Am I too old to enter tech industry?

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gzt

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#2193203 7-Mar-2019 20:12

GreenApples: Does anyone here recommend the ISTQB Foundation Level tester certificate?

For a test job it's a potential advantage. At around $300 for the exam it's good value as a cert.

Would this certificate be able to land an entry level role in a company?

It doesn't have much weight by itself. It's also a significant investment in study time that you might be better off using elsewhere - especially if your goal is programming.

GreenApples

16 posts

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#2193817 8-Mar-2019 17:38

gzt:
GreenApples: Does anyone here recommend the ISTQB Foundation Level tester certificate?

For a test job it's a potential advantage. At around $300 for the exam it's good value as a cert.

Would this certificate be able to land an entry level role in a company?

It doesn't have much weight by itself. It's also a significant investment in study time that you might be better off using elsewhere - especially if your goal is programming.

Do many people in the industry have this certification?

gzt

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#2198292 14-Mar-2019 22:43

Yes, it's very common.

voicetech

38 posts

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#2198440 15-Mar-2019 10:14

One of my problems is that I don't have work experience history. My biggest work experience was being a red cross volunteer helping refugees resettle for a couple of years. I don't have a history of transferable skills.

I'm looking for a means to an end. But hearing about graduate stories is pretty depressing.

A great thing about coding for web is that you can just jump in and start doing it. Financially speaking there's a low barrier to entry. Do online courses to learn the basics. In the coding world you need to do things to learn - so start building your own projects, simple ones at first, then more complex as you get better.

Then after a while you'll have a portfolio of sites that you can refer to when looking for work. Showing good recent examples mixed with real enthusiasm will matter more in getting a job than what you've done for the last 20 years.

If you don't have the skills (= not putting the effort in to learn and practice them), or you're just "looking for a means to an end", then you'll struggle to get a job in this industry without some very good luck or great contacts.

dc2daylight

87 posts

Master Geek

#2198460 15-Mar-2019 10:40

I have the ISTQB level one certification, and like A+ which I also have consider it mostly a waste of time and money... It does teach you about all the buzzwords and process descriptions that formal software testing utilizes, but despite this virtually every single tester role I searched for afterward always mandated previous experience of at least a year, the usual NZ Tech industry catch22 and gotcha.

My provider for the ISTQB certificate was a fly-by-nighter startup which has most likely disappeared by now. The courses were however free as in beer, and you had to wonder if their CEO and I use that term lightly might have been partaking of the golden amber a little too often himself. There were many problems with course delivery which was 90% online, and they had even appropriated some government funding, which should never have been granted as they were highly dodgy. They had promised to place us all in Jobs , but it soon became apparent that there were few to none, or else they were actually minor internal projects or those of their associates back home in India.

I did actually enjoy learning about software testing, and would like to try it, but the Industry in a country of NZs size seems so small and competitive versus how many people get this certification, and the experience needed first - catch22 that I would advise instead focusing on Programming which is what I should have done, or even better Project Management or Electronics Engineering at degree level.

My background is as a PC Hardware Technician, as the role used to be described, and I learnt far more from a night course I did at AUT in 1994 (ATI as it was known then) run by a Lecturer from their Engineering department. By the second night he was describing calling interrupts in software programs in Dos, and referencing standard BIOS functions in Assembler. Sadly AUT is so corporate and hipster now that I doubt they could offer a course of the level of quality as the extremely comprehensive "Certificate in IBM PC servicing" delivered back then.

I've been out of work a long time, which makes my situation worse, but to the OP - I learnt far more about the hardware side of things from a combination of constant self-learning, being an electronics hobbyist, and working for myself and a few other small businesses over the years. Sometimes for free as in work experience too. In my opinion practical experience trumps theory and formal education most of the time, but sadly recruitment agencies and HR departments think in terms of certification acronym lists and who you have worked for already.

I think sometimes the tall poppy syndrome applies quite strongly to our burgeoning high tech sector in this country, and that more Kiwi's need to offer a hand-up to each other instead of suggesting "send more applications" or "you aren't trying hard enough". To get a foot in the door here is about who you know more than what you know sadly I think. So the more the OP can network with others the better. Meetup groups would probably be a really good way to scope out where opportunities are to be found, and sometimes even the right pub carefully selected near some prominent businesses could be a plan as well.

graham007

221 posts

Master Geek

#2198461 15-Mar-2019 10:43

Am trying to help a friend get a entry - lower mid level IT / IT support role / network hardware role, if anyone is hiring here, please help out, his visa is almost run out, he needs a job else he would need to head back home.

frankmachine

56 posts

Master Geek

#2278607 17-Jul-2019 21:24

You're not alone... I'm 50, I have been doing IT Support/IT Manager/Sys Admin/Tech Support roles in Auckland since 1996. Almost exclusively Wintel desktops, servers, printers, phones... etc etc... quite a generalist and have seen a lot of water pass under the bridge so to speak. I've worked for the nations airline and I was also the sole IT resource for one of NZ's most famous startups in recent history.

I've applied for an awful lot of jobs, particularly in the past year, never aiming too high, never exaggerating a single thing, yet have managed to get only 3 interviews and have landed nothing. About 75% of roles applied for I never heard a single whisper back.

Thoughts?

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Technofreak

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#2278620 17-Jul-2019 21:49

frankmachine:

You're not alone... I'm 50, I have been doing IT Support/IT Manager/Sys Admin/Tech Support roles in Auckland since 1996. Almost exclusively Wintel desktops, servers, printers, phones... etc etc... quite a generalist and have seen a lot of water pass under the bridge so to speak. I've worked for the nations airline and I was also the sole IT resource for one of NZ's most famous startups in recent history.

I've applied for an awful lot of jobs, particularly in the past year, never aiming too high, never exaggerating a single thing, yet have managed to get only 3 interviews and have landed nothing. About 75% of roles applied for I never heard a single whisper back.

Thoughts?

Thoughts?

I'd hazard a guess you don't have a university qualification. So many recruiters these days seem to think a degree is necessary even to be the office cleaner.

Then again perhaps you're aiming to low for your experience or perhaps your CV needs jazzing up a bit. Sometimes the old saying "Fake it till you make it" holds true too. Don't undersell yourself.

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SpartanVXL

1314 posts

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#2278742 18-Jul-2019 10:19

frankmachine:
You're not alone... I'm 50, I have been doing IT Support/IT Manager/Sys Admin/Tech Support roles in Auckland since 1996. Almost exclusively Wintel desktops, servers, printers, phones... etc etc... quite a generalist and have seen a lot of water pass under the bridge so to speak. I've worked for the nations airline and I was also the sole IT resource for one of NZ's most famous startups in recent history.

I've applied for an awful lot of jobs, particularly in the past year, never aiming too high, never exaggerating a single thing, yet have managed to get only 3 interviews and have landed nothing. About 75% of roles applied for I never heard a single whisper back.

Thoughts?

IT support you might be too ‘experienced’ for.

IT manager they’ll be looking for management traits, project/product manager cert or experience etc.

Sysadmin nowadays they’ll want people who can code, its moving into automation now so without coding skills you’ll be passed over those who can. For Microsoft shops Powershell, some .NET etc. and if you’re *nix (or have to look after unix boxes, and for places that have them don’t say you “can’t”) bash/python or whatever you need to do the job.

Tech Support again might be due to your ‘experience’.

gzt

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#2278949 18-Jul-2019 13:09

frankmachine: I've applied for an awful lot of jobs, particularly in the past year, never aiming too high, never exaggerating a single thing, yet have managed to get only 3 interviews and have landed nothing. About 75% of roles applied for I never heard a single whisper back.

Are you on LinkedIn? Recruiters seem to be very proactive there. Some search very specifically so breaking a suite into application names, providers into services and things like that can help them.

noeltj

12 posts

Geek

#2308416 30-Aug-2019 12:20

Never, i had someone study with me who was in his early 60's who wanted a change in career while he was stepping into retirement .

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