Studying an IT course - which to choose

AubreyMac

In my current job doing administration the role is a bit boring and can get a bit stagnant. Admin is basic minuting of meetings and data entry etc, any bimbo can do this.


I have been told that I can go on courses that will help with the role and the company can pay for the course or agree to time off for study without losing pay.


But it must be related to my work, I must prove that it'll help in the job. I can't just go and start a degree in engineering to do admin work.


I work for social services and do not want to develop a career in the area. Another option is to do IT course as my colleagues think I can be good at IT (I'm not, they're just old and struggle with basic emailing).


My problem is that IT sounds complicated to me and also, so many people study and work in IT.


What do IT courses teach you? I wouldn't jump into doing a degree just yet, I could do some foundation course to test the water.


Previous courses I've been on have just been to teach how to use the latest versions of outlook, word etc.

NewShadow

IT has quite a few areas:

I like coding - thinking about how to develop a piece of software to save time/money/make something better. It can be quite satisfying and stimulating, but occasionally involves me staring at a wall for a couple of hours before putting my headphones on and typing frantically for a bit. (in my head) It's very similar and completely nothing like knitting when you having a ball of wool and no pattern - trying to decide what you want to make, then figuring out the exact details as you go (which probably explains my organic looking jumpers).

Recently I streamlined a form on our intranet. I'd been musing about it for about a year, and it suddenly came to me how I could make it better/automate parts of the process - It took me about 5 days to develop and test a solution; saved the company around 70 admin hours (10 days) in the last 3 months of piloting.

There are lots of courses online, and you could start with having a look at the really simple python modules on code academy

ETA - It just occurred to me a better example for you could be that I developed a new visitor booking form for reception (again intranet/sharepoint based) where people could manage their visitors remotely and in real time, saving a huge amount of work for the receptionists who could access the data as they needed it, and I also developed an event booking form for the events team - allowing them to manage delegate registration more efficiently - again saving them time, but also improving information management.

robatwork

You've got broadly programming, support, admin and sales.

Which if any of these areas do you think you'd be good at and are interested in?

(The admin I referred to is really part of support - database admin or exchange admin etc.)

AubreyMac

NewShadow wrote: »

IT has quite a few areas:

I like coding - thinking about how to develop a piece of software to save time/money/make something better. It can be quite satisfying and stimulating, but occasionally involves me staring at a wall for a couple of hours before putting my headphones on and typing frantically for a bit. (in my head) It's very similar and completely nothing like knitting when you having a ball of wool and no pattern - trying to decide what you want to make, then figuring out the exact details as you go (which probably explains my organic looking jumpers).

Recently I streamlined a form on our intranet. I'd been musing about it for about a year, and it suddenly came to me how I could make it better/automate parts of the process - It took me about 5 days to develop and test a solution; saved the company around 70 admin hours (10 days) in the last 3 months of piloting.

There are lots of courses online, and you could start with having a look at the really simple python modules on code academy

ETA - It just occurred to me a better example for you could be that I developed a new visitor booking form for reception (again intranet/sharepoint based) where people could manage their visitors remotely and in real time, saving a huge amount of work for the receptionists who could access the data as they needed it, and I also developed an event booking form for the events team - allowing them to manage delegate registration more efficiently - again saving them time, but also improving information management.

That sounds interesting, I can be quite creative and originally studied art & design. I'm more interested in IT than social work because I am not a peoples person, I need to do something factual and impersonal.

Basic things within companies that aren't there (such as clear info and clear navigation on a webpage) really frustrates me.

Coding, I never heard of such a thing. Thanks.

AubreyMac

robatwork wrote: »

You've got broadly programming, support, admin and sales.

Which if any of these areas do you think you'd be good at and are interested in?

(The admin I referred to is really part of support - database admin or exchange admin etc.)

I'm not sure on what each of these are? Cane to give a brief on to differentiate?

Didn't realise IT had such variety. I can swear the IT people in my work sit around doing nothing, whenenter something goes wrong they take forever to sort it. I thought IT. Was just fixing computers.

NewShadow

very generally

programming - coding and developing as I described above - but I do bits of it rather than as a full time job - as a job there'd be more day to day fixing and cleaning code for efficiency and to resolve specific pre determined issues/adding new pre determined features

support - fixing IT hardware (computers) and software (mostly people not knowing how to use computers)

admin - fixing software and network/server issues in the background (if it helps - exchange means emails)

sales - erm, well... I'm going to say sales is sales...

PenguinOfDeath

AubreyMac wrote: »

I can swear the IT people in my work sit around doing nothing, whenenter something goes wrong they take forever to sort it. I thought IT. Was just fixing computers.

Yep, you and the rest of the world :wall:

Double_V

NewShadow wrote: »

IT has quite a few areas:

I like coding - thinking about how to develop a piece of software to save time/money/make something better. It can be quite satisfying and stimulating, but occasionally involves me staring at a wall for a couple of hours before putting my headphones on and typing frantically for a bit. (in my head) It's very similar and completely nothing like knitting when you having a ball of wool and no pattern - trying to decide what you want to make, then figuring out the exact details as you go (which probably explains my organic looking jumpers).

Recently I streamlined a form on our intranet. I'd been musing about it for about a year, and it suddenly came to me how I could make it better/automate parts of the process - It took me about 5 days to develop and test a solution; saved the company around 70 admin hours (10 days) in the last 3 months of piloting.

There are lots of courses online, and you could start with having a look at the really simple python modules on code academy

ETA - It just occurred to me a better example for you could be that I developed a new visitor booking form for reception (again intranet/sharepoint based) where people could manage their visitors remotely and in real time, saving a huge amount of work for the receptionists who could access the data as they needed it, and I also developed an event booking form for the events team - allowing them to manage delegate registration more efficiently - again saving them time, but also improving information management.

Have you got a demo for that work ?
Sounds interesting.

NewShadow

Double_V wrote: »

Have you got a demo for that work ?
Sounds interesting.

Which application? It's was just basically java based tweaks to sharepoint web parts/workflows and lists - using the existing intranet platform for greater efficiency.

directdebiter

AubreyMac wrote: »

That sounds interesting, I can be quite creative and originally studied art & design. I'm more interested in IT than social work because I am not a peoples person, I need to do something factual and impersonal.

Basic things within companies that aren't there (such as clear info and clear navigation on a webpage) really frustrates me.

Coding, I never heard of such a thing. Thanks.

If you studied art and design and pick up on things such as web page navigation - why don't you look into becoming a web designer ? This seems like a good fit and there is a good demand for web design skills.

Useful info on retraining here
I think it is important to start playing around in your spare time with computers to better understand the opportunities

DKLS

AubreyMac wrote: »

That sounds interesting, I can be quite creative and originally studied art & design. I'm more interested in IT than social work because I am not a peoples person, I need to do something factual and impersonal.

Basic things within companies that aren't there (such as clear info and clear navigation on a webpage) really frustrates me.

Coding, I never heard of such a thing. Thanks.

If you enjoy the creative aspects it might be worth exploring web design courses, and more specifically UX courses as that is a growing area.