Where do I go now?

Hi,

Its great that you're becoming certified. The more certifications and qualifications you have, the better. So chhose another one that interests you and go for it!

But I think you've hit the nail on the head yourself! What you learn in these courses has little bearing on what happens 90% of the time in the real world.

Sure, you need to know what you CAN do to make something work, but often for the specifics and commands you need, you'll look up them up in the manual... More often than not, its the process you follow to get things done that is more important than the detailed knowledge you have at the beginning.

Working for free to get experience? Excellent! Its hard to get a job without experience and by working for a charity or whatever, you're both gaining experience and showing potential employers that you're a self starter.

What to do next? Well, you could start applying for jobs. It may take a while so dont get too disheartened. The market is right down now... but it will happen eventually and if this is what you enjoy doing, then this is definitely the right move!

I've noticed you on the forums a few times and I guess you're here because you like it... that is a good indication to me that you like what you're doing. Stick with it!

And good luck.
Cheers,
Tim.

This question was closed by the author

Congratulations on your study effort, best of luck on your pending certification, and congratulations on your first day of work. And I support all that Tim said as encouragement to keep pressing forward.

Now if you take a moment and look at whatyou said and think about it a bit you will see your answer as to where your going to need to look. You indicate WANS and routing and etc, does this happen in a single office small company. Maybe but they probably have someone put that in for themand call those people when they need help. In a larger company, or even a smaller one with several offices, they are going to be thinking of good connections and MAN WAN. And companies that sell CISCO products, new and old probably have to have some people that know how to do it correct, or be able to test before they put them out there. And what makes all these Cisco things talk together, wires and telephones and ISP, ahh maybe then its telephone companies or cable companies or ISP,ASP's, or....
Or maybe somebody just hires a person when they have a Cisco problem so that would be a service or repair company that says We Do Cisco.

See where I'm pointing here. If your going to want to be in the thick of it, you need to be placing your attention to those entities that use or do it a lot. Bigger companies, companies with more than one office, companies that setup and service telecommunications. Multi location, School systems, Government, multi national companies, ISP's etc etc.
Now if the person your talking with doesn't recognize CCNA or Cisco, be nice give them a little overview of what it means and where it is used and then go find someone else to talk to because it is clear they don't have a need, or at the very least they aren't the one to be talking to. Or ask them who fixes or makes changes for their CISCO equipment, or wide area connections, and then go talk to them.

(finishing above, I never seem to find the comment button)

Hope that gives you something to think about. Be realistic. Depending on where you are there may not be a lot of jobs right now that have the focus your looking for and there can be many people with qualifications that are better then yours, for right now. But what you want to know and work with is who MIGHT hire you and keep a list of all those places, who to talk to, complete application, go to interviews, go back to those places again and again (not right away of course) and keep at it till you break through.

And then keep in mind there is a bunch of computer stuff that is all around those switches and routers and stuff. Sometimes you have to just get in, then work towards being the one to get to work with them.

Hope that gives you some ideas, and remember, there can be many roads to a single point, don't be worried about the length, just enjoy the journey along the way.

Thanks to all of you guys for the encouragement, it really helps, Im gonna stick to it and be pacient,as some of you said Ill focus on enjoying the ride!Ill be persistent on reaching my goal.
Thanks to all of you guys!
MDL3