Working as a technology professional offers the chance for both interesting work and a lucrative salary. The demand for talented IT professionals also remains high despite the threat of a potential recession and economic downturn.
Let’s take a closer look at starting a career in the technology field. We cover how to qualify for many open positions as well as how to succeed once hired.
Educational Requirements for Starting a Technology Career
Obviously, qualifying for any open IT position requires at least some level of technical knowledge. While some tech jobs demand a four-year degree related to the open position, this isn’t always the case. Some entry-level positions require less rigorous qualifications, including only a two-year degree or even just an IT certification. Still, a new bachelor’s degree in a technical discipline ensures qualifying for most open entry-level tech jobs.
For example, a desktop support technician role generally requires candidates to possess a two-year IT degree or certification. For this and other similar positions, make an effort to analyze the job requirements and study those topics beforehand. Tailor your résumé to emphasize your skills and any experience matching the open position. It gives you the best chance at an interview and an eventual job offer.
Gain Relevant IT Experience
Earning technology experience as a relatively new IT professional requires some creativity. If you want to become a programmer, volunteer on open-source projects and build your own apps. This approach helps you develop a portfolio attractive to IT hiring managers.
Even doing some charitable tech work for a local charity or non-profit helps build experience. Also, take advantage of any internship opportunities and potential freelance work to add depth to your résumé. This approach also exposes you to working in an actual technology office on real projects.
Tips For Thriving in Your First Technology Job
As a new IT professional, you need to give extra effort to succeed in your first position. Be sure to arrive at work a bit early and stay a little extra each day. Always keep a positive attitude with your managers and coworkers.
Spend extra time each night learning everything about the tools and technologies you use in your new job. This additional work puts you squarely on a path to lifelong success as an IT professional!
Contact Us
If you need help finding a technology position, contact the expert recruiters at the Atlantic Group. As one of the top staffing agencies in New York City, we know the companies looking for technology candidates. Connect with us soon!
Having no direct IT experience should not put you off firing off a resume for your dream role.
Gaining industry certifications, learning relevant skills, and finding the right components in your degree can all help.
You may be an ideal candidate for a certain IT role and if you have the right skills and experience from elsewhere that this can be applied and your resume should demonstrate that.
In this article, we will look at what to put on an IT resume, even if you have no experience.
Achieve Relevant Industry Certifications
If you fail to have a specific IT degree, or relevant experience in the industry, then that should not stop you from trying to prove that you can do the job you are applying for.
Once you appreciate that a degree may take a total of four years to complete then a few certifications can prove well worth attaining.
Take your pick, get down and study and within a few months, you will have a few IT certifications that you can detail on your resume.
If you want to specialize in a certain sector, or simply want a broader understanding of the industry you want to join, there are a range of certifications available.
For entry-level positions, the CompTIA Network is a good place to start to gain technical skills to manage various business networks.
Similarly, CompTIA Security+ can help you into a cybersecurity role. Then there is the ITIL® 4 Foundation to help you grasp the key concepts of the IT industry and provide a focus on digital service delivery.
By taking the time to learn relevant industry certifications you have already shown a willingness to learn.
There is some debate over the importance of an IT degree over certifications and a lot of businesses are willing to look past the lack of an IT degree and look towards relevant industry certifications.
They can be a great way to show how ideal you are as a candidate, and it comes cheaper and quicker than a degree. Now, with the right skills, you can become a standout in their pool of job applicants.
Learn Relevant IT Skills
Information technology is such a broad subject and there are many relevant hard skills you can learn that should be ideal for the role you are applying for.
These hard skills are the ones that you should learn via specialized training or education.
You could even learn these skills in previous employment through on-the-job training. The skills tend to be job-specific and should be listed in the job description.
These hard skills will include specific abilities and knowledge that are required to be successful in the role.
If you are a blogger then appreciating how to use WordPress could go a long way and help prove that you have a basis in code.
Try to appreciate that, though you may not have learned certain skills in a job role, you can still apply them having watched a few tutorial videos and then practicing them out.
Check out a few videos on YouTube, practice the skills on a computer, and list them on your resume once you gain a competency.
Should you envisage yourself in a dream IT role then realize it by learning the relevant skills.
Learn about hardware and software when you can and once you become competent at a skill, you can justify including it in your resume.
That practice of learning a skill in your free time should also be valuable to employers who are looking for candidates to show some initiative and are willing to put the hours in to learn.
If you have the work ethic to learn relevant IT skills, then that itself can qualify as a soft skill that employers are looking for.
Alongside the work ethic and initiative, try to consider examples of soft skills such as verbal and written communication, time management, self-management, and team leadership.
Perhaps you have been in employment that left you to look after your own workload, communicate effectively with others, and lead a team.
If you have, then those skills, and an attitude to learn more skills, should be detailed on your resume as it could be exactly what the recruiter is looking for.
Consider Your Degree, Even From Another Field
We all make mistakes, yet choosing a certain degree may not be the disaster you think it is. Certainly not when it comes to applying for jobs in another field.
If you desire a job in the IT field, even a degree from another field could prove useful to detail on your resume.
Simply finishing a degree can demonstrate initiative and a hard work ethic and should remain an achievement to be proud of.
Try to look past the fact that your degree is not in a specific IT field, even an unfinished degree, and consider how it applies to the job you are applying for.
You may not realize it, yet a major in philosophy may be ideal to show a creative, thoughtful approach to challenges by applying logic.
Remember that the simple fact you have a degree to list on your resume is a plus point, especially when you detail how it can apply to the role.
IT is a growing sector so more employers are looking to broaden their pool of new hires from different fields.
Final Thoughts
Updating your resume to make it relevant when applying for a certain position is a daunting task.
However, once you get past your lack of experience, take the time to look over the job description and demonstrate that you can have a range of skills and experience that are still worth considering.
If there are certain certifications or areas of expertise that you are lacking then make a note of them and make plans to become competent so you are better prepared for the role.
That willingness to learn and demonstrate initiative with a hard-working ethic are vital skills to possess and should be included on your resume.
Frequently Asked Questions
What Are The Best Skills To Put On An It Resume?
Think about the IT role you are applying for and consider which skills will have the most relevance.
For a help desk position, you need to demonstrate good communication skills and an understanding of Microsoft Office.
However, you could learn Salesforce in your spare time which would prove useful to include on your resume to show you understand customer relationship management software.
What Are Considered The Seven Essential Soft Skills?
There are seven essential soft skills and they include a work ethic, active listening, adaptability, and an openness to feedback.
The set of skills is completed by a growth mindset, team player attitude, and emotional intelligence.
Should a tech business fail to enact salary transparency then it may not realize how much harm that is doing.
From failing to entice the best prospective new hires to how they could end up breaking the law.
Disclosing salary transparency could even help a tech business decide how to organize its pay structure and go some way to achieving pay equity across society.
In this article, we will look at the appeal of salary transparency in tech hiring.
‘Competitive Pay’ May Be Putting Off The Best Applicants
A lot of tech businesses may not even realize how just one phrase in a job advertisement has already limited their pool of applicants.
According to the latest Compensation and Culture Report from bequm, 79% of job seekers listed the salary as a key factor to see included in a job description. Should a job description list the pay as ‘competitive’ then many job applicants will be put off.
That the lack of salary transparency was seen as a red flag perhaps should not be a huge surprise yet the extent to which the vast majority of those surveyed singled it out should be a real concern.
Such immediate skepticism may lead the best candidates for the job to look elsewhere, even if the salary is actually higher than that of a rival company.
If only describing a salary as ‘competitive’ is seen as such a warning sign then a job description that details the salary range could be seen as an indication of a tech business worth applying to.
Paying a new hire what they are worth is one thing yet giving them a reason to apply to a rival company due to the failure to disclose a prospective salary is quite another.
The law may even be ruling the practice out altogether.
Law Changes To Enforce Salary Transparency
Change is coming to how businesses are able to treat salary transparency and if it can happen in New York then, chances are, it can happen anywhere.
The law has been changed in New York City so that businesses are required to list their salary ranges in job opening advertisements.
Due to the New York City Human Rights Law, it will be unlawful for businesses with four or more employees to advertise for a ‘job, promotion, or transfer opportunity’, unless they list the minimum and maximum for that role’s salary.
There is also the Equal Pay for Equal Work Act which has been passed in Colorado and requires employers to list compensation in job postings.
As salary transparency is now law in New York City and Colorado, many businesses across the US have taken it upon themselves to get ahead and publish their pay structures.
A business that is wholly transparent about its salary transparency may even find it easier to organize its pay structure. In 2013, the social media company, Buffer, decided to publish every single one of their employee salaries online.
This was not a leak but a pre-meditated act and since then, the company has used a formula approach to calculate salaries.
Instead of approaching salaries at the negotiating table, their pay structure has been so transparent that it has become effectively simplified.
If both the business and its employees are on the same page with what they should be earning then it becomes relatively easy to calculate that salary, even when you throw in the location.
Like many businesses, Buffer pays more depending on an employee’s location. Such locations like San Francisco garner a higher wage due to the higher cost of living.
With that in mind, you can simply input the location and the job title to find out how much you would be set to earn.
For some businesses, the thought of publishing their employee salaries and making their pay structure public may seem daunting.
However, since Buffer has taken the lead, the video call company, Whereby, and the software company, Gitlab, have followed suit with their own Compensation Calculator.
If a tech business is willing to pay a fair wage to attract the best talent then making those individuals aware of the pay structure is one way to go about it.
Achieving Pay Equity
Salary transparency may not simply make sense for potential employees and the tech businesses themselves but provide a greater good to society.
Data pulled from the United States Census Bureau continues to show that there remains a pay gap between genders and races.
For example, pay discrimination remains illegal yet the Pew Research Center has shown that white women still earn only 84% of the salaries of their male counterparts.
The Gender Wage Gap still persists and there is some evidence that the gap is larger for women of color. Pay Equity would help close the gap between women and races.
Also, with more salary transparency, you can expect a more robust pool of applicants who can see that the salary is worth applying for.
Final Thoughts
When it comes to salary transparency in tech hiring, it really does make sense. If a business is going to recruit a new hire then disclosing what they are set to earn marks the tone for how they are viewed by prospective employees.
If the job advertisement mentions the phrase ‘competitive pay’ then not only does it make the tech business seem like they have something to hide but is seen as a red flag by most job seekers.
Salary transparency should be achievable across certain industries, soon enough it may even be law.
Frequently Asked Questions
What Is Known As Pay Fairness?
When you consider pay fairness, you are really looking at pay equity. That notion that employees of a business should be paid exactly the same if they are deemed to be doing work that is of an equal value.
That should be seen in a business’s pay structure in that different roles are paid equally if they are deemed to perform roles of equal skill and effort.
How Does A Business Ensure Pay Equity?
Salary transparency can help a business ensure pay equity by preventing disparities with new hires.
It also helps if employee compensation is reviewed regularly and that compensation reviews are kept separate from performance reviews.
