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PacketPushers.netInfrastructure Careers Are ChangingAre you thinking about Enterprise IT and your career ? Have youconsidered the possible impact of change to your career plans ? Somechanges are easy to see but many are not obvious. Are you ready ?Being prepared for industry change is a positive life choice and vital toa long and successful career. A career that spans forty or even fiftyyears and you will re-skill, re-train and reset your job several timesbefore you retire.How are you going to handle it ? Have you thought about recruiters ?Have you considered any career mistakes you have made ? What doesyour manager think of you ? What should you say ?Over the decade of podcasting as Packet Pushers, I've been sharing mylearning, research and thinking with so many people from differentareas of the world. Real people who have boring jobs, or work for badcompanies or have a manager who doesn't care.Publish: 5 May 2021 Packet Pushers Interactive LLC 20211 of 66

PacketPushers.netMost "self help" books talk about attitude, motivation, bad ideas andeasy fixes for a complex world. Thats not how it works.This book is the plain, blunt career advice that I would give you at theconference bar. In the real world, jobs can be awful, managers can befools, and the company doesn't care about you. Making decisions aboutlife and career choices isn't easy.I've got sections on how to survive the recruitment process, plain ideason getting paid, on making decisions and common career mistakes.Working in Enterprise IT Infrastructure is an outstanding careerchoice with high pay and good conditions. But several factors aredisrupting the status quo. Are you flexible, adaptable but mostimportantly, thinking about the changes you will have to survive.Four PartsThis book is published in four parts.Part 1: Surviving in a Changing WorldPart 2: Understanding Modern RecruitmentPart 3: Common Career MistakesPart 4: Evaluating YourselfYou can access this and much more content at Packet Pushers website.This book is Greg Ferro and Packet Pushers Interactive LLC.Publish: 5 May 2021 Packet Pushers Interactive LLC 20212 of 66

PacketPushers.netWhy This BookI've spent more than twenty five years working as an IT professional ofwhich fifteen years I worked short term contracts and changedemployers more than fifty times. I've applied for thousands of jobs,attended hundreds of interviews and managed a real life.The combination of my unusual career path makes me sensitive tomarket transitions. Early in my career, I survived the desktop PC,Novell NetWare and Windows NT technology fashions before movinginto networking. I've seen skills become boring and moved on quicklyto the next skillset.I worked for agencies, resellers, small & big companies, consultingfirms for adhoc/short/long periods. I've taken jobs as freelancer, temp,contract and perma-ployed. During the boom years of the early 2000's Iwas receiving up to eight calls a day from recruiters desperate foravailable candidates with the right skills.Publish: 5 May 2021 Packet Pushers Interactive LLC 20213 of 65

PacketPushers.netA few years went by and the market changed. The time between callsgot longer, the pay rate fell and those interviews were harder to get. Thedead time between contracts got longer, employers got pickier and Istarted missing more roles that I wanted. After several years of pickingthe best job, now I was taking whatever roles I could get before Itransitioned to a new hotter skillset to follow the latest fashion.I've been through this cycle four times. I offer some advice that mightwork for you or might assist in your own decisions.As the co-host of Packet Pushers I get to meet a lot of people and I'moften asked for career advice almost as much as I am about technology.Here is some tips that I would offer. You should definitely talk to otherpeople and get their take too.I wanted to share some of what I've learned with you because I thinkEnterprise IT is going out of fashion1 right now.Book Style1In fact, I started the Human Infrastructure newsletter http://packetpushers.net/human-infrastructure/ was started to talk aboutcareers on a regular basis.Publish: 5 May 2021 Packet Pushers Interactive LLC 20214 of 65

PacketPushers.netThis is a fast paced and blunt speaking book. Most likely you have someexperience in Enterprise IT and I assume that you are looking to bebetter, want more and get more from your life, both personal andprofessional Its geared towards understanding your career, job searchetc and less about planning your career from a learning perspective.As a co-host of Packet Pushers, I am often asked for career advice. Thisbook combines my own lived experience with hundreds ofconversations in dozens of countries.You won't walk away feeling happy or uplifted. There are no easyanswers, quick tips or fast successes because the real world is messy,complicated and confusing. Its not about training or education. Itsmostly about being mentally prepared for whatever is coming.TakeawaysKey takeaways in this book that I think I should list here: Removing headcount from IT teams is a key success factor for ITmanagement (but not for you) Businesses are choosing new ways to consume computing such as publiccloud and hyperconverged infrastructure. Your career should follow thistrend. 'Software Defined' will automate low value tasks. New jobs with higherskills and interesting work will be created. Your ego can prevent you from surviving and making the best decisions. Be honest about evaluating your career and whether you got lucky in thegrowth phase. Are you ready to move to the next job ? What is your exit strategy ? Social and political factors are driving change as much as currentbusiness fashion or technology. How to survive modern recruitment process with agencies andautomated human resources Tips on your resume and improving your attractiveness to employersPublish: 5 May 2021 Packet Pushers Interactive LLC 20215 of 65

PacketPushers.netAbout the AuthorGreg Ferro is a Network Architect and Engineer working. Over the last25 years or so he has worked across the industry for FTSE 250companies in Europe and previously across Australia and Asia Pacific.Greg specialised in the design and deployment of Data Centresincluding Network Fabrics, Data Security, Cloud and Internet. He hasworked as a consultant for high profile companies throughout Asia andEurope and now lives in the UK.Greg is the founder and co-host of the weekly “Packet PushersPodcast” at PacketPushers.net where he co-hosts interview withnetwork engineers, vendors and industry figures on a range of highlytechnical topics where the motto is “Too Much Networking WouldNever Be Enough”.Greg is widely known for his blog at EtherealMind.com and co-host ofPacket Pushers podcasts where he writes regularly about many aspectsof Data Networking since 2008. His personal, non-technical blog is atGregFerro.com.He has written for a number of recognised publications but now makesa living from podcasting at Packet Pushers.Publish: 5 May 2021 Packet Pushers Interactive LLC 20216 of 65

PacketPushers.netCopyright and VersionVersion 20180712: First issue.Version 20210405 : Second Issue. Many small changes and edits. Nomajor edits.This ebook is copyright in 2021 by Packet Pushers Interactive LLC.You are welcome to share this ebook with anyone and everyoneprovided that you do not modify or change the file in any way. Allattributions to the source website and author must remain. You maynot copy or steal content but you are welcome to quote provided yougive attribution to the source.I welcome your feedback - https://packetpushers.net/contactPublish: 5 May 2021 Packet Pushers Interactive LLC 20217 of 65

PacketPushers.netContributionsI would also welcome contributions. A collection of my views andopinions is necessarily incomplete. But I'm one of the few peoplewilling to write stuff down and publish it.It could be enhanced and improved by your contribution. Send me yourresponses, ideas and additions and perhaps I will include them in theupdated edition. This would make the book better and help morepeople make better decisions.Email careers@packetpushers.net with your thoughts andsubmissions.Publish: 5 May 2021 Packet Pushers Interactive LLC 20218 of 65

PacketPushers.netPart 1: Survival in a Changing MarketI've had personal experience of the boom and bust cycle in technologyjob markets over the last 30 years. I've worked as freelancer/contractorfor agencies or direct. I've worked direct with large and smallcompanies on a per-project basis (paid on completion) and aspermanent employee.In the 1980s, I was building and repairing x86 clone PCs hardwarewhile mastering MS-DOS. In the 1990s Novell NetWare was the hotthing before I migrated skills to Windows NT. Other skills have peakedand fallen, look at IBM AS400, mainframes and Unix systems.During the growth cycles, markets would boom and anyone withexperience could get hired. You could speak a few buzzwords youpicked up from reading magazines and be offered an entry levelposition. Pay rises, bonuses, expense accounts were easy to get andoften given.Publish: 5 May 2021 Packet Pushers Interactive LLC 20219 of 65

PacketPushers.netRecently the Enterprise IT market has stopped growing and demandhas stabilised. Other trends are public cloud, hyperconvergedinfrastructure, software defined networking and software,virtualization and containers. As the market matures companies arelooking for communication, team 'fit', emotional intelligence andability to change.Takeaway : When new technologies become 'old' technology, themarket shrinks for existing skills slows down and you should know itstime to invest, to 'skill up' and make the move into new areas. Or youmay be left adapting your career to a smaller market where you are nolonger the hot talent.Difficult Choices in A Changing MarketInfrastructure IT is changing dramatically. Cloud, hyper-convergenceand 'software defined' are some of the factors that are forcing change.You might not have heard of them but they are coming.The overall market for Enterprise IT people is changing and you arefaced with choices about your future.Publish: 5 May 2021 Packet Pushers Interactive LLC 202110 of 65

PacketPushers.netPublic cloud companies are reducing demand for existing skills.Hyperconverged systems reduce the work hours spent on basicoperations in storage, networking and compute. Cloud enablessoftware companies to host applications and sell them 'as-a-Service'.Some of the apps in your data centre will be replaced. Software iscoming to automate simple infrastructure tasks and replace others. Forexample, SD-WAN vendors offers cloud-based software to providegood WAN monitoring services removing the need to monitor yourWAN.What does this mean ? Instead of picking the position you want withthe best location, good company or role that advances your long termplans you may have to choose a role with an employer you don't likewith works that don't interest you (or worse).You might find your current skills losing relevance. Maybe you are lessimportant as new technologies get the attention. It could be that yourskills aren't used any more and you have to choose to retrain or leave.Takeaway:Be prepared to change your expectations if you don't have manychoices.It may take longer to find a role or you need to work harder on yourimage & presentation.Publish: 5 May 2021 Packet Pushers Interactive LLC 202111 of 65