IT Certifications and Careers (Official Discussion Thread)

[I AM WE ARE]

Brehs,

This thread is full of years of valuable and relevant information. You need to read through this whole-entire-thread front to back. This is EXACTLY what I did When I started in IT and its the reason I have a great career now.

From 2017 til now I have read through this entire thread 30 times. With each revisit, I found something new that I might have missed or ignored previously but speaks to me now that I'm at a certain career level.

I've been dropping gem after gem because I want you niccas to fllourish and I want to keep this thread going strong, But dont expect me or anybody else spoonfeed you every step of the way. You have to take the initiative, research and find out shyt for yourselves.

This thread has all the info you need to to get started. The A+, Sec+, Net+ and CCNA, MCSA and CISSP has been covered 100's of times in painstakingly detailed fashion. Examples of the amount of money you can make has been discovered thousands of times by real people working in the field, telling you how to get there. You just have to read this thread front to back. it's all you need.

When I started, I aint know shyt. Didnt know how to get started, didnt know what this or that cert was for. I was attending some certification bootcamp while unemployed and my wife was the breadwinner. She was stressed, I was stressed, my pride was shot, and at times I wanted to just give up and go back to working warehouse jobs because it was tough getting a job in IT. Interview after interview. One shady recruiter after another misleading me and selling me bullshyt knowing they didnt have any jobs lined up.

IT started with this thread. Cats like B.Dizzle, Havoc, and others was dropping all this inspiring and informative shyt page after page. I became hooked. This thread was my entertainment, my vision board, and my bible. I read this shyt obcessively over and over again to the poin I already knew what to do before I landed my first job.

Got my 1st job in IT after getting my A+ and following the advice in this thread starting at $18/hourly. 7 months later I got another jobs paying $28 an hour. Gotta pay raise 7 months after that making $34.00 an hour. From the time I got my 1st job, My life started to turn around like a muthafukker. Debt was being eliminated rapidly; Bills just evaporating, Having all this disposable income. Between me an my wife we bring home 8 G's or more a month now. Been able to work from home during this COVID bullshyt and I cant remember the last time we were even hurting for money. Sometimes we forget that we even got paid because we still got money sitting in the account from previous pay periods.


Even with all the success and blessing coming my way, I still read through this thread when I'm not home labbing, cert prepping or just living life. This shyt is a constant grind and you need to always be learning and and taking the initiative to invest in yourself, Having a mentor is good, but fukk that. Dont sit around waiting for muthafukkers to teach you how to do anything or pay for your certs. I dont care how much the certs cost or how much time you have to invest into learning and growing, This is the nature of the game and you need to get numb to it. Put your emotions and ego to the side and attack this game with relentless determination. Failure is to be expected but it aint shyt in the long run. Keep pushing and ignore the setbacks.

Dont matter how hard something is. If you want it, you will find a way to justify the energy you put into it. The key to becoming good at anything is repetition+time. Dont matter if you suck at it or cant fathom how you could ever do something you think is impossible. You have to be stubborn to the voice of your own inner resistance/self-doubt and just keep trying and one day shyt will just click and then it snowballs into competence, into expertise and finally into mastery.

You think Programming languages is impossible, You think Linux is spaceship magic wizardry that only the elite minds of the world can understand or that cloud is some spooky shyt that you will never be able to learn. It's all bullshyt. Keep pushing and time will do the rest of the work. In this game you will find your self around muthafukkas who are smarter and more experienced than you but fukk it let it be your motivation. You aint got to be the smartest to make top dollar, just be on top of your shyt with a some modicum of people skills and you will flourish. You'll be able to blow past all these gurus and nerds who have they expertise but non of the hustle or dirve to play i the big leagues. You will reach a point where you think you aint good enough but once again, it's all bullshyt. You are, even if your job doesnt acknowledge. Just get your weight up and bounce for a better one if need be.

All in all. you have to be willing to bet on your self and take initiative. I been through the shyt, people in this thread have been through the shyt, and you're gonna go through it as well.
Keep in mind that you're in control of your destiny in this IT game and when you hit a rough patch or start to doubt yourself, push thought it because it aint nothing but some ole bullshyt to learn from get better.

The world is your oyster my G's but you gotta believe it.
Stay solid and the success will come 100-fold. I promise you this.

Done.

Nothing but respect my g
You ever thought about teaching or publishing? You got beaucoup knowledge

 

[StretfordRed]

I would rather knock out all the free CTF's along with HtB and TryHackMe instead. Or until I can find a company to pay for my OSCP.

There are barely any courses like that on the BlueTeam side. The only thing I've found recently was this IR challenge by Cynet. No wonder everyone keeps getting owned by hackers.

Cynet Launches the First of its Kind Public Incident Response ‘Capture the Evidence’ Challenge – with a First Prize of $5,000 - Cynet

Thankfully my company is paying. I also knocked out my GCFA, GCFE (facilitation) via my company.

I’ve done a few Blue team CTF. SANS DFIR and Splunk Boss is the SOC were the more interesting ones.

OSCP is fun though and I like the learning of aspect of it. That’s what you don’t get with other labs. Back on it tomorrow anyway, sticking to 1 box a day otherwise it feels a bit disruptive

 

[StretfordRed]

Free Autopsy Training too, was $500

Autopsy | COVID-19 Free Autopsy Training

 

[I AM WE ARE]

Free Autopsy Training too, was $500

Autopsy | COVID-19 Free Autopsy Training

Signed up for this
+rep

 

[Rhyme n Tekniq]

Nothing but respect my g
You ever thought about teaching or publishing? You got beaucoup knowledge

I still got a ways to go breh, I'll always be a work in progress because i'm that dedicated to my craft

Far as teaching and publishing? not really , but I guess in a way I do. My goal is to get as many brehs and brehettes into IT as possible. I wanna pull people away from shytty careers in other industries break them offf with game that will set them on the path to financial freedom and a career they can take pride in.


There are so many socially inept a$$holes, pushy indians and elitist nerd tech hobbyist, in this industry playing "gatekeeper" with the knowledge, they have this attitude that if you aint been doing this shyt since the age of 5 then you dont have the true passion to be in IT.

Just pull up any thread related to IT on Reddit or Quora. You'll see a ton of dismissive, demoralizing, and bitter ass discussion going on.

You ask about certs or how to progress your career? They'll say some shyt like "certs are worthless" or "experience is king" or "if I was a hiring manger I wouldn't hiring anyone with certs...blah blah"

They speak alot of half-truths with bad intentions, play coy or just tell flat out lies to discourage newcomers from getting into IT. God Forbid more women and Black people get into the tech sector. These muthafukkers think it's their personal clubhouse..


This thread here? It's each one, teach one. I'm just doing my part to keep this thread going because in my honest opinion, it's the best part of this site. No e-beefing, trolling, race baiting, and constantly being hit with a barrage of depressing negative bullshyt like other subforums on this site.

This is probably the best IT related discussion I've ever come across and dare I say the whole internet. The energy is real, the content is rich, and most importantly, the people are helpful.

When you get the wind behind you and you start to come up, just be sure to reciprocate that energy to other brehs lost in the wilderness so to speak.

 

[Regine Hunter]

my mental is taking what should be a 1-2 month study, practicing and exam writing process stretch out to 9.
the fear, the self-doubt...shyt will have you waste mad time. I'm tryna get right. Time has been wasted, at this point I got these last weeks to get my shyt together as I really do not want to push my exam date back.

 

[Regine Hunter]

i still ain't figured out this VM thing

 

[Obreh Winfrey]

i still ain't figured out this VM thing

What are you having trouble with?

 

[xXMASHERXx]

i still ain't figured out this VM thing

Post what is causing you to have issues and maybe one of us can help.

 

[Obreh Winfrey]

Post what is causing you to have issues and maybe one of us can help.

at a rate of $55 per hour.

 

[KingTut]

After all the strides I've made in my short IT career I'm honestly burnt out. The constant on-call duties, the insane responsibility, having to work with demanding and stubborn clients, etc.

If I could leave IT and make as much money in another field I would quit my job today. I just have no idea what else I'd do. I'm not sure if I'm burnt out with IT or if I'm just realizing this working 8-9 hours/day for 5 days/week is the biggest scam on earth. I know I'm lucky as hell to be in my position but I'm just mentally drained.

 

[Rhyme n Tekniq]

After all the strides I've made in my short IT career I'm honestly burnt out. The constant on-call duties, the insane responsibility, having to work with demanding and stubborn clients, etc.

If I could leave IT and make as much money in another field I would quit my job today. I just have no idea what else I'd do. I'm not sure if I'm burnt out with IT or if I'm just realizing this working 8-9 hours/day for 5 days/week is the biggest scam on earth. I know I'm lucky as hell to be in my position but I'm just mentally drained.

I go through this feeling 2-3 weeks at a time but I pull through once things slow down, and i'm able to re-calibrate my mind and get back focused on my mission. Not all jobs in IT are this hectic and stress-inducing to the point you start having existential meltdowns and thinking about switching industries. Most people who are in this predicament that I know have been doing helpdesk for YEARS even a decade or more.

Helpdesk will always be helpdesk, It's not meant for most to stay there. It's the Burger and fries job of IT, a starting point you should be clawing and scratching to get the hell away from fast as you can

I dont know your particular situation but most cases of career burnout in IT is becasue people stay in helpdesk or high volume traffic type roles far too long

Prolly bout time to switch up and bounce for something better, because most of my roles have been a breeze with the exception of a few incidents here and there

 

[Rawtid]

After all the strides I've made in my short IT career I'm honestly burnt out. The constant on-call duties, the insane responsibility, having to work with demanding and stubborn clients, etc.

If I could leave IT and make as much money in another field I would quit my job today. I just have no idea what else I'd do. I'm not sure if I'm burnt out with IT or if I'm just realizing this working 8-9 hours/day for 5 days/week is the biggest scam on earth. I know I'm lucky as hell to be in my position but I'm just mentally drained.

IT is so expansive, so there are opportunities for you to explore other areas or specializations and not customer facing. It could also be the company you're working for. When I was doing help desk work, it was never demanding, but I also worked for a smaller company and eventually the state government.

Try looking for a Fed job. The application process is more streamlined, you just have to make sure the keywords in the job description are on your resume for the best chance. It's typically a more laid back environment, but with more opportunity to explore and advance.

 

[Regine Hunter]

Post what is causing you to have issues and maybe one of us can help.

at a rate of $55 per hour.

whoa
damn can i get a discount or something i'm just a po millenial tryna learn the 'puter

I'll break it back out later tonight with some screenshots.

 

[KingTut]

I go through this feeling 2-3 weeks at a time but I pull through once things slow down, and i'm able to re-calibrate my mind and get back focused on my mission. Not all jobs in IT are this hectic and stress-inducing to the point you start having existential meltdowns and thinking about switching industries. Most people who are in this predicament that I know have been doing helpdesk for YEARS even a decade or more.

Helpdesk will always be helpdesk, It's not meant for most to stay there. It's the Burger and fries job of IT, a starting point you should be clawing and scratching to get the hell away from fast as you can

I dont know your particular situation but most cases of career burnout in IT is becasue people stay in helpdesk or high volume traffic type roles far too long

Prolly bout time to switch up and bounce for something better, because most of my roles have been a breeze with the exception of a few incidents here and there

I work in the cloud sector currently. I think I just need to move out of operations and into the software development side. Last week a former colleague reached out to me about a security engineer position that opened up in his company. Tbh I think what's killing me the most is the on-call and client facing portion of the job. Might take a week of PTO to get my head right and start looking elsewhere.

IT is so expansive, so there are opportunities for you to explore other areas or specializations and not customer facing. It could also be the company you're working for. When I was doing help desk work, it was never demanding, but I also worked for a smaller company and eventually the state government.

Try looking for a Fed job. The application process is more streamlined, you just have to make sure the keywords in the job description are on your resume for the best chance. It's typically a more laid back environment, but with more opportunity to explore and advance.

Yeah my family has told me to start looking for some fed/state government positions if possible. I think I'll start looking into that possibility tonight.