[Help] Starter jobs in IT

[Professor Plum]

Of course it's not, it's an old man's joke. Like Meeja, Sports and Social Meeja. Have you seen how many people are actually employed in these industries these days ?

But it's not Maths, History or the Classics, innit

You’ve lost me, but no worries.

 

[Birdie Boy]

And this seems the appropriate thread for

What do you say to a person with a Computer Science degree ?

Big Mac and fries please

It really hasn't lost anything in 30 years

You don't need a big mac anymore, a mac book will suffice.

 

[brighton_dave]

Lots of good advice. He might need to start in a clerical role in a largish company and move into IT when opportunities arise. Has he tried the Albion? Or EDF? Or Amex? Or that company at the bottom of West Street - Family?
Going direct sometimes works
Good luck

Can he code? Make sure he knows the common languages, AWS etc. Ability to code front end interfaces and backend would be useful. Make sure he understands the agile methodology too, scrum being key. Anything to make him stand out from the rest.
I'm with EDF and lots of our recruitment is internal. Agree with the above, perhaps start in the call centre, to get a foot in the door. Once he is in the door at one of bigger organisations, he will see lots more opportunity.
Southern water and HMRC have offices in Worthing, so look into them too.

Apprenticeship Jobs

Join our Apprenticeships and gain a qualification and learn new skills with on the job training.

www.edfenergy.com

 

[amexer]

Having just glanced at this thread have some of you spent 30/40 hours a week for 20/30 years looking at a screen.

 

[backson]

And this seems the appropriate thread for

What do you say to a person with a Computer Science degree ?

Big Mac and fries please

It really hasn't lost anything in 30 years

Reminds me of Stephen Fry saying how you address an actor in LA.

"Waiter?!"

 

[thedonkeycentrehalf]

there are many more IT career paths than coding that can be just as rewarding and @amexer thankfully they do not involve spending all your time in front of a screen. Instead you can also spend hours under desks, floors and in stupidly tight cabling cabinets

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Having just glanced at this thread have some of you spent 30/40 hours a week for 20/30 years looking at a screen.

And that's just on NSC

 

[Shropshire Seagull]

And this seems the appropriate thread for

What do you say to a person with a Computer Science degree ?

Big Mac and fries please

It really hasn't lost anything in 30 years

And the other long-standing favourite of yore:

How many software engineers does it take to change a light bulb?




NONE - its a hardware issue ....

 

[Westdene Seagull]

This is a good point. What John really wants to do is networking (he borrowed by course books from when I did my CCNA, even though I told him it was completely out of date). He'd love to do real get his hands dirty stuff but he also likes fixing computing issue. He does tip his toe into programming but I get the sense that his heart isn't in it. I think testing is an excellent idea, he'd probably go for that. But I could also see if some cloud stuff piques his interest.

I hadn't realised so many people had done the TOPS COBOL course. I did that back in the day but soon found I liked writing about computers more than I liked programming them.

Actually my area of expertise - although I've been off the tools for quite sometime. He might like to look at Ideal Networks, Start Communications or even Focus Group - all local to the Brighton area. Further afield Aptum in Havant often take on apprentices.

 

[Birdie Boy]

Having just glanced at this thread have some of you spent 30/40 hours a week for 20/30 years looking at a screen.

Hence my saggy eyes...

 

[Guinness Boy]

Can he code? Make sure he knows the common languages, AWS etc. Ability to code front end interfaces and backend would be useful. Make sure he understands the agile methodology too, scrum being key. Anything to make him stand out from the rest.
I'm with EDF and lots of our recruitment is internal. Agree with the above, perhaps start in the call centre, to get a foot in the door. Once he is in the door at one of bigger organisations, he will see lots more opportunity.
Southern water and HMRC have offices in Worthing, so look into them too.

Apprenticeship Jobs

Join our Apprenticeships and gain a qualification and learn new skills with on the job training.

www.edfenergy.com

HMRC was outsourced to Capgemini. Not sure if it still is.

 

[Guinness Boy]

Lots of good advice. He might need to start in a clerical role in a largish company and move into IT when opportunities arise. Has he tried the Albion? Or EDF? Or Amex? Or that company at the bottom of West Street - Family?
Going direct sometimes works
Good luck

OneFamily is where you mean in West Street. That's where I got into IT, joining as a tester from Customer Services when they re-platformed. Initially seconded then made permanent. From there into training and helpdesk support, then left for a software house. Great times, although my boss was a twat

I know they replatformed again during Covid though not sure how that went and they've just acquired Beagle St so there may well be jobs there, if they've not outsourced. L&G like to build their own systems also.

I do have to say a few things though. Firstly, as nice as it is to reminisce about the misty days of COBOL and manual testing, that's really not where things are heading. Increasingly Cloud based SaaS offerings are where it's at and, for a large organisations, this means a few of them that talk to each other. Where there is a real need at the moment is for technical architects or devops who understand the whole of an IT estate and are good with interfaces, particularly RESTful APIS and tools like Postman. Or people who know how to deploy software into Azure or AWS, learn CI/CD processes (so here you could use code to write test tools) and ensure compliance with data storage, disaster recovery, performance and privacy in the cloud.

Another route may be to get certified in a particular software (a Salesforce admin would be one suggestion, absolutely loads of companies use it and they have a program you can enrol in) or to understand new low code / no code technologies, so here javascript and how UI configuration tools interact with data models.

Secondly, it's the worst time in the market I've ever known. There is a race to the bottom on price and code and testing jobs increasingly have bums on seats in Pune, Manilla or Riga rather than Brighton or Crawley. IT in this country is NOT a future proof career.

 

[thedonkeycentrehalf]

Actually my area of expertise - although I've been off the tools for quite sometime. He might like to look at Ideal Networks, Start Communications or even Focus Group - all local to the Brighton area. Further afield Aptum in Havant often take on apprentices.

Acora in Burgess Hill might also be worth contacting

 

[CheeseRolls]

One area that is still sucking in apprentices is IT Security and it isn't a skill set which is likely to disappear any time soon.

 

[Guinness Boy]

One area that is still sucking in apprentices is IT Security and it isn't a skill set which is likely to disappear any time soon.

Definitely better to look at than coding or testing IMO. Anyone dealing with the EU will need to be DORA compliant soon for starters and no ones really wrapped their heads round that.

 

[CheeseRolls]

Definitely better to look at than coding or testing IMO. Anyone dealing with the EU will need to be DORA compliant soon for starters and no ones really wrapped their heads round that.

yep and UK Gov Secure By Design

 

[RandyWanger]

Although not necessary, I do find people I hire who have done a helpdesk role seem to be more well rounded and I'd still recommend it as an entry point into IT and then branch off into something more specialist. It's easier to get a first role with no experience or without a degree on a Helpdesk too. Most companies I've worked at love to hire within so shouldn't be too hard to change roles if they have the right skillset.

 

[RandyWanger]

HMRC was outsourced to Capgemini. Not sure if it still is.

Gone to India, one of the Sunak companies I think.

 

[Wardy's twin]

Couple of nondescript A levels and a 6 week COBOL training course courtesy of the Civil Service actually

6 weeks?, i think i had two weeks....

 

[Gwylan]

there are many more IT career paths than coding that can be just as rewarding and @amexer thankfully they do not involve spending all your time in front of a screen. Instead you can also spend hours under desks, floors and in stupidly tight cabling cabinets

TBH, that sounds like John's ideal job.

There have been some brilliant suggestions on here and he's going to follow some up. I'll report back on how he's getting on