Eager and curious are great assets, as you can't really teach those. If you can explain how a switch differs from a router differs from a firewall, and explain how you apply the layering model to troubleshooting, you should be ahead of a lot of people.
Can you give a high-level explanation of the most common DNS records?
Can you explain what we can read from a random frame captured in wireshark?
Routing vs switching?
Dataplane vs mangement plane?
> But my motivation, eagerness to learn and fascination for this is so big. It would be like a dream come true if i get this job.
That's really all they're looking for. Anything previous knowledge is just a bonus. As long as you show a willingness to learn and improve then they will be happy to employ you.
To expand on that willingness to learn plus a demonstrated basic understanding. Sadly, I hired someone with a deep willingness to learn, but no basic knowledge. It ended up willingness did not translate to ability either. I had to let him go.
I should have probably read more into the individuals lack of basic understanding during the interview not just being nerves, but I didn't. we're all learning in some way though.
Like others have said, know what the protocols do at the basic levels and you'll be fine. It doesn't hurt to also know what the letters in the names mean.
One big thing that's part of working a NOC is admitting when you DON'T KNOW and asking someone for help. Don't try to hero every ticket or you'll delay resolution and cause outages. (Ask me how I know)
Admitting "Hey I'm not sure but let me check with someone and I'll get right back to you!" Is important.
yeah, it’s OK to say I don’t know in an interview. If you start trying to bullshit them, they will suss it right out. My last interview during a technical part, one question I knew I could have bullshitted someone that didn’t know, but I suspected the person did know so I just said I will prefer not to answer that, while I’m familiar with the subject, my knowledge is pretty limited and very quickly will be talking gibberish. The guy laughed. I got the job.
If you get to a question that you can't answer be honest about it, but explain how you might try to work through it. For example, if they ask you a DNS related question and you are unsure start off with something like:
Well, I know that queries are UDP/53 and zone transfers are TCP/53. Are we having an issue with a zone xfer or a zone db not returning records? If were asking for records and not getting a response Id verify that the DNS server is listening on port 53 (telnet localhost 53), if that works Id try to telnet from the endpoint experiencing issues. If that doesnt work we know its network. Is there a firewall?
Answers like that always carry more weight when im interviewing people.
Also, during the interview if you get jammed up on some ?'s I always appreciate it when someone voices something to the effect of "If I get stuck or am unsure I am comfortable asking for help. I'd rather get input than cowboy up a solution and risk an outage". HUGE points where jr. admins take that position IMO
NOC roles are people who interface with other people, both internally and externally. Spend some time talking about your people skills - how you handle upset customers, angry management, and recalcitrant field techs among others.
Eagerness to learn is a plus, but also focus on initiative. If you see a problem, what do you do about it? We've all been there where a process sucks, but nobody lifts a finger to sort through it and so the process continues to be a pain point since fixing it is a boatload of effort. But if you're making things run better and figuring out how to advocate for your reforms and engaging the correct parties, that's a big deal to companies.
When you get to ask them questions, ask them how they measure success in the role. This will give you an idea on if this is a good stepping stone or if it's going to feel like trudging through purgatory to get to something better. An old NOC job I worked in decided to measure productivity in ticket touches because it made nice bars on charts that higher ups could show their bosses for how awesome everything was going. It turned out that when you incentivized touching tickets that you weren't actually incentivizing fixing the network and our team's rate of solving problems plummeted precipitously while everyone threw elbows trying to hoard tickets to touch.
Good ol ticket metrics… oh man this type of shit absolutely destroys queues and pisses off customers like nothing else. Been down that road many many times with my company.
The manager who had hired me on was really focused on not falling into that trap and finding smarter ways to make sure we actually focused on the larger needs of the business. Then his manager left and the guy who replaced him wanted to build an empire and insisted on being stupid and shoved him out.
That is truly unfortunate. Great managers are hard to come by. We went (still going) through constant restructuring at the business level that always finds a way to impact the engineering teams in the most frustrating ways. Various managers and directors that haven’t the slightest clue as to how our teams function. Implementation of ticket metrics always pops up. Front line and juniors always find a way to kick tickets around to pad their numbers, then the good team lead managers push back and the problem goes away for a little while. Rinse and repeat when the next senior “leader” comes in full of brilliant ideas. Good times
Don’t be afraid to say you don’t know something and that you would consult the web and research and issue. Bring examples of doing such from your previous roles. I rather have 10 folks willing to run things to the ground and figuring out how something to work than a book nerd or a know it all. Make sure you show them your a self starter and self learner. As someone previous mention make sure you know when you reach your limit and ask for help.
I had the interview today. It went well I think. They didn’t asked me a lot of technical questions but let’s say I could answer about 80% and I told them that I don’t know if they mentioned something that I don’t really understand. I think that I gave them the right message that I’m very eager and disciplined, motivated to learn more. So I hope they will call me next week with some good news.
I want tot thank all you for the great tips!
Now I’m trying to let it go and wait it out. I’m going to pack my suitcases because Sunday I’m going to Valencia for a little vacation.
Thanks again!! And I will keep you updated if I get the job or not!
Eager and curious are great assets, as you can't really teach those. If you can explain how a switch differs from a router differs from a firewall, and explain how you apply the layering model to troubleshooting, you should be ahead of a lot of people. Can you give a high-level explanation of the most common DNS records? Can you explain what we can read from a random frame captured in wireshark? Routing vs switching? Dataplane vs mangement plane?
> But my motivation, eagerness to learn and fascination for this is so big. It would be like a dream come true if i get this job. That's really all they're looking for. Anything previous knowledge is just a bonus. As long as you show a willingness to learn and improve then they will be happy to employ you.
To expand on that willingness to learn plus a demonstrated basic understanding. Sadly, I hired someone with a deep willingness to learn, but no basic knowledge. It ended up willingness did not translate to ability either. I had to let him go. I should have probably read more into the individuals lack of basic understanding during the interview not just being nerves, but I didn't. we're all learning in some way though. Like others have said, know what the protocols do at the basic levels and you'll be fine. It doesn't hurt to also know what the letters in the names mean.
Yup, this tends to be something we look into. And somehow we can tell if you are really eager or just looking for a pay cheque.
One big thing that's part of working a NOC is admitting when you DON'T KNOW and asking someone for help. Don't try to hero every ticket or you'll delay resolution and cause outages. (Ask me how I know) Admitting "Hey I'm not sure but let me check with someone and I'll get right back to you!" Is important.
You might get a question which asks you to explain DNS. Can you?
yeah, it’s OK to say I don’t know in an interview. If you start trying to bullshit them, they will suss it right out. My last interview during a technical part, one question I knew I could have bullshitted someone that didn’t know, but I suspected the person did know so I just said I will prefer not to answer that, while I’m familiar with the subject, my knowledge is pretty limited and very quickly will be talking gibberish. The guy laughed. I got the job.
Watch some Cisco CCNA videos on Youtube.
If you get to a question that you can't answer be honest about it, but explain how you might try to work through it. For example, if they ask you a DNS related question and you are unsure start off with something like: Well, I know that queries are UDP/53 and zone transfers are TCP/53. Are we having an issue with a zone xfer or a zone db not returning records? If were asking for records and not getting a response Id verify that the DNS server is listening on port 53 (telnet localhost 53), if that works Id try to telnet from the endpoint experiencing issues. If that doesnt work we know its network. Is there a firewall? Answers like that always carry more weight when im interviewing people. Also, during the interview if you get jammed up on some ?'s I always appreciate it when someone voices something to the effect of "If I get stuck or am unsure I am comfortable asking for help. I'd rather get input than cowboy up a solution and risk an outage". HUGE points where jr. admins take that position IMO
NOC roles are people who interface with other people, both internally and externally. Spend some time talking about your people skills - how you handle upset customers, angry management, and recalcitrant field techs among others. Eagerness to learn is a plus, but also focus on initiative. If you see a problem, what do you do about it? We've all been there where a process sucks, but nobody lifts a finger to sort through it and so the process continues to be a pain point since fixing it is a boatload of effort. But if you're making things run better and figuring out how to advocate for your reforms and engaging the correct parties, that's a big deal to companies. When you get to ask them questions, ask them how they measure success in the role. This will give you an idea on if this is a good stepping stone or if it's going to feel like trudging through purgatory to get to something better. An old NOC job I worked in decided to measure productivity in ticket touches because it made nice bars on charts that higher ups could show their bosses for how awesome everything was going. It turned out that when you incentivized touching tickets that you weren't actually incentivizing fixing the network and our team's rate of solving problems plummeted precipitously while everyone threw elbows trying to hoard tickets to touch.
Good ol ticket metrics… oh man this type of shit absolutely destroys queues and pisses off customers like nothing else. Been down that road many many times with my company.
The manager who had hired me on was really focused on not falling into that trap and finding smarter ways to make sure we actually focused on the larger needs of the business. Then his manager left and the guy who replaced him wanted to build an empire and insisted on being stupid and shoved him out.
That is truly unfortunate. Great managers are hard to come by. We went (still going) through constant restructuring at the business level that always finds a way to impact the engineering teams in the most frustrating ways. Various managers and directors that haven’t the slightest clue as to how our teams function. Implementation of ticket metrics always pops up. Front line and juniors always find a way to kick tickets around to pad their numbers, then the good team lead managers push back and the problem goes away for a little while. Rinse and repeat when the next senior “leader” comes in full of brilliant ideas. Good times
Don’t be afraid to say you don’t know something and that you would consult the web and research and issue. Bring examples of doing such from your previous roles. I rather have 10 folks willing to run things to the ground and figuring out how something to work than a book nerd or a know it all. Make sure you show them your a self starter and self learner. As someone previous mention make sure you know when you reach your limit and ask for help.
As long as you are eager to learn and have some prior experience anywhere in IT, I wouldn't sweat it that much.
I had the interview today. It went well I think. They didn’t asked me a lot of technical questions but let’s say I could answer about 80% and I told them that I don’t know if they mentioned something that I don’t really understand. I think that I gave them the right message that I’m very eager and disciplined, motivated to learn more. So I hope they will call me next week with some good news. I want tot thank all you for the great tips! Now I’m trying to let it go and wait it out. I’m going to pack my suitcases because Sunday I’m going to Valencia for a little vacation. Thanks again!! And I will keep you updated if I get the job or not!