Suggested Areas for IT Specialization?

6 months ago I started a new job after having been jobless since graduating from college in December 2003. Well, the place I work for is steadily downsizing IT. I've been through 2 large reorgs and will soon be moving on to my 5th boss in just 6 months. I haven't been on a task or under a manager long enough to gain any traction and actually learn anything useful. I've dabbled with MS Access, but then that project was trashed. I've been working with ASP.NET (as evidenced by several of my previous entries), but this last reorg rendered that work useless and I've had to shelve everything I had done. I'm right now in-between assignments. My old work has been canceled but I haven't been reassigned anywhere yet. Needless to say I'm less than confident in my job status. There is no security here right now and I wouldn't be surprised if all of IT isn't outsourced by the end of the year.

So I'm now faced with a problem I had before I got this job. I still need to find an area of specialization. I need to find an area of IT that I can latch onto and excel in. I'm hesitant towards programming as I'm not sure I want to spend all day typing out code on a screen. I like doing a bit of coding here and there on hobby projects but I'm not sure I'd do well with it as a profession.

What areas of IT have you all found interesting/worthwhile? I have a general Info Sci/Tech degree from Penn State, and little specific training in any area yet, so I'm essentially a clean slate.

Also, any suggestions for affordable training/certification programs? I've found that most companies put very little stock in being "self-taught" and want to have skills lists backed up by work experience or education. Well, I haven't developed much in my current job due to the constantly shifting nature of my work, so I need to look at outside training. Affordable is key because I will likely be out of work within the next year and need to bank as much money as I can.

Your help and suggestions are much appreciated.

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Phoon

Join Date 10/2001

+382

I'm beginning to think that it's not even worth it to pursue much in this industry anymore since MANY companies don't seem to value our skills in the first place. They would much rather outsource to companies in India rather than contribute to our economy. God forbid that they pass those savings down to the employees which they didn't boot either!!
Being entirely self-taught myself I can relate to your statement of companies attitude toward this. (even though you have more hands on experience and practical "real world" knowledge under your belt)..
That being said.. My personal opinion would be to go for MS Certifications of some degree. Stick with your job as long as you can because without the hands on experience, the MS Cert isn't worth the paper it is printed on. Lovely isn't it.. They won't hire you without Certs or experience alone.. you have to have both. Consider yourself luck that you have your foot in the door already.

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Zoomba

Join Date 11/2002

+114

There is a limit to what can be outsourced overseas. In reality you can only outsource menail, repetitive coding tasks. Maintenance and update stuff. Time and language barriers prevent really complex stuff from moving to India. Also, network management can't be outsourced since you want your staff on-site with the servers in case there's a physical problem.

When I say outsourcing in my article, I mean to another US-based company that would move its employees in here. We currently have another firm handling our desktop support, but they all physically work in this building with us.

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Lantec

Join Date 07/2003

+346

CAD Operators with IT knowledge are hard to come by. A good CAD operator can pick and chose his job and Wage wars erupt occasionally due to the lack of skilled individuals. I own a Civil Engineering Company and have no problem hiring engineers (5 year college degree and experience) I have to pay my CAD operators almost as much as the engineers to keep them. Typically they have less than 2 years college but do have 2-5 years experience. If you learn fast you should be able to use your other computer skills to get an entry level CAD job. It probably won't pay much at first but should keep up with your skill level as you improve. Look at smaller companies because they will want to protect the investment of training you. AutoCAD is the industry standard with Microstation making up a larger and larger market share each year.
Good Luck

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From what I'm seeing up here in the frozen North, people with junior qualifications are best to have either Java or .NET under their belts -- preferably with a bit of experience. Seeing as you've done a little ASP .NET, I'd try and go further down that road -- VB or C# if possible.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but to the old snobs like me, MCSE/MCSD/etc., are basically toilet paper versus real experience.

Long term, try and find an industry in your area and pick up its specialised skills/packages. For example, oil/gas and natural resource companies are looking for GIS people. Likewise, there're certain SAP or Peoplesoft (ugh) packages that specific groups (e.g., universities, insurance companies, etc.) usually rely on when they get to a certain size (i.e., unmanageable).

Good luck.

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