Question:

I recently graduated with a bachelors degree of Science in Computer Information Systems & Management Science, which is a business/computer degree. My ultimate goal is to get into IT management. I have had experience as a technician and as a software trainer. I had the opportunity to work as a IT/Software Teacher at a community college but chose a lower paying entry level technical job because I felt that it would provide a better opportunity for advancement than the teaching job, which I was afraid would be a dead end. I could still reverse my decision. Would the teaching job be dead end in IT?

First Answer:

When I read your question my first response was to send a broadside about how no job is a dead end unless the holder of that jobs wishes it to be.

On reflection, your question indicates a lack of personal knowledge of who you are and want you want from a career. Without self-knowledge based upon some inner searching of you values, goals, wishes and desires, the way you work, the work environment you are most effective within, you will not reach a satisfying career conclusion. Without this inner knowledge, you will continually look over the fence and find greener grass rather than the assurance of knowing you are in the right place for you.

Perhaps you feel an academic career will not be as exciting as one in industry. Perhaps you feel you will not be on the "leading edge" of technology. Academic and business are not mutually exclusive but interdependent. You can do both by have an IT business position and teach night classes or an academic position and consult to business. In any case, the perception is up to you. You will make your situation what you want it to be. You are in charge of you and thus your career.

Another perspective is you have probably forty years of career ahead of you and a significant lifetime beyond that. Your decisions are always open for revision and adjustment. The choice made today is not putting you a lifetime track. You will change, your industry will change; virtually everything will change. We live in a dynamic era, exciting, intriguing and scary. With as fully developed awareness of yourself and the on-going desire to adjust to your development and the effects of a dynamic economy you can move forward confidently into whatever is offered you now and in the future.

-- Robert C. Resch, Career Center, Triton College

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