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[Justin Bailey]

How do you like it? Is the job boring? rewarding? can't wait to be promoted? Are you essentially the IT department's bitch? I've always understood help desk as a good entry-level position for recent grads to get their foot in the door for the IT field.

Any tips for the interview and/or the job in general?

 

[Lhadatt]

As for the interview: Take the mindset of you know you can do the job, you know you're the right guy for the job, but you also know it doesn't pay to have an ego about it; appear as if you will be disappointed if they do not hire you, but not devistated. In short, don't appear too eager.

The job: Get your hands in as much as you can. Linux, Windows, admin stuff, firewalls, routers, advanced desktop configs, instructional curriculum design (if they teach thier employees - and if not, suggest a plan and design the curriculum), networking, PHP, SQL (especially MySQL, PostgreSQL, or MSSQL), any sort of personnel management systems (SAP, Peoplesoft, etc). Anything technology, really.

Pick something that interests you and specialize in it, without forsaking knowing enough about the other stuff to make you valuable to have around for multiple tasks.

 

[Justin Bailey]

Thanks

 

[Deleted member 1235]

They will ask you technical questions at your interview, so brush up. And get off the helpdesk as soon as you can once you are in the door. Do you know what systems they use? You will probably get asked a ton of questions like "user calls and says his printer doesn't work, what steps do you take" which sounds easy and all, but people screw this stuff at interviews all the time.

 

[Wraith]

The job: Get your hands in as much as you can. Linux, Windows, admin stuff, firewalls, routers, advanced desktop configs, instructional curriculum design (if they teach thier employees - and if not, suggest a plan and design the curriculum), networking, PHP, SQL (especially MySQL, PostgreSQL, or MSSQL), any sort of personnel management systems (SAP, Peoplesoft, etc). Anything technology, really.

This is the key. Unless you really enjoy the bitchwork that is being a help desk employee, use the help desk to learn as much as possible and then try to move on to something that interests you.

 

[Phoenix]

Tell them you hate people, like watching/hearing them suffer, and look forward to making sure that the customer never gets a chance to bother the IT department.

 

[Mashing]

^^^Phoenix, you fucking rock man. Fucking helpdesk.

 

[Cloudy]

It's a good (maybe the best?) step in the door but make sure you don't become stagnant in it. Get an MBA on their dime and aim for management so you can get paid a ton to make presentations to the bigwigs and manage the IT guys...

 

[gigapower]

Tell them you hate people, like watching/hearing them suffer, and look forward to making sure that the customer never gets a chance to bother the IT department.

Your hired!

 

[blahness]

dress in a suit!!!

 

[Diablos]

The help desk is like the IT world's version of flipping burgers, bagging groceries or pushing shopping carts.

It's not a bad place to start, but don't make a lifelong career out of it.

 

[Justin Bailey]

dress in a suit!!!

really? I was thinking wife beater and a hula skirt.

 

[shuri]

Help Desk killed my interest in computers.

 

[Justin Bailey]

Yeah I don't plan on staying help desk forever. The guy I'd be working under is supposedly a big Linux guru so I'm gonna pick his brain for all that he knows.

 

[Diablos]

Help Desk killed my interest in computers.

Shame, because that's a shitty representation of the IT world.

That's not to say a job relating closer to hardware or something won't be daunting, but you'll certainly have more freedom than you do telling people how to make an archive folder in Outlook or something.

 

[Lhadatt]

Tell them you hate people, like watching/hearing them suffer, and look forward to making sure that the customer never gets a chance to bother the IT department.

:lol

Yes, all of us tech support types are BOFHs (google it, you low-tech plebeian swine!).

In reality, it's the users that make techies hate them. The users do stupid things that the techies have to clean up after, then giggle and give a throw-away apology when the techies encounter problems during the clean up.

It's analagous to a group of small children trashing a bathroom with their feces like monkeys, then offering only a feeble "hehe, whoops!" to the janitors who get to fix the mess; I bet janitors would hate people too, if that was a common occurrence.

 

[The Take Out Bandit]

Make sure your fly is up.

No seriously. :X

 

[Lhadatt]

Yeah I don't plan on staying help desk forever. The guy I'd be working under is supposedly a big Linux guru so I'm gonna pick his brain for all that he knows.

Very good idea. Get on good, possibly even personal terms with him.

...

No, not that personal. Jeez, kid.

At any rate, a happy Linux guru will bestow many tidbits of knowledge. A good portion of these guys are the ones who like to welcome new converts.

 

[Diablos]

Your boss is a Linux guru... are you providing Linux support?

 

[Fresh Prince]

I'm happiest when dealing with programming. I feel I have to watch my back just when shit goes crazy since non-solved computer fault = my fault :\

 

[Justin Bailey]

Your boss is a Linux guru... are you providing Linux support?

No, just desktop support (at least at first). Basically he wants someone to do some of the lower-level support while he works on whatever the hell else he does. At least that's my understanding of it from talking to the job recruiter. They said he would also want to train whoever they hire for Linux stuff, which is cool.

It's a small software company so at least the support will be more hands on than phone. I really don't like phone support -_-

 

[Mupepe]

Oh my god, I hope you can handle idiots. That's all I have to say. Be patient my friend.