The Big Change

The last few of months of my life have been very interesting. 

For most of the summer, I was constantly running around a neighborhood inspecting a street reconstruction project.  I was constantly bartering with contractors, climbing into storm sewer structures, and helping angry residents get... well... less angry (usually). 

A little over a month ago, my supervisor's supervisor called me on my cell phone around 8 o'clock in the morning.  He asked to meet me at 3 o'clock that afternoon to go over some "IT stuff". 

At 5 minutes to three, I walked into a conference room and sat down with my supervisor's supervisor, my supervisor's supervisor's supervisor, and my union representative. Now, you can clearly imagine what was going through my head... "I'm screwed."  However, there was a wild-card... the IT Director. 

It was explained to me that due to budget change, my position in the engineering department was going to be eliminated.  However, I was offered a position in the IT Department as an IT Technician.  To say the least, I was a little surprised at the sudden turn of events.  I hadn't considered a career in IT for a very long time, and never seriously.  I sat down with the IT Director the following day and had a long discussion regarding his expectations of me in my new role.  Following this discussion, I formally accepted the transfer, and waited to hear when the big change was going to take place.  The people at the top of the totem pole, who decide such things, settled on the 7th of November. 

Over the next few weeks, I spent my days at work wrapping up my duties as a street reconstruction inspector, and began to self educate about computers. 

Let's back up a little bit. 

I've always been pretty good with computers, at least no worse than you average computer user.  I grew up with Windows 98, had Windows XP in high-school and college, and used an Apple every once in awhile.  One time, in the fifth grade, one of the teachers couldn't get her printer to work, and she asked me to help her.  I don't remember if I got it to work or not... but it was pretty cool that she asked.  I also set up a wireless network one time.  So, besides using a computer for work every day, that's about the extent of my computer experience.

Naturally, I was a bit nervous about taking on a new responsibilities without having any formal training in the field.  So, I stopped by the library and picked up as many books as I could find that seemed relevant to the work I was going to be doing.  Quite honestly, I was really hoping to find a Windows 7 for Dummies book, but it wasn't there.  Shucks.  I did find a few good books and did my best to learn some of the lingo that those cool IT people use. 

Finally, the big day arrived.  Since then life has been a blur.  I've had some really great days working in IT already... I can hardly describe all of the things that I've done and learned already.  We're in the process of rolling out a new phone system, so I've been very busy adding phones and components to a database, assembling phones, and installing phones at workstations through-out the organization.  It hasn't been all phones... I've learned a little bit about networking, power supplies, Windows operating systems, VPNs, and a whole bunch of other things.  I'm hoping to pick up a few new things every day, eventually obtain some formal training and perhaps get some certifications in this field.

It seems as though things are working out.  This is a chance that I never knew I wanted to have.