Career Minded Immersion. "It’s easier to live it then learn it"

Welcome back techies thanks for stopping by. Today I'll give you my thoughts on the best way to get and stay ahead in this industry. Everyone knows that that technology advances and changes very quickly these days. That means that the IT field has continuously changing needs and practices. Unlike many careers which tend to have a learning cap where once you reach a certain understanding or accreditation you will be able to perform your job till retirement rarely needing to learn new things or master new skills. Now I know it may sound daunting at first to choose a career where you have to continuously learn and experiment with new tech to stay a relevant and needed part of your professional ecosystem. Don't panic though I’ll let you in a little secret I’ve found makes that makes things a lot easier. "It’s easier to live it then learn it".

What I mean by this is that its far easier to learn about everything going on by constantly reading tech blogs, listing to tech podcasts, and staying up on what is trending tech news on social media then it is to wait till you are forced to use a new technology you know nothing about. That’s my tip, try and stay informed on all emerging technologies by immersing yourself into the tech community. That way no matter what way or trend the industry goes you will just naturally grow with it simultaneously. I feel this is much more natural and practical then waiting to see what your changes your company implements as they grow, and then playing catch up as you try to learn everything all at once about a technology that you could have been hearing about months before it was released. There’s so many things I know about only because its background noise in my day to day life. As I sit writing this right now event though I'm focused on this post I'm half listing to the guys on a technology podcast discuss rumors about the apple car. I have never been an apple user and most likely never will be. I'm far more interested in googles attempt at a self-driving car (and everything else for that matter), but that doesn't matter. The point I’m getting at is I now know enough about apples car to hold a conservation with another informed person on the subject. If someday my company decided to use a fleet of apple cars and they wanted me to train everyone on how to use them. I would already know all sorts of things about this technology I'm not event very interested in, all because I stay immersed in technology news and media. This gives me a clear advantage over someone else who needs to learn everything from the ground up on this new technology.

Once you decide to dedicate your free time to following technology news and trends it really starts to build on itself. If you’re thinking this sounds like a smart approach but you’re apprehensive because there’s so much out there it’s overwhelming or confusing I’ll make some suggestions. Stop listing to the radio and turn on some podcasts as your background noise. There are so many quality podcasts out there ranging every topic related to info technology, I highly recommend giving some of the twit (this week in tech) podcasts a listen. Twit has many different casts and are all very informative.  Ditch Facebook guilty pleasures for interesting tech news. We all do it, waste small parts of downtime looking at the same recycled posts on Facebook day after day. Why not use that same time to better yourself by keeping up on trending technology news on social media. That way in this quickly changing world you will always be up on the next big thing. Lastly talk to people about what you hear and read. The more you talk to different people about the things you’re learning from all your new exposure to the tech world the more you will learn. At first it may be hard to find people with shared interests but technology is everywhere it affects every aspect of our lives and is becoming a more popular and mainstream subject every day. I’ve found once you do find people who share a passion for technology it becomes the favorite and go to subject every time you meet.  Even though I am still on the road to my career in the IT field I have already recognized and began to implement this idea of career minded information technology Immersion.

Why I am at MATC

Hello, welcome to my technology blog. This is my first blog post so I'll give you a little background on myself. My name is Jon I'm a 27 year old technology enthusiast. I have been intrigued and fascinated by computer technology ever since I can remember. I attribute my interest and fluency for technology in a large part to my father, he was an early adapter of the early 90's technology boom and had both me and my brother playing with primitive computers since we could walk.  For most of my life computers were mainly a source of information, form of recreation, and conduit for media.

After high school I became a commercial telecom technician, it played in well with my love of technology, while at the same time taught me other disciplines. I really enjoyed creating infrastructure, installing and maintaining data communications technology. The more I worked in the industry the more IT professionals I met and worked side by side with. It was in these experiences that I started to realize I wanted to be on the other side of the IT workforce. It wasn't that I didn't enjoy getting my hands dirty and using power tools (I did) and it wasn't that I wasn't good at my job (I was very good) but more that the soft side of IT seemed more interesting and challenging to me. After I having this epiphany my mind was made up, the only question remaining was how exactly to best go about getting the career I want.

It's common knowledge one of the best ways to break into the career you desire is to go to school get proper training, and a certification or diploma. I knew this was the logical and most practical method so I decided to go to school to get some IT credentials. Picking MATC was an easy and obvious choice for me. MATC is very affordable compared to every other IT program I looked into in the area, which combined with the fact I live less than a mile from west campus and have heard nothing but positive feedback from former students decided it. With that decided I signed up for their IT support specialist program and haven't looked back. This is my first blog post, but the first of many. I hope you enjoyed it and will maybe follow this blog and watch my progress as I continue my education to achieve my professional goals.