What BASH and SSH Mean for Windows Systems Administration
-
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
really? You think most people in this world are willing to relocate, but somehow IT personal aren't? Why would that be?
You asked about careers, I thought. Most people just worked low end jobs wherever they are. Whatever is available. Unskilled work, not in a career.
You inferred careers. But I suppose I'll give ya that one - still most people I know haven't moved.
-
@coliver said:
@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
We live in the era of relocation. Inability to relocate is a total yoke for nearly any profession. Doesn't matter what you do: teach high school, electrical engineer, IT, muralist, concert pianist, actor, pilot.... if you are unable to relocate your career pretty much stops. It's not just that opportunities disappear, but the few remaining employers know that they own you and that you have no leverage so your "market value" disappears.
When did this era start? I guess it started when cars became affordable to the every-man. So this isn't something new. Outside of the military I know very few people who have moved into or out of my city. Not saying it doesn't happen, I just don't feel like it's a common, or even considered normal thing.
Does that leave employers in the driver's seat? Sure.
Oh wait - maybe this is one of those, the just because the normal person doesn't do it, doesn't make it wrong type situations you always have on hand. Now that I'll give you. But humans by nature aren't very nomadic, that was neanderthal.
Growing up we never lived in one place for more then 2 years. One place we stayed for 6 months. Although from my experience in most places we grew up we were the exception and not the rule.
Growing up for me wasn't that volatile. Dad in the Air Force, we moved every 2-4 years until Nebraska, been here since 84.
-
@Dashrender said:
@coliver said:
@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
We live in the era of relocation. Inability to relocate is a total yoke for nearly any profession. Doesn't matter what you do: teach high school, electrical engineer, IT, muralist, concert pianist, actor, pilot.... if you are unable to relocate your career pretty much stops. It's not just that opportunities disappear, but the few remaining employers know that they own you and that you have no leverage so your "market value" disappears.
When did this era start? I guess it started when cars became affordable to the every-man. So this isn't something new. Outside of the military I know very few people who have moved into or out of my city. Not saying it doesn't happen, I just don't feel like it's a common, or even considered normal thing.
Does that leave employers in the driver's seat? Sure.
Oh wait - maybe this is one of those, the just because the normal person doesn't do it, doesn't make it wrong type situations you always have on hand. Now that I'll give you. But humans by nature aren't very nomadic, that was neanderthal.
Growing up we never lived in one place for more then 2 years. One place we stayed for 6 months. Although from my experience in most places we grew up we were the exception and not the rule.
Growing up for me wasn't that volatile. Dad in the Air Force, we moved every 2-4 years until Nebraska, been here since 84.
That would be very difficult for me. I get anxiety if I don't get a feeling of home for an extended period of time like moving to a new place etc.
-
@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
really? You think most people in this world are willing to relocate, but somehow IT personal aren't? Why would that be?
You asked about careers, I thought. Most people just worked low end jobs wherever they are. Whatever is available. Unskilled work, not in a career.
You inferred careers. But I suppose I'll give ya that one - still most people I know haven't moved.
But... you live in a place where people would only move FROM not TO, right? So that should be expected.
-
@scottalanmiller said:
Our parents generation (those about to retire) were the first of the relocation generation. We are the mobile generation... always on the move. Everyone I know with a vibrant career moves regularly for it. All fields, all company types. Moving regularly is just part of a normal career now. For our parents it was "the first generation to broadly leave home" and not work in their home town. For us, we are the generation that never settles down.
That's probably the opposite for me. Maybe it depends on your definition of "vibrant career" - maybe my friends don't have vibrant careers, but they don't tend to move much. I liked to move around when I was younger, but now I stay put mainly for my kids - they don't want to have to move and make new friends and go to a new school.
-
@Carnival-Boy said:
@scottalanmiller said:
Our parents generation (those about to retire) were the first of the relocation generation. We are the mobile generation... always on the move. Everyone I know with a vibrant career moves regularly for it. All fields, all company types. Moving regularly is just part of a normal career now. For our parents it was "the first generation to broadly leave home" and not work in their home town. For us, we are the generation that never settles down.
That's probably the opposite for me. Maybe it depends on your definition of "vibrant career" - maybe my friends don't have vibrant careers, but they don't tend to move much. I liked to move around when I was younger, but now I stay put mainly for my kids - they don't want to have to move and make new friends and go to a new school.
but aren't you in... London?
-
So?
Anyway, I live about 60 miles north of London. Not many people commute there from here.
-
@Carnival-Boy said:
So?
Anyway, I live about 60 miles north of London. Not many people commute there from here.
I specifically mentioned that people in NY and London are often a rare exemption from the need to constantly move as the only two markets of their size and type in the world.
-
I can only think of certain careers like say, banking or the media, where you have to live in London or NY. Other careers you can work anywhere. There may be more IT jobs in London than elsewhere in the UK, but there's still a massive IT market outside of London. A career in IT certainly doesn't mean you have to move to London.
-
@Carnival-Boy said:
I can only think of certain careers like say, banking or the media, where you have to live in London or NY. Other careers you can work anywhere. There may be more IT jobs in London than elsewhere in the UK, but there's still a massive IT market outside of London. A career in IT certainly doesn't mean you have to move to London.
In the US it certainly means NYC. There are very, very limited high end IT options outside of NYC. SF has some, but they are very niche. Texas has some, but they are limited and very limited if you don't treat Texas (much bigger than the UK) as a single market.
Even in the UK, there are no broad career options in the other cities like in London. Not even close. There are options here and there, but trying to make a career in any city other than London (and to some degree even London) is going to hold you back.
But in the US, thinking that you can have a vibrant career rooting yourself outside of NYC is folly. You might get lucky, but you are one in a thousand. The ability to move up is severely hampered in the smaller markets.
-
How do you define "vibrant career" and "high end IT"? I don't even know what these jobs are. Cambridge is a big technology centre in the UK (ARM is based there), as is Reading (Microsoft), although to an American these places would probably be considered London suburbs.
In my town, the motor industry is big. I have a friend who definitely has a "vibrant career" as an engineer for Mercedes.
-
@Carnival-Boy said:
How do you define "vibrant career" and "high end IT"? I don't even know what these jobs are. Cambridge is a big technology centre in the UK (ARM is based there), as is Reading (Microsoft), although to an American these places would probably be considered London suburbs.
We have places like that in the US, but IT doesn't exist at those places. Austin, for example. Great for tech and developers, but almost zero IT. What little IT there is is half the standard US wages. San Fran is like that, sounds great but there is very little IT there. Only a fraction of what you would expect.
Vibrant meaning getting to do awesome IT work, being taken seriously, making respectable money, continuously being able to move forward in your career, getting creative and business challenges.... all the things people understand with a vibrant career in any field.
Examples are... do you make six figures by say thirty, do you continue to move forward your entire career (everyone has a set back now and then), do you never really worry about finding the next job, do you get regular promotions internally or externally, can you keep moving forward without changing careers (like to management) .... basically are you doing what most anyone in IT can do with ambition or are you far below?
Look at SW, for example. The average person feels that they are stagnating at work, that they have no path forward, that moving beyond $60K is impossible (except MAYBE as a manager), that they are barred for [insert random excuse] from any possible advancement, that they spend their time fighting to get to do their jobs instead of doing good work... basically unrewarded mentally or financially.
Then look at people who are willing to relocate. Regularly earning 200 - 300% of the SW "caps", excited about their jobs, respected at work, spend their time doing IT not fighting to be allowed to work, etc.
Relocation is certainly not the only factor. But in looking at many thousands of IT people, the relocation factor is often staggeringly tied to how much people get stuck in one category or get to move into the other.
-
@Carnival-Boy said:
...although to an American these places would probably be considered London suburbs.
Correct, all commuting distance of the singular market.
-
Pretty much every job conversation that I have with people who are unhappy with their current situation comes down to the same factor... location. I talk to people about this all the time and almost never is "you learned the wrong technologies a factor." Oh sure, I might nudge them to pick up PowerShell or whatever, but that is not what holds them back. It's that they are in a location where no one is hiring. Every time.
-
Here is a limited example....
If you want to work in systems administration in the US, once you cross the $150K mark, there are just four markets that really hire in the US (other than one off jobs) and those are NYC, NOVA, Chicago and San Fran.
However, NYC, NOVA and Chicago mostly hire only traditional system admins and San Fran almost exclusively DevOps. But you can't get into DevOps without a lot of non-DevOps experience.
There is almost no path from wherever you start to DevOps within San Fran. For any reasonable option, you have to do your early career elsewhere and then move there. And that's why I've never met a person who did their IT career in that market, even though it is insanely large.
Nearly all markets, outside of NYC and London, have huge gaps in the skill sets that they have in their market. Often these gaps are in the middle of the "ladder" or at the "top". SF is weird that it is at the bottom. To get around these gaps either you have to be insanely lucky or you have to move to a place that doesn't have the gap that you are ready to fill.
IT suffers a lot from this.
-
OK, so you're not talking about most people. Most people don't earn 6 figure salaries by the time they're 30. Most people don't move that much.
-
Studies show that careers do best (people are happiest, learn the most, advance the quickest, gain experience faster and get paid far more) when there is a high density of good people doing the same thing in the same region. They feed off of each other. This is why VCs and developers all congregate in the valley, it's the network effect.
IT is the same. If you work in a lone location without peers you tend to, just like any career, not excel like you do if you have a support network.
-
@Carnival-Boy said:
OK, so you're not talking about most people. Most people don't earn 6 figure salaries by the time they're 30. Most people don't move that much.
I specifically said not most people, just most IT career people. People who have careers mostly move (or get to NYC/London and then don't have to) relatively often or accept that they are letting their careers slow or stop. A few get lucky, but it seems to be pretty few.
-
Not that moving to London will necessarily help that much. If only it were that easy. Do an IT job search for jobs over $150k - I bet there won't be much. How many wage earning, non-managerial, IT people earn over $150k, either in London, NY, or anywhere?
-
@Carnival-Boy said:
Not that moving to London will necessarily help that much. If only it were that easy. Do an IT job search for jobs over $150k -
Well, I know that my circles are skewed, especially in London as I was the cheap offsite labour for London for a long time, but 200K quid, not dollars, I might now 500 or so non-management IT people getting that in London personally.
