I am wondering what kind of career moves I have available to me because I am over the bullshit of desktop support. I have been brushing up on my Linux skills, learning docker, and doing a whole bunch of networking-related things. At this point, I am 46 years old. Would it benefit me to go back to school to learn a skill to help me advance beyond this role? I just don’t know what to do. There are many options, none of them truly low cost and all of them involving a significant amount of risk.

I get that there is no avoiding risk when making a career change so late in life. I was looking at training for Java or Oracle and it isn’t cheap. Maybe given my experience I could teach A+ or Network+? I don’t know. I’ll welcome any ideas right now.

  • Aniki 🌱🌿@lemm.eeEnglish
    111·
    1 year ago

    There’s not enough Linux admins. Come to the dark side. I make so much more money than I ever did doing desktop support.

    • Meow.tar.gz@lemmy.goblackcat.comOPEnglish
      9·
      1 year ago

      The hard part is convincing somebody to hire me without formal production experience. I am in the classic Catch-22 situation: How do I get experience if nobody will give me the opportunity?

      • Aniki 🌱🌿@lemm.eeEnglish
        61·
        1 year ago

        You’re going to need a portfolio of stuff you’ve built if you want to show you can do it but if you have a nice webpage that you setup professionally and have Linux skills on your resume you’ll get a hit. My company cannot hire competent Linux admins fast enough.

      • PancakedWaffle@lemmy.worldEnglish
        51·
        1 year ago

        Go look on upwork for some gigs at your current hourly rate. Once you do one or two the interviews will go much smoother.

        Highly recommend this Linux admin path for you. Knowing from personal exp the pay in support desk vs devops, you might 4x your pay inside 3 years.