although they tend to pay lower, you can often get a position as more experienced people aim for the higher wages in the private sector. Get some experience and move on in a year or 3.

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CorsairKing@reddit

I'm not going to say it's impossible to "jump the line", so to speak. But I'm not sure if it's the right move if your goal is to be a good system administrator.

Working the help desk is a tedious, exasperating ordeal—which is exactly why it's so important. Especially if you're working for a MSP, the help desk will expose you to the incomprehensible mess of obsolete software, EOL systems, and under-specced hardware upon which the modern world turns. It will also expose you to the users who depend upon that technology, and you will learn that their relationship with computers is fundamentally different than your own.

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Negative-Omega@reddit

I retired from a non-IT profession (I'm old) and got a degree in cybersecurity. I spent months trying to get a cybersecurity related job, with no luck. I was getting desperate and finally took a helpdesk internship. That internship turned into a full time job after 3 months. When I was up for my 6 month review I ended up getting a promotion and substantial raise.

Starting in a helpdesk role can work out.

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robokid309@reddit

Technically I started at an MSP for $15 an hour. Any advice I’d give is you might have to make a sacrifice. You’re not going to make tons of money starting out. If you get offered any sort of IT role, take it.

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Panta125@reddit

You better get an internship asap.....

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Cheomesh@reddit

Kinda? I was basically a one man shop originally.

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silver_2000_@reddit

Start working any way you can, use your skills for money. You need experience anyway you can get it. I've been in industry 30 plus years. Certs mean little, they don't teach how to think and troubleshoot and deal with humans . Find any paid work you can get to get experience with real end users that aren't your school, your church or family ....

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g-rocklobster@reddit

Is it possible to jump straight to sysadmin? Well, like my grandpa used to say, anything's possible. But you'd pretty much have to have the exact right set of circumstances to line up perfectly for that to happen.

I know it sounds "boomerish" to say that everyone has to "pay their dues" before advancing - that sounds trite and like someone with either an elitist attitude or jealous that they had to work their tail off to get somewhere so everyone should have to work that way.

But the reality is that it's doesn't become a saying without there being some truth to it. I'd say 90% of sysadmin-types did have to start at some entry level position such as help desk. For me, I started in a check sorting room at a bank with no degree and no experience. It took a good 3 or 4 years to get my first admin position.

Like others said, look for solid internships. Beyond that, if you're in a high cost of living, maybe look in some lower cost of living areas for a year or two while you build experience. Once you have 12-24 months of experience then you can look back in areas you'd prefer with a better chance of landing a job.

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Gidderdunner@reddit

Shoulda skipped college and went straight to helpdesk. It pays low, but minus the cost for school, you come out ahead. Experience is more important than degrees. Get certs on your own while working helpdesk n

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Squossifrage@reddit

I started as the night shift help desk for a dial-up ISP.

I have 0 certifications and my degree is in an unrelated field (physics).

Now I'm a consultant and my normal annual income is just over about 10x what that job paid.

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DiiifferentPC@reddit

Helpdesk is a great start. Income is income, better than no income, and helpdesk is helpdesk, better than no IT experience at all. Take what you can, but do the best you can. It’s a ladder, and you’ll climb it very fast once you start. Especially if you have solid work ethic.

I wish I could tell you my method of getting into sysadmin when I graduated in 2022 would work… but it’s hard these days. Even some of the most experienced engineers are having a hard time getting sysadmin roles in my area.

I had a data privacy internship, was really familiar with Ansible, and created a lab consisting of two file servers, a few random VMs to simulate EU activity, AD, a SIEM, a honeypot, and a pretty hefty packet tracer lab.

My first interview, the interviewer (my current manager) mentioned that he didn’t believe I have enough experience right out of college. Having my labs on the fly and being able to explain them within 5-10 minutes really changed his mind in the moment and got me into the next interview.

I couldn’t tell you if you’ll be able to jump right into sysadmin. But I can tell you I’m rooting for you regardless! Graduation is right around the corner, so do the best you can one step at a time. It will all work out.

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Gidderdunner@reddit

Or a call center.

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kenrblan1901@reddit

I didn’t. I got a job at my campus computer center doing configuration and installation on faculty and staff desktops. After my junior year I spent the summer on a NSF funded CS internship at a different university. An opening for doing full-time computer repair work opened up and I landed that job when I returned to my campus after the internship. That put me on track to work on some server hardware until I completed my degree. Once I had the degree in hand, I interviewed for and won a position doing sysadmin work for the campus library. From there my career progressed by getting out of the library and into the main computing center.

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Jess_S13@reddit

I started out doing tech support for an IT vendor doing l1 support (receive calls/email tickets for replacing hard drives, read RAID error reports, compare to known issues, help with cluster software updates etc) and worked my way up to the engineering team as a customer advocate engineer (basically take l3 defects and work with dev to find work arounds for urgent issues while dev worked on final fixes). After a while one of my customers offered me a comical raise to switch sides and admin for them instead. Been working in sysadmin for the last 12 years.

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anonymousITCoward@reddit

What do you mean start? I'm still on the helpdesk

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adeo888@reddit

Nope ... my first computer job started me as the sole Systems and Network Admin for a smaller ISP. I had no other conceivable choice but to grow into the job really FAST. The former admins sabotaged the network a couple of weeks after I started, so * hit the fan and it was all on me. Oh yeah, there was no help desk, but others in the organization would take calls to shield me and give me time to fix things.

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oubeav@reddit

CS degree? Isn’t that programming/coding/developing? And you want to be a SysAdmin? Yep. Help Desk is where you start.

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thesals@reddit

As a hiring manager, your education doesn't mean shit to me if you don't have experience. Some of the most educated people I've worked with are the most useless fuckwits.

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vermyx@reddit

Computer lab helper -> software developer -> environment engineer (break fixing/upgrading/setup) -> Sysadmin

Hell of a ride so far, but all of this has helped me build the skills necessary to talk to people and call vendors out on their shenanigans and better evaluate talent.

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AngryBeaverSociety@reddit

It is unlikely to make that jump. You may be a Rockstar among your peer group at school, but your peer group is about to get a whole lot bigger. Some of them have 4 years experience and no degree, some have graduate degrees, some are transitioning careers and have 15 years experience in a nearly related role, some were in the service and are coming out with an associates and six years experience.

Your competition just got fierce, and its an uphill climb from here on.

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bearwhiz@reddit

Get a job at the school's computing center help desk if you can, and network with your school's sysadmins. You'll learn some stuff you won't learn in classes, especially if you find the guy who's Gen-X or older that everyone else defers to....

Your RHCSA will get you past human resources. It won't get you a great UNIX admin job, because the senior admins who are on the interview are looking for actual experience, not the stuff on the test. We're also looking for how you think: do you think systemically? Do you know when to say you don't know, and do you have a plan to find out? I don't expect a new kid to know everything, but I do expect them to know how to read a man page...

Don't ignore electives and outside-of-school activities. They may be what gets you the job. It's not hard to find a RHCSA. Finding an RHCSA who also can write great documentation because they've got experience on the school paper and maybe a minor in English is unusual and valuable. Or maybe your first job isn't as a UNIX admin but doing tech suppport for something tangentally related: RHCSA plus knows how to terminate Ethernet properly? Knows how to fix a printer? You never know when some little thing will be what makes you perfect in a hiring manager's eyes. Especially since HR will never put it in the job listing.

And if you do wind up at helpdesk... yeah, it sucks. Pay your dues, and come away with new respect for just how dumb users can be, and pick up tips on how to get the story out of 'em from your senior coworkers. Learn the value of documenting everything you learn so you can use it again later. (My first out-of-school phone support job, they handed me an empty four-inch-thick three-ring binder and said "This is your 90% Book. By the time you're here a year, the answers to 90% of the questions you're asked should be in this book. Go ask your coworkers to see theirs and start making copies...") Make connections with coworkers, engineers, etc., because your best future jobs won't come from job listings, they'll come from someone remembering you and saying "I know a guy we should bring in..."

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homercles89@reddit

No, I started as what might be called a business analyst or software system engineer. I wrote requirements documents and admin'd some small work systems in my spare time. After my main job went bust, I applied somewhere else to be a full time sysadmin and got hired on.

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CoffeePizzaSushiDick@reddit

I started out if my home, answering random misdialed calls to a computer repair shop less than a block away, and 1 digit off of my own number. Mix that with being used to your family calling and also their giving friends and their friends friends my number to call for free help too…. I got a lot of experience before anyone needed to actually discuss bringing in their pc to me.

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NohPhD@reddit

Yeah, I was good at troubleshooting because of self study, practice and natural ability but going onto a 24x7 Helpdesk for one of the worlds largest banks gave me a PhD in troubleshooting, just from the sheer volume and variety of tickets. I was there for a year, including Y2K and made bank…

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ImTheRealSpoon@reddit

I started at desktop went down to help desk to train up and lead the team then sys ops

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ZeeTagg_10@reddit

I honestly feel like long term for your career starting at HelpDesk is good, specifically if you can get in to Help Desk at a small sized MSP. It’s hell and it feels like playing on hard mode, but the exposure to multiple problems in multiple environments is what got me to where I am today (I am now running an internal IT team for a company). The things you learn along the way as how to deal with people from different backgrounds and approach problems in different ways made me extremely versatile.

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Philly_is_nice@reddit

... Pretty much man, yeah.

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pemungkah@reddit

My route int systems programmer was "kid who knew way too much about the OS while in college" -> "kid who can program in assembler and write this networking code" -> "kid who has written about five TSO utilities that everyone in the systems group uses" -> "known quantity and we need a new junior systems programmer".

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Delta31_Heavy@reddit

I started in desktop/server support. The helpdesk is as a call center and its own entity. The people on the helpdesk would be promoted onto our team if they were good.

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Ape_Escape_Economy@reddit

Yes.

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PrincipleExciting457@reddit

Possible, yes. Feasible, not really. Especially right now. The job market is pretty tough in most of the US if you live there.

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Casey3882003@reddit

Not in title per say but essentially help desk. I started as a System/Network Adkin role for a 100 user company but it was a sole IT person role. So I mostly did Helpdesk and a few higher level items, but it was mostly helpdesk. It really limited my growth opportunity and looking back it would have been better for my career to have started at help desk for a larger corporation.

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Sqooky@reddit

No, I got my first job as a pentester through networking at a local security conference.

I was also incredibly lucky. I also had more than a good idea of how system administration worked, knew the ins and outs of AD, could tell you how to manage a domain like the back of my hand. Same thing with networking & network administration.

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LBishop28@reddit

I was a helpdesk person as an intern.

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eddiekoski@reddit

I start as neighborhood computer guy

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Monsterology@reddit

Eh, sort of. More of a help desk / sysadmin hybrid solo. Been an interesting ride so far.

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BuoyantBear@reddit

5+ years ago you definitely had a better shot of jumping into a higher role, especially if you already had some kind of specialization, but in the current job market it's your only real hope. You'll learn a million things you didn't learn in school that are more relevant to your career down the road.

Everyone has to earn their stripes.

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itboyband1433@reddit

Helpdesk to VP of IT/Security. Took 20 years. :)

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SpakysAlt@reddit

I did not, though certainly started at an equivalent level as a PC technician making $13 an hour. That was 8 years ago and I’m at $65 an hour now.

You can rise very fast if you’re dedicated to learning and getting the necessary certifications.

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KindlyGetMeGiftCards@reddit

I went from a position akin to help desk, it wasn't called that back then, it was called helping users with issues and escalating when needed.

Help desk as a start is common because you get exposed to normal daily stuff to fix that you need to know later on your career. You said you are studying, so you are most likely living like a student by living off beer and noodles, when you start your first job it's not caviar and champagne, you still live the same until you level up. Don't be in a rush to get to the top you will skip over important skills that WILL help you in your future career.

I suggest get a job at a MSP, learn all the stuff which will be like drinking from a firehose, while still studying for certs that you need for your next step then jump to that role, keep studying and keep levelling up. It will suck and and isn't quick, so be prepared for this.

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robvas@reddit

No. Have had plenty of grads with zero experience put on our teams.