Career Advice?

[jimmmaaa]

I have been in working in Telecom for about 6 1/2 years and was wanting some general advice from those who have been around longer. I have worked on some different PBX's: Siemens, Rockwell(actully Spectrum ACD) and most recently Avaya Definity v. 9.5. I am fairly proficient at cross-connects and various aspects of cabling although I am not an expert such as doing huge jobs. I have not worked on Siemens for a while, but on Avaya and Rockwell I have done day to day moves and changes, ACD stuff, Routing and setting up T1's from start to finish. I guess I am wondering if I should move in the Cisco direction, CCNA, VoIP or what. I guess I am at little bit of a plateau and want to keep growing in knowledge and experience. Also I am a little bored at my current postition, but it is a fairly secure job....and that seems to account for a lot these days, and is especially important considering I am the sole bread winner of my 5 person family. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!!!

 

[heyitsthephoneguy]

This is just MHO....

Learn as much as you can re: Cisco & Cisco's VOIP products. With VOIP integrating with LANs, you'll see the Network guys becoming more and more protective of what equipment is on their networks...and the main equipment LAN admins use is Cisco.

 

[Phoneman2]

I've started studing for my ACACN. It's more about networks and how they work. It's from Avaya leading in to R11 CTI stuff. Someday it will be VoData Network (Voice/Data) Wisdom is Knowledge
that is Shared

Thanks All Phoneman2

 

[20ver]

I think the more you can learn about LAN's and networks the happier and more sucessful you will be in the future. Start studing for your ACACN or CCNA. I personally have my ACACN, and am working on my Avaya specialist for work. Personally, I would learn the Cisco before Avaya, but there paying me to learn Avaya, so that's what I am doing for now. I wish they would have asked me to get my CCNA instead.

I also started in Networking out of college and moved to phones for something different and a little more rare. But it sure is nice to know the terms and be able to talk to the network people.

That's my cent and a half's worth.

 

[vaoldschl]

I'm with 20ver, I'm pleased as punch to be in the phone business because the skill set is more rare. I also find it easier to cross the border into the network than most network people seem to find it to come into the switch room.

Make sure you have your network fundamentals down first and then move into the (insert vendor here) specific stuff even if just for enjoyment and personal growth but (knock on wood) even in poor job markets there seems to always be a place for the telephone man.

 

[jimmmaaa]

Thanks all for your advice. One thing I know is that I need to keep on learning and not get complacent and stagnant.