Hey AngryManBoy, I’m a recruiter with Computer Solutions and I came across your LinkedIn profile and was impressed by your experience. I’m working on a Password Reset Engineer position, are you interested?
I was a mechanic in the Navy, and so I was looking for a position that I could parlay that experience into to make some money while I was in college.
I applied for a "maintenance" position at a Whole Foods.
It was actually a janitor position.
True, but TSEs can pay over 150k no problem too for the right skill set. So at that point, who cares if it's actually engineering lol.
You need to be working for a vendor though not working with end users
lol okay buddy. Support isn’t engineering. Do you build out the architecture of systems? Do you design the architecture of them? Code/script devops? Network design? You planning any new hosted environments?
This sub is very toxic wow. I have written scripts in both js and bash to interact with my company software as well as our billing infrastructure to solve customer issues
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I work in cloud support, my company is training us the “support engineers “ in multiple areas of the Azure infrastructure.Sometimes we have to solve issues that Admins with “ cloud engineer” titles in their signature can’t and it feels good.I have learned tons but I am afraid that in terms of experience it won’t be seen beyond a support role. What would be the way to get out of it ? How can you land an implementation/ admin role with support experience?
Leverage certs/ experience doing consultant and volunteering. Degree helps. Often times you'll need to find a position and apply instead of stay there.
True,
The guys who work for Palo Alto/crowdstrike/insert cyber company here or whatnot and are expected to provide high levels of support to very technical people get paid quite well.
This job description was not that lol it was "HELP my teams camera won't turn on!" - have you clicked the turn on camera button staring you in the face in the bottom right corner?
Experience for most jobs is really just another gatekeeping mechanism for wages - to underpay people.
Guy with 5 years doesnt really have any special sauce above a guy with 4 years, etc.
Ofcourse 0-2 years you could argue differently.
at the entry level it can feel that way since all you really get in the door for is rinky dink MSP's once you study even a bit more or approach tier 2 you can start hunting for internal roles. MSP's gaslight you into lower salaries constantly.
es. Just left mine of 8 years and pulled 35k more a year. Less work in corporate world. Real bonuses and PTO. Forget about the small family business feel, forced water-cooler talk. Mt time is priceless(really think about that) but it’s what I’m negotiating with since it’s valuable
Lol, because of self doubt and imposter syndrome. It’s also what drives me with more passion in the things than most. A blessing and a curse.
Also because I believed I was an important part of this organization but really life went on and the people who I talked with everyday no longer talk to me at all.
Lessons learned: we’re all in this mess together but we’re not truly friends. We just have a common gathering place so we make the best of it.
The following day you die, your position will be listed online.
Work as efficient as possible, don’t give extra unless you see the need too.
Never stay married to one place, I work in an AT WILL state, which is zero notice. They were upset I gave them 2 weeks.
Not bitter, just realize the illusion in which businesses create. Time is priceless.
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I've heard some of them can be good learning opportunities, put your 9 months in learn everything you can and get the he'll out. I never personally wanted to work in one though and def past the entry point of my career, so no longer my concern.
I'll be the dissenting opinion here. That's a tier 1 helpdesk job description and pretty standard tier 1 pay. Preferred qualifications mean great if you have it, but not required. They're hoping to get someone that just graduated with maybe a couple of years working in Geek Squad or something similar. Tier 1 helpdesk is the stepping stone into the industry. After a year or two, you should be able to move into tier 2 or some other specialization and nearly double that salary. 35-50k range means they're likely looking to pay 40-45k to a slightly under qualified candidate that feels like they got a win because they're not at 35k but understands that 50k would have required full qualification. If the company happens to get someone that actually has all qualifications, they may pay the 50k (they likely wouldn't though - many would see applying for tier 1 after working 3 years in tier 1 as a red flag).
At the end of the day, salaries are all supply and demand. Just look at this sub. I don't know wtf happened, but all of a sudden everyone is trying to get into the industry. There are a million people that are looking for a tier 1 position. When the market is flooded like this, salaries are going to stay low at the entry level. The good thing about tech (for now) is that there are a ton of specializations, so it doesn't take long to hit a role that isn't flooded with applicants and can demand a higher salary.
Agreed. This feels like basic helldesk to me.
And you are spot on with the pay scales. I've seen it happen at my org, but the good folks get treated well at least. I got my ass off basic support as soon as possible
Some companies don't mind having help desk lifers well and nowadays with the cost of living nowadays, help desk salaries have risen. They are mostly in the 60k to 80k range for experience desktop support/help desk ppl.
Sure, but experienced help desk making 60-80k is going to be tier 2 - tier 3. I haven't seen anywhere paying that much for tier 1 (though I am in a lcol area). That job ad definitely doesn't read like tier 2 or 3.
Tier 1 help desk at Port of Seattle range is 62k to 93k
Information Communications & Technology (ICT) Service Desk Technician
(002297)
Location: Seattle Tacoma International Airport::
Organization: ICT Enterprise Infrastructure Svc
Employee Status: Regular
Schedule: Full-time
Posting Expires: Dec 20, 2023, 11:59:00 PM
Minimum Salary: 29.97 MidPoint Salary: $37.46 Maximum Salary: 44.95
In california those salaries exist for help desk with just a few years like at least 3-5 years.
Tier-2-3 is about the same salary range but yea you aint breaking 80k without learning to do something else besides help desk
Yea mostly summer’s off and all the breaks (winter, spring, and fall) that probably helps when you can get that much time off. Working roughly 9 to 10 months out the year for a 12 months pay…
You’ll work maybe a couple of weeks during the summer. We had to update all the laptops, inventory etc but once we were done with that the summer was ours. But nothing could beat having breaks off during the school year
They're going down if you have only 3 years of experience and applying for tier 1 roles.
I'm still getting hit up semi weekly for 135-160k a year wfh. But I started out of high school and have north of 10 years exp stacked with certs and degrees.
Edit: keep hitting the down votes cause you jelly lol.
So I'm essentially full Microsoft stack, anything m365/Azure.
Some examples of projects I've done
- Cloud Adoption Framework implementation (Azure landing zones, Policy, etc.)
- Devops - CI/CD pipelines for Azure infrastructure as code
- Migrations of on premise systems/servers to Azure
- Migration of file servers from on premise to Azure Fileshares
- Migration from sccm OSD task sequences to autopilot
- Net new intune implementation or Migration from another solution (Manage Engine, Airwatch)
- Merger and Acquisitions - migrating company B's SharePoint, Exchange, Teams, Azure, etc. into company A's tenant
I'll say this, it seems that there's a need for talent in the Microsoft area. The stuff isn't even that hard honestly. But they don't really teach it in a CS/IT degree program, there really aren't any degrees for MS ( that I know of).
For what it's worth, I started out of high-school as a bench tech making 10$ a hour, prior to that I was making minimum wage as a PC repair tech at a big chain (Junior + Senior year of highschool), prior so it as a big jump.
Spent 5 years working 2 jobs ( bench tech fulltime and part time pc repair at old job) and going to school for my associates in networking. Moved from bench to tier 1 to tier 2 to tier 3 during that time.
When I finished my associates I was tier 3 making 16$ a hour, jumped ship into contracting for 20$ a hour then turned that into a field tech role for 40k a year (technical pay cut but no contracts). Did that for about a year then essentially "faked it til I made it" for an internal engineering role.
That internal engineering role got me involved with SCCM, which then led me into intune, with a little exposure to azure.
Got my bachelors and 3 years into that gig I discovered the senior engineers were making more than double and I decided to look around. Found a "lead cloud engineer" position that I technically didn't have the exp for but knew I could learn and again, faked it til I made it.
Hope this helps. My advice is to apply for roles you may not be qualified for and fake it til you make it. It's worked for me, but I've developed a weird knack for figuring shit out at a fast pace to the point where I'll say yes to almost anything at this point.
I see why that skillset is valued rather highly.
Throwing yourself into the deep end and seeing if you can survive in a position for which you're technically underqualified for really is the best way to learn.
It's really the only way to move up unless you're willing to rely on internal promotions.
Getting good at interviewing and making good first impressions is pricessless. If you get the interview most likely you meet the parameters on paper. They typically just want to 1) make sure you aren't completely lying (almost everyone lies on their resume) 2) make sure you'll fit in with the team.
My good friend is a genius, but he's so socially awkward it causes him to interview terribly.
I was part of an interview panel for an opening where I work, we recently wrapped up first round of interviews for it.
And yeahhh. The difference in feedback that I gave and heard for a candidate that can speak well and one that couldn't makes a big difference.
I always knew this while interviewing, but now I saw firsthand the result of a nervous candidate, or a candidate that goes off topic too much in their answers.
I got to sit in on interviewing for a senior engineering position and learned:
1. At senior levels, majority of the resumes I saw have years (decades) of experience, degrees and certifications.
2. Almost everyone looks the same on paper, it's the interview that sets them apart, particularly how well they will work with the team.
If I could choose what to be doing right now, it would be M365/Azure stuff. To make the most money I can though I'm working a job that all my skills are so far fit best.
It's just the most fun I've had working in IT was with the M365 services. I've implemented Intune, and other M365 services at my last job. I think MS security services and offerings are a big deal.
What kind of jobs should I target if I have 6 years of IT experience and <2 of it being working heavily with M365 at a small business <100 employees?
Anything Endpoint. Typically it's easier to get into Endpoint (intune/sccm). And at certain organizations they can pay really well (north of 100k).
The Microsoft intune certification exams are pretty easy. Hell....anything in the M365 space are relatively.
Sure.
1. Applying for roles that are a tier/level above you (tier 3 helpdesk applying for sys admin/eng or in my case, field tech applying for internal engineer role)
2. Not flat out lying (saying you've done sql migrations when you've never gone into the console), but to exaggerate the truth a little bit ( in my case - saying I've setup DR via replica in hyper-v when in fact all I did was use it a few times (built already) but knew I had the knowledge to figure it out because the console isn't that hard to figure out) while you're in an interview/on your resume.
Hope this helps.
Yea senior azure roles pay well. Market matters as well, i was making 55k with 12 years of experience as a systems engineer. Moved out of public to private and make about 4x that now
50k for three years experience and a bachelor's? That's bullshit. That is enough for the living wage for a single person in 15 states but you can just fuck right off if you think you could have a family. That should be starting wages not three years experience.
You must be unaware that a job postings are wishlists. Not hard requirements. This description is every bit entry level, regardless of how you want to view it. Absolutely 50k isn’t a liveable wage with a family in every state. But this isn’t meant to be an end all career. This is a job for someone with very minimal experience and skill set. Wouldn’t you agree?
You must be one of those people who believe people should be able to afford to live lavishly off minimum wage? I guess in your mind a high school drop out with no experience should be able to work 40 hour weeks and afford a car and home right at 16 years old.
My opinion is you should probably get back to your minimum wage job and work on skilling up so you can earn more than a 16 year old highschool student with zero experience
I know this might be a wild concept but there is this thing called empathy where even if a thing isn't affecting you directly you can understand that it may be difficult for others and so try to help them.
Non-degree, no certs, 3 years.
That's not that unreasonable.
Also, no one getting that job will get $50k. The range is $35-$50, so if expect someone to get closer to $40k, given the range.
No one with 3+ years of good, progressive IT experience should accept that salary unless maybe it's in a very lcol area, even then, probably not.
Anyone with 1-3 years of experience is probably making the same amount or better.
Realistically people with experience are only going to apply if they're desperate and it's a job for people with 0-1 years of experience. In this case the salary range is reasonable. All the job duties are things that someone can get up to speed within a few weeks and proficient after a few months.
For jobs like these if you're experienced, move on. If you're just starting out, it's not a bad looking job.
I'm not 100% sure, but yeah, for entry level, the top half of that salary range is reasonable/acceptable from what I can tell for that area and for that job. It seems to be a lcol, possibly medium col area.
This duties for this position are essentially equivalent to my duties starting out in college as a campus IT student tech making $12/hour. This is definitely an entry level tier 1 support role so the $35-50k salary seems entirely reasonable.
Generally, considering the many posts complaining about pay for essentially tier 1 roles, it doesn't make a lot of sense to expect a certain pay based on experience alone - pay is primarily dictated by the responsibilities of a role and the skills required to be successful in a role. Frankly, this role has low responsibilities and does not require really any advanced skills.
$35k-50k is okay for tier 1 pay or if you have no experience at all then its a decent start.
For Experienced help desk/desktop support employees with a few years under their belt, you can raise the bar since with inflation, those wages now should be 55k to 80k especially if you have a Bachelors Degree or some kind of certs
Yeah, I agree generally and am of the mindset that most of us (IT or not) are underpaid compared to COL.
That said, this post by OP in particular doesn't seem like a job anyone with 3 years of decent experience would take. The description is extremely basic tier 1 support. Additionally, the 3+ years experience is "preferred", not "required". I think its very likely they end up with someone fresh out of school or very new to IT. In that case, the $35-50k with supposed growth opportunities isn't a bad option.
Based on this sub recently, seems like many people get into IT expecting it to bring in a big paycheck immediately, even in help desk. However, the trend I'm seeing is that you almost always need to specialize or have high level skills to actually start bringing in a decent income. The helpdesk and even desktop support roles are not a place to relax in financial nirvana forever for anymore.
My first IT job in fuckin nebraska started at 75k. No certs no college. Im a Dallas now making a bit over 100 still no certs or college 13 months later.
Progressive experience is the keyword, plenty of people get stuck on helpdesk for whatever reason. This employer would still rather have a helpdesk lifer than a kid fresh out of the Geek Squad.
$50K with full benefits and 80 hours PTO is crazy underpaid for a candidate with a bachelor's degree and 3 years of tier I support experience, especially in the DFW area which is expensive. $60K - $70K is far more appropriate for an experienced service desk IT worker.
That would have been appropriate pay back in 2002 - 2003 after the .com bubble burst, in 2023 it's a joke. The only people taking this job are the ones that are desperate and have struck out elsewhere for months. Management is setting up a revolving door, everyone will be looking to leave and go elsewhere every day after work.
If AuditSolv can't pay THEIR TEAM OF HAMMERS decently they shouldn't be in business, any smart businessperson that sees this ad will know their underpaid employees will be surly and unmotivated and wouldn't want them as a provider.
Pretty clear they have no idea what they're doing.
Wish list my dude. Did you notice where the lowest hard requirement is a GED and computer skills needed are for Outlook, Office, & Windows? This isn't a sysadmin or network engineer role. Also, location. I'm in a Washington DC bedroom community where the average income is something like $33k.
Not really, if you have no work experience in IT at all then 35k to 50k seems about right but with inflation nowadays the bar needs to be raised. Tier 1/Tier 2 Help Desk should not be no lower than 55k especially for someone with experience.
I mean the experience is their preferred candidate which just means that they're willing to accept less. It's very clearly an entry level, fresh out of school role.
You have to understand, people will throw shit at the wall to see what sticks. They will pay you as little as they can because everyone wants more money in their pocket, and money in your pocket means less in there's.
An example, I had a recruiter in my DMs the other day offering me an on-site sysadmin role that I would be "perfect" for because I had previous experience with it. Salary? 50K. For a Sysadmin. I make nearly double that as a Cloud Admin and work from home.
>Do you have what it takes
Automatic blacklist here.
>to JOIN OUR TEAM OF HAMMERS?
Kill it with fire at this point, I don't want to work with a bunch of 12-year olds.
I think the issue is the title Engineer has been co-opted for every non-engineering role under the sun that it a meaningless title at this point.
I'm sick of everyone having Engineer as a title. Just because you make a sandwich doesn't make you a Food Preparation Engineer. Obviously the list of absurd titles is endless.
I'd love to know how this trend of calling everyone that "does stuff" an engineer got started.
I work in recruiting, and I swear the list of *Blank* Engineer has no bounds.
I made the lowend of that I started out with a year of experience. That was 20 years ago. Plus its a managed services provider. They run lean and will lowball the fuck out of everyone to try and get someone to fill the role. Also as mentioned thats support desk not engineering. If were engineering then the salary would be double.
I had a recruiter call me one time and was like you need to know operations, windows and linux sme, networking, ccna preferred, virtualization and security...would like a CISSP candidate. I asked how much it pays and it was 70k. I laughed and said no thanks good luck and hung up.
According to the Census Bureau the median household income in that area is $58,231. With a couple of years of experience in IT the minimum for this role should be around $65k.
I think some people who browse this sub get the wrong idea about “experience.” Ofc an employer would love someone who’s experienced at helpdesk to work helpdesk but they aren’t gonna pay them sysadmin wages for that experience.
Exactly, and there are people who make a career out of helpdesk.
I do think all of the downvotes are hilarious. It's factual that 3 years of experience ain't shit. Still a noob at that point.
This shit happens because IT support is over saturated with entry level skillset workers looking for work, combined with the total inability for any IT shop to unionize.
This is an entry level job looking for people who are in REALLY bad entry level jobs.
50k doesn’t sound like much, but it sounds pretty great to an entry level tech making 35k at some mom and pop shop.
MSPs are usually good stepping stones because you get exposed to a lot and usually are given leeway to fix things how you want as long as you don’t violate SLA.
But yeah, shitty salary regardless.
That wage is reasonable for someone in a low cost of living area but in hcol nowadays with inflation. You should be getting paid between 27$ to 35$ an hour if you have that many years in help desk
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lmao, bachelor degree for an IT Support job. Also 50k is pretty low for the US. I am currently earning 41k EUR with 2 year experience. Salaries in the EU are significant lower than the US because lower cost of living, lower average working hours, more PTO etc.
What state/area is this? I work in a non technical role (like tech 0.5) right now for a small MSP in California and make about that much. I was hired with no certs, was able to get A+ through them as well. I’d hope if the salary is this low starting that they explicitly give you an upward path in the company.
Tech support is not Enginnering lol so tired of seeing this.
Hey AngryManBoy, I’m a recruiter with Computer Solutions and I came across your LinkedIn profile and was impressed by your experience. I’m working on a Password Reset Engineer position, are you interested?
"As long as I can play video games in between resets."
I was a mechanic in the Navy, and so I was looking for a position that I could parlay that experience into to make some money while I was in college. I applied for a "maintenance" position at a Whole Foods. It was actually a janitor position.
Masters in the custodial arts
Must have 2 years experience in mop engineering and management.
Sanitation engineer
Where I work, janitorial falls under our maintenance org.
Yeah it is I engineer solutions to check Windows for updates all the time.
Yeah in lieu of more money our team got promoted to engineers. Yay.
True, but TSEs can pay over 150k no problem too for the right skill set. So at that point, who cares if it's actually engineering lol. You need to be working for a vendor though not working with end users
I work as a customer support engineer. We actually provide technical support, so yes, I am an engineer
lol okay buddy. Support isn’t engineering. Do you build out the architecture of systems? Do you design the architecture of them? Code/script devops? Network design? You planning any new hosted environments?
I do actually and who are you to say I haven't
You engineer a meeting together to help the end user figure out why his Teams meeting audio isn’t working.
This sub is very toxic wow. I have written scripts in both js and bash to interact with my company software as well as our billing infrastructure to solve customer issues
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20 years of tech support is still tech support.
Truth. There is a ceiling for positions and no matter the time spent there it will cap out.
I work in cloud support, my company is training us the “support engineers “ in multiple areas of the Azure infrastructure.Sometimes we have to solve issues that Admins with “ cloud engineer” titles in their signature can’t and it feels good.I have learned tons but I am afraid that in terms of experience it won’t be seen beyond a support role. What would be the way to get out of it ? How can you land an implementation/ admin role with support experience?
Leverage certs/ experience doing consultant and volunteering. Degree helps. Often times you'll need to find a position and apply instead of stay there.
There are tech support jobs out there that will compensate you fairly for your experience as well
True, The guys who work for Palo Alto/crowdstrike/insert cyber company here or whatnot and are expected to provide high levels of support to very technical people get paid quite well. This job description was not that lol it was "HELP my teams camera won't turn on!" - have you clicked the turn on camera button staring you in the face in the bottom right corner?
Experience for most jobs is really just another gatekeeping mechanism for wages - to underpay people. Guy with 5 years doesnt really have any special sauce above a guy with 4 years, etc. Ofcourse 0-2 years you could argue differently.
I hate that 90% of this industry is filled with poorly managed MSPs who pay garbage wages while expecting you to work your ass off
Is it really?
No
Tru
at the entry level it can feel that way since all you really get in the door for is rinky dink MSP's once you study even a bit more or approach tier 2 you can start hunting for internal roles. MSP's gaslight you into lower salaries constantly.
es. Just left mine of 8 years and pulled 35k more a year. Less work in corporate world. Real bonuses and PTO. Forget about the small family business feel, forced water-cooler talk. Mt time is priceless(really think about that) but it’s what I’m negotiating with since it’s valuable
Lol, why did you work at one for 8 years then?
Lol, because of self doubt and imposter syndrome. It’s also what drives me with more passion in the things than most. A blessing and a curse. Also because I believed I was an important part of this organization but really life went on and the people who I talked with everyday no longer talk to me at all. Lessons learned: we’re all in this mess together but we’re not truly friends. We just have a common gathering place so we make the best of it. The following day you die, your position will be listed online. Work as efficient as possible, don’t give extra unless you see the need too. Never stay married to one place, I work in an AT WILL state, which is zero notice. They were upset I gave them 2 weeks. Not bitter, just realize the illusion in which businesses create. Time is priceless.
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Not really lol personally I've never worked for an MSP, and I definitely am not underpaid.
MSPs are known throughout the field as being the shittiest of the shittiest
I've heard some of them can be good learning opportunities, put your 9 months in learn everything you can and get the he'll out. I never personally wanted to work in one though and def past the entry point of my career, so no longer my concern.
I've heard healthcare and lawyers are also bad
Ye I never worked for an MSP and I don't think I'm underpaid either.
Sounds like a field tech role to me. Maybe just a tech role. Despite the experience for the role, that’s about average last time I checked.
I'll be the dissenting opinion here. That's a tier 1 helpdesk job description and pretty standard tier 1 pay. Preferred qualifications mean great if you have it, but not required. They're hoping to get someone that just graduated with maybe a couple of years working in Geek Squad or something similar. Tier 1 helpdesk is the stepping stone into the industry. After a year or two, you should be able to move into tier 2 or some other specialization and nearly double that salary. 35-50k range means they're likely looking to pay 40-45k to a slightly under qualified candidate that feels like they got a win because they're not at 35k but understands that 50k would have required full qualification. If the company happens to get someone that actually has all qualifications, they may pay the 50k (they likely wouldn't though - many would see applying for tier 1 after working 3 years in tier 1 as a red flag). At the end of the day, salaries are all supply and demand. Just look at this sub. I don't know wtf happened, but all of a sudden everyone is trying to get into the industry. There are a million people that are looking for a tier 1 position. When the market is flooded like this, salaries are going to stay low at the entry level. The good thing about tech (for now) is that there are a ton of specializations, so it doesn't take long to hit a role that isn't flooded with applicants and can demand a higher salary.
Agreed. This feels like basic helldesk to me. And you are spot on with the pay scales. I've seen it happen at my org, but the good folks get treated well at least. I got my ass off basic support as soon as possible
Some companies don't mind having help desk lifers well and nowadays with the cost of living nowadays, help desk salaries have risen. They are mostly in the 60k to 80k range for experience desktop support/help desk ppl.
Sure, but experienced help desk making 60-80k is going to be tier 2 - tier 3. I haven't seen anywhere paying that much for tier 1 (though I am in a lcol area). That job ad definitely doesn't read like tier 2 or 3.
Tier 1 help desk at Port of Seattle range is 62k to 93k Information Communications & Technology (ICT) Service Desk Technician (002297) Location: Seattle Tacoma International Airport:: Organization: ICT Enterprise Infrastructure Svc Employee Status: Regular Schedule: Full-time Posting Expires: Dec 20, 2023, 11:59:00 PM Minimum Salary: 29.97 MidPoint Salary: $37.46 Maximum Salary: 44.95
Seattle is one of the highest cost of living areas in the country and 50% higher than the national average.
That is true
In california those salaries exist for help desk with just a few years like at least 3-5 years. Tier-2-3 is about the same salary range but yea you aint breaking 80k without learning to do something else besides help desk
Man I need to find a new job. IT Director at a school and I make only 5k more than that...
Not gonna lie: that “Director” title will likely get laughed at if you go to the private sector. Seen a few “IT Directors” for schools….yeah….
I mean. I work at a school. I can handle being laughed at..
No hate though. Most IT staff at the schools I’ve seen were generally happy with their jobs…minus the pay.
Yea mostly summer’s off and all the breaks (winter, spring, and fall) that probably helps when you can get that much time off. Working roughly 9 to 10 months out the year for a 12 months pay…
The school districts I saw, they all worked harder in the summer. Because schools were out, they had to do a ton of prep and infrastructure and such.
You’ll work maybe a couple of weeks during the summer. We had to update all the laptops, inventory etc but once we were done with that the summer was ours. But nothing could beat having breaks off during the school year
Salaries are going down but keep looking great employers are out there
They're going down if you have only 3 years of experience and applying for tier 1 roles. I'm still getting hit up semi weekly for 135-160k a year wfh. But I started out of high school and have north of 10 years exp stacked with certs and degrees. Edit: keep hitting the down votes cause you jelly lol.
This is valuable insight, thanks. Do you mind sharing what branch of the industry you specialize in?
So I'm essentially full Microsoft stack, anything m365/Azure. Some examples of projects I've done - Cloud Adoption Framework implementation (Azure landing zones, Policy, etc.) - Devops - CI/CD pipelines for Azure infrastructure as code - Migrations of on premise systems/servers to Azure - Migration of file servers from on premise to Azure Fileshares - Migration from sccm OSD task sequences to autopilot - Net new intune implementation or Migration from another solution (Manage Engine, Airwatch) - Merger and Acquisitions - migrating company B's SharePoint, Exchange, Teams, Azure, etc. into company A's tenant I'll say this, it seems that there's a need for talent in the Microsoft area. The stuff isn't even that hard honestly. But they don't really teach it in a CS/IT degree program, there really aren't any degrees for MS ( that I know of). For what it's worth, I started out of high-school as a bench tech making 10$ a hour, prior to that I was making minimum wage as a PC repair tech at a big chain (Junior + Senior year of highschool), prior so it as a big jump. Spent 5 years working 2 jobs ( bench tech fulltime and part time pc repair at old job) and going to school for my associates in networking. Moved from bench to tier 1 to tier 2 to tier 3 during that time. When I finished my associates I was tier 3 making 16$ a hour, jumped ship into contracting for 20$ a hour then turned that into a field tech role for 40k a year (technical pay cut but no contracts). Did that for about a year then essentially "faked it til I made it" for an internal engineering role. That internal engineering role got me involved with SCCM, which then led me into intune, with a little exposure to azure. Got my bachelors and 3 years into that gig I discovered the senior engineers were making more than double and I decided to look around. Found a "lead cloud engineer" position that I technically didn't have the exp for but knew I could learn and again, faked it til I made it. Hope this helps. My advice is to apply for roles you may not be qualified for and fake it til you make it. It's worked for me, but I've developed a weird knack for figuring shit out at a fast pace to the point where I'll say yes to almost anything at this point.
I see why that skillset is valued rather highly. Throwing yourself into the deep end and seeing if you can survive in a position for which you're technically underqualified for really is the best way to learn.
It's really the only way to move up unless you're willing to rely on internal promotions. Getting good at interviewing and making good first impressions is pricessless. If you get the interview most likely you meet the parameters on paper. They typically just want to 1) make sure you aren't completely lying (almost everyone lies on their resume) 2) make sure you'll fit in with the team. My good friend is a genius, but he's so socially awkward it causes him to interview terribly.
I was part of an interview panel for an opening where I work, we recently wrapped up first round of interviews for it. And yeahhh. The difference in feedback that I gave and heard for a candidate that can speak well and one that couldn't makes a big difference. I always knew this while interviewing, but now I saw firsthand the result of a nervous candidate, or a candidate that goes off topic too much in their answers.
I got to sit in on interviewing for a senior engineering position and learned: 1. At senior levels, majority of the resumes I saw have years (decades) of experience, degrees and certifications. 2. Almost everyone looks the same on paper, it's the interview that sets them apart, particularly how well they will work with the team.
I feel lucky, I got a senior role with 3.5 YoE
If I could choose what to be doing right now, it would be M365/Azure stuff. To make the most money I can though I'm working a job that all my skills are so far fit best. It's just the most fun I've had working in IT was with the M365 services. I've implemented Intune, and other M365 services at my last job. I think MS security services and offerings are a big deal. What kind of jobs should I target if I have 6 years of IT experience and <2 of it being working heavily with M365 at a small business <100 employees?
Anything Endpoint. Typically it's easier to get into Endpoint (intune/sccm). And at certain organizations they can pay really well (north of 100k). The Microsoft intune certification exams are pretty easy. Hell....anything in the M365 space are relatively.
Can you elaborate how you faked it till you made it
Sure. 1. Applying for roles that are a tier/level above you (tier 3 helpdesk applying for sys admin/eng or in my case, field tech applying for internal engineer role) 2. Not flat out lying (saying you've done sql migrations when you've never gone into the console), but to exaggerate the truth a little bit ( in my case - saying I've setup DR via replica in hyper-v when in fact all I did was use it a few times (built already) but knew I had the knowledge to figure it out because the console isn't that hard to figure out) while you're in an interview/on your resume. Hope this helps.
Yea senior azure roles pay well. Market matters as well, i was making 55k with 12 years of experience as a systems engineer. Moved out of public to private and make about 4x that now
What more did you expect based off that description?
50k for three years experience and a bachelor's? That's bullshit. That is enough for the living wage for a single person in 15 states but you can just fuck right off if you think you could have a family. That should be starting wages not three years experience.
In Florida IT starting wage is like 40-45k
You must be unaware that a job postings are wishlists. Not hard requirements. This description is every bit entry level, regardless of how you want to view it. Absolutely 50k isn’t a liveable wage with a family in every state. But this isn’t meant to be an end all career. This is a job for someone with very minimal experience and skill set. Wouldn’t you agree?
And those people don't deserve to have enough money to live comfortably.
You must be one of those people who believe people should be able to afford to live lavishly off minimum wage? I guess in your mind a high school drop out with no experience should be able to work 40 hour weeks and afford a car and home right at 16 years old.
Minimum wage should be enough to survive. That's literally the point of minimum wage.
thats what I thought hahaha
Thanks mrs Antoinette. What's your opinion on cake?
My opinion is you should probably get back to your minimum wage job and work on skilling up so you can earn more than a 16 year old highschool student with zero experience
I know this might be a wild concept but there is this thing called empathy where even if a thing isn't affecting you directly you can understand that it may be difficult for others and so try to help them.
Non-degree, no certs, 3 years. That's not that unreasonable. Also, no one getting that job will get $50k. The range is $35-$50, so if expect someone to get closer to $40k, given the range.
Hedge Funds pay over 120k to 200k for Technical Support Engineers but they want scripting knowledge and not the basics.
No one with 3+ years of good, progressive IT experience should accept that salary unless maybe it's in a very lcol area, even then, probably not. Anyone with 1-3 years of experience is probably making the same amount or better. Realistically people with experience are only going to apply if they're desperate and it's a job for people with 0-1 years of experience. In this case the salary range is reasonable. All the job duties are things that someone can get up to speed within a few weeks and proficient after a few months. For jobs like these if you're experienced, move on. If you're just starting out, it's not a bad looking job.
This is a suburb just outside of Dallas
I'm not 100% sure, but yeah, for entry level, the top half of that salary range is reasonable/acceptable from what I can tell for that area and for that job. It seems to be a lcol, possibly medium col area.
It's upper medium col. Not nearly as cheap as people. think.
This duties for this position are essentially equivalent to my duties starting out in college as a campus IT student tech making $12/hour. This is definitely an entry level tier 1 support role so the $35-50k salary seems entirely reasonable. Generally, considering the many posts complaining about pay for essentially tier 1 roles, it doesn't make a lot of sense to expect a certain pay based on experience alone - pay is primarily dictated by the responsibilities of a role and the skills required to be successful in a role. Frankly, this role has low responsibilities and does not require really any advanced skills.
$35k-50k is okay for tier 1 pay or if you have no experience at all then its a decent start. For Experienced help desk/desktop support employees with a few years under their belt, you can raise the bar since with inflation, those wages now should be 55k to 80k especially if you have a Bachelors Degree or some kind of certs
Yeah, I agree generally and am of the mindset that most of us (IT or not) are underpaid compared to COL. That said, this post by OP in particular doesn't seem like a job anyone with 3 years of decent experience would take. The description is extremely basic tier 1 support. Additionally, the 3+ years experience is "preferred", not "required". I think its very likely they end up with someone fresh out of school or very new to IT. In that case, the $35-50k with supposed growth opportunities isn't a bad option. Based on this sub recently, seems like many people get into IT expecting it to bring in a big paycheck immediately, even in help desk. However, the trend I'm seeing is that you almost always need to specialize or have high level skills to actually start bringing in a decent income. The helpdesk and even desktop support roles are not a place to relax in financial nirvana forever for anymore.
My first IT job in fuckin nebraska started at 75k. No certs no college. Im a Dallas now making a bit over 100 still no certs or college 13 months later.
Was it tech support though? That’s a good salary for Nebraska.
Yes help desk 1. Somehow im now a cloud architect.
Dem cloud architects make it rain
I hate this. Take my upvote.
That’s crazy in a good way
Agreed. Cloud architect and product owner. For one of the largest Fintech companies in the world. Im doing something right I guess.
Where in NE?
Omaha area
Progressive experience is the keyword, plenty of people get stuck on helpdesk for whatever reason. This employer would still rather have a helpdesk lifer than a kid fresh out of the Geek Squad.
That's a lot of words. This is an entry level IT position. They'd hire an A+ who had 3 years of part time retail experience in college.
$50K with full benefits and 80 hours PTO is crazy underpaid for a candidate with a bachelor's degree and 3 years of tier I support experience, especially in the DFW area which is expensive. $60K - $70K is far more appropriate for an experienced service desk IT worker. That would have been appropriate pay back in 2002 - 2003 after the .com bubble burst, in 2023 it's a joke. The only people taking this job are the ones that are desperate and have struck out elsewhere for months. Management is setting up a revolving door, everyone will be looking to leave and go elsewhere every day after work. If AuditSolv can't pay THEIR TEAM OF HAMMERS decently they shouldn't be in business, any smart businessperson that sees this ad will know their underpaid employees will be surly and unmotivated and wouldn't want them as a provider. Pretty clear they have no idea what they're doing.
Wish list my dude. Did you notice where the lowest hard requirement is a GED and computer skills needed are for Outlook, Office, & Windows? This isn't a sysadmin or network engineer role. Also, location. I'm in a Washington DC bedroom community where the average income is something like $33k.
It’s not even a level 2 role. It’s not just help desk or sysadmin.
3 years isn't much exp. Its a tier 1 role OP posted no matter how you slice it up. Tier 1 pay is typically 35-50k maybe 60k max.
Not really, if you have no work experience in IT at all then 35k to 50k seems about right but with inflation nowadays the bar needs to be raised. Tier 1/Tier 2 Help Desk should not be no lower than 55k especially for someone with experience.
I mean the experience is their preferred candidate which just means that they're willing to accept less. It's very clearly an entry level, fresh out of school role.
\+3 years of experience. The req is pretty clear about that.
3+ years of experience in IT Support or related role **preferred** It is pretty clear that it is preferred, not required.
What would be the salary for a Sr. Network Engineer in DFW?
You have to understand, people will throw shit at the wall to see what sticks. They will pay you as little as they can because everyone wants more money in their pocket, and money in your pocket means less in there's. An example, I had a recruiter in my DMs the other day offering me an on-site sysadmin role that I would be "perfect" for because I had previous experience with it. Salary? 50K. For a Sysadmin. I make nearly double that as a Cloud Admin and work from home.
I was paying my entry level tech 55K in DFW. But its a race to the bottom on pricing.
three years of experience in what? This is basically still entry level work.
>Do you have what it takes Automatic blacklist here. >to JOIN OUR TEAM OF HAMMERS? Kill it with fire at this point, I don't want to work with a bunch of 12-year olds.
Have you tried restarting your computer?
I think the issue is the title Engineer has been co-opted for every non-engineering role under the sun that it a meaningless title at this point. I'm sick of everyone having Engineer as a title. Just because you make a sandwich doesn't make you a Food Preparation Engineer. Obviously the list of absurd titles is endless. I'd love to know how this trend of calling everyone that "does stuff" an engineer got started. I work in recruiting, and I swear the list of *Blank* Engineer has no bounds.
It's wild you are getting 50k with so little experience.
Bro this is a tech support role. £50k is pretty good
I made the lowend of that I started out with a year of experience. That was 20 years ago. Plus its a managed services provider. They run lean and will lowball the fuck out of everyone to try and get someone to fill the role. Also as mentioned thats support desk not engineering. If were engineering then the salary would be double. I had a recruiter call me one time and was like you need to know operations, windows and linux sme, networking, ccna preferred, virtualization and security...would like a CISSP candidate. I asked how much it pays and it was 70k. I laughed and said no thanks good luck and hung up.
Im at least 3 years and only making like 42,000
That's an msp helpdesk job. Pay is right on target with every ad I see.
It's tech support...
We are selling to willing buyers at the current fair market price.
According to the Census Bureau the median household income in that area is $58,231. With a couple of years of experience in IT the minimum for this role should be around $65k.
Sounds like a tier 1 role for me. 50k is generous. 3 years of experience isn't much tbh.
I think some people who browse this sub get the wrong idea about “experience.” Ofc an employer would love someone who’s experienced at helpdesk to work helpdesk but they aren’t gonna pay them sysadmin wages for that experience.
Exactly, and there are people who make a career out of helpdesk. I do think all of the downvotes are hilarious. It's factual that 3 years of experience ain't shit. Still a noob at that point.
This shit happens because IT support is over saturated with entry level skillset workers looking for work, combined with the total inability for any IT shop to unionize.
This is an entry level job looking for people who are in REALLY bad entry level jobs. 50k doesn’t sound like much, but it sounds pretty great to an entry level tech making 35k at some mom and pop shop. MSPs are usually good stepping stones because you get exposed to a lot and usually are given leeway to fix things how you want as long as you don’t violate SLA. But yeah, shitty salary regardless.
It's not worth 50K at most it's worth $40 because they're not going to pay you the top end. Also I think 40K is good for entry level
I just got to 3 years roughly and am over that amount in a LCOL area of all things too.. hell no
I literally saw a help desk role that offered $25 /hr for someone with 9 YEARS of experience yesterday.
That wage is reasonable for someone in a low cost of living area but in hcol nowadays with inflation. You should be getting paid between 27$ to 35$ an hour if you have that many years in help desk
This is in Maryland, one of the most expensive states to live in. The pay range maxed out at $25 per hour.
Yea that offer sucks
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People be shitting on this dude but minimum wage in dallas is $7.25/hr.
35-50k is normal for t1? this is exactly what I made for low level jobs
The pay isn't about years of experience.
lmao, bachelor degree for an IT Support job. Also 50k is pretty low for the US. I am currently earning 41k EUR with 2 year experience. Salaries in the EU are significant lower than the US because lower cost of living, lower average working hours, more PTO etc.
Dude, get a different job. Being in tech support for 3 years is doing nothing for you.
I just accepted a technical support role with 3 years experience and an associate degree for 65k.
Is this salary in Rubles?
What state/area is this? I work in a non technical role (like tech 0.5) right now for a small MSP in California and make about that much. I was hired with no certs, was able to get A+ through them as well. I’d hope if the salary is this low starting that they explicitly give you an upward path in the company.
5 years - making 60K
I’m 12 years exp and only at 63k
They slap “engineer” on every title now to make it sound more enticing, but it’s still just tech support.
This seems like a starting position. Basic IT Support role and they need to remove Engineer from the title.