It’s been a month since I’ve been at my new employer. What’s different is that I’m more focused on a smaller set of technologies. On one side, I’m less exposed to the cutting edge. But now I can really focus on just a few technologies and become a subject matter expert.
That leads to me to say that you will be reading more about Microsoft technologies. It will be leaning on Active Directory, Exchange and SharePoint. Those are currently my primary areas of focus. I think they’re great topics and have lots of room for growth.
Networking will still be a large part of what I do since its what transfers the 1s and 0s. And it’s quite possible that I may be on a networking project.
My environment is definitely different. I’m going from a non-profit to a private equity firm. Huge change. I’m enjoying it. The people are great and fun to be around.
The current projects I’m looking at will help increase the productivity and reliability for the whole firm. It’s an exciting time to be in IT for the firm.
Friday the 13th was my last day at my non-profit employer. I had been there for a good five years. A good run for sure. I learned so much there. I did everything from configuring laptops, troubleshooting said laptops, configuring email on iPhones, Blackberries, Androids and tablets, provisioning servers, deploying VMs, dealing with alarms.. you name it.
It was definitely a jack of all trades kind of thing. But then came a moment when I felt that I needed something different. A change.
Starting today I will be working at a private equity firm as a Sr. IT Support Specialist. I’ll be supporting a growing infrastructure. Similar to my previous job responsibilities.
In a way I’m happy to move back to a for-profit. There are many pros and cons to both for-profit and non-profit. Probably better fit for another blog post.
All I can say is that I’m looking forward to this new chapter.
Near the end of 2010 I set out some goals for myself to complete in 2011. Did I complete them? Hell no. But I’m not necessarily bummed out about it. In your professional career, you go where your career takes you. Sometimes it takes a different path. My career is still along the IT path but it has somewhat shifted a bit.
My major goal for 2011 was to get my CCNP RS. I attempted my CCNP ROUTE but failed on my first attempt. No problem. I’m still studying for it now and will probably sit on the exam before March 2012. It’s still on my list of goals!
When I look back at 2011 I see it as a maintaining year for our network. Not too many implementations. Lots of troubleshooting and optimization. I did work on lots of planning and project management. Learned quite a bit there but nothing of a large scale.
I’ve had growing interest in more implementations for new systems and have been training myself in that area.
2012 will be an interesting year for me and I’m not going to create any major goals this year. What I want to do is see how my career plays out for a while. Let’s just say I’ll create some small goals 