At the crossroad of career, need your help 2

[cfh2004]

I hope I could find some helps on my career direction here. I am right now at the crossroads of my career and confused about my next step.

A little bit about myself: I got a master degree in Computer Science from Canada. Since then, I have been working as a C++ programmer for 5 yrs (dealing with MFC, COM objects etc). Before I came to Canada, I had an accounting background: bachelor degree in accounting from an international university and almost 2-year working experience in a small CA firm outside of North America. Currently, I am taking some accounting courses given by the unversity and trying to pick up the accounting knowledge that I have given up for 10 years, and also open my eyes to a different accounting system. I think it is time for me to plan my next career path since I don't want to be a programmer for ever. I kinda miss the opportunities to interact/communicate with people in my current job. I am thinking to move from pure techie to business-oriented disposition by making good use of my knowledge, experiences and skills. Just hope that the older I get, the more competitive in the market with the accumulated experiences of more and more projects.

But I am not sure which career path suits the most for me regarding to my background. One thing: I don't see myself in the architect level. Any inputs will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

 

[mmorancbt]

You may want to look at consulting - specifically with accounting and ERP systems. A place to look might be consulting firms that are integrating things like SAP, Oracle Financials, or other ERP systems.

The programming & systems experience would serve you well and your stated desire for more interaction could be met in this type of role.

Good Luck!

Matthew Moran (career blog and podcast below)
Career Advice with Attitude for the IT Pro

http://blogs.ittoolbox.com/pm/career

http://techcareerconsult.blogspot.com

 

[sstoppel]

In the US there are numerous new standards of compliance relating to accounting, confidentiality, and security. For example, Sarbanes-Oxley, Payment Card Industry, and HIPAA. Huge numbers of systems must be audited and retrofitted to assist with compliance.

 

[cfh2004]

Thanks, mmorancbt,
Actually, I've ever considered this career path, but look at the job postings related SAP, Oracle Financials, or other ERP systems, they all require working experiences. It is rare that they will hire newbies. Many have contributed their time and money to get trained, but end up with no jobs.

If you could share your opinions on how to build-up this career path, I would appriciate it.

PS. I saw other posts, some of them mentioned about Business Analyst, or System Analyst, or Financial Analyst. What do you think about these paths?

Thanks,

 

[cfh2004]

Thanks, sstoppel,
I guess you referred to IT auditing, right?
I saw one post saying that this field is hard to break into for a beginner. It is more for an experienced professional. And also the future is not very broad, meaning that an IT auditor will end up being an auditor either in IT auditing or internal auditing in an industry. Since I am not very familiar with IT auditing, could you elaborate this career a little bit such as the prospect, what the career path would be...
Thanks a lot

 

[sstoppel]

Well, if you have 5 years coding and an accounting degree you are probably an "experienced professional" by today's standards.

Consider the trend toward "Service-Oriented Architecture" and the way that a given piece of data moves through an app, between services, between servers, etc. By examining what happens to data as it is processed there are opportunities for compromise of confidentiality. If you have the ability to read code you can examine for design decisions or revisions that affect a standard. Let's say that a billing dept. uses an old app for payment processing. In order to be PCI compliant that system must NOT store credit card data anywhere but on a secure system. Perhaps a new card processing module is installed - it needs to be examined to be sure that a log or temp files aren't sitting around with credit card info on it. Credit card, SS#s, medical information, financial info, etc. all must be controlled and audited.

I think if you become expert in the standards you can leverage your technical knowledge to get an "in" with a consulting company at least at a junior level. That could lead to senior level and a pretty lucrative career in a few short years.

 

[hilfy]

You also might want to consider a "Business Analyst" type of position. Where I work, the BA's are the liason between the programmers and the business team. They are people with knowledge of the business who also have technical knowledge. They gather requirements, help with creation of functional specs for the programmers, test changes and enhancements from a business perspective, and, most importantly, help to make sure that the programmers and end users are really talking about the same thing when we work together. These are the folks who make sure that we're giving the users what they really need to do their jobs more efficiently, which is not necessarily what the techies think they need.

-Dell

A computer only does what you actually told it to do - not what you thought you told it to do.