Izabella
What is a day like in the computer networking field?
#Technology #ComputerNetworkAssistant #Network
30 answers
Ramprasanth Raja
Ramprasanth’s Answer
Basically, I can define computer networking jobs with the following role's
In service-based companies, you will find the following roles.
1) Design and Implementation ( Network Architect ) - In this role, you will actually plan, design, review and implement the networking equipment for an organization. The request will come from the client and you have to work as part of the Design and Implementation team.
2) 24x7 Operations Team (Network Administrator ) - This role is to operate what the above team has already implemented. You should ensure that all networking equipment is operating without any issues. You will be also part of the software and hardware upgrade activity in order to ensure that there are no issues after the activity. You may need to work in shifts as the role is to cover 24*7 operations.
In product-based companies -
You can actually develop and engineer the actual networking technologies. Product-based companies such as Cisco, Juniper, Nokia, Alcatel-Lucent, Arista, etc., develop networking products and sell the products.
You can become part of such product development and fix the software/hardware issues found in respective products. There are multiple teams in these product companies such as Engineering, TAC Support, Testing, Professional Services, Sales, etc., You can become part of such teams.
People would prefer working in product companies than service companies as the scope of work is limited in service companies and again it depends on the role you opt-in.
Sachin Bodkhe
Sachin’s Answer
Network field has changed a lot in decade time, I remember when I started my carrier when people used to say 10+ or 12 pass candidate can join the networking course and work as networking support staff.
Previous networking was mainly consider as LAN (local area network engineer), Now depending on your roles, as you grow as network engineer you need to learn LAN/WAN/SAN?compute/datacenter/Loadbalancer/ VMWARE/Python or shell)
and every other day there will be technology evaluation and you need to keep adopting those skill which is changing very rapidly.
So long story short, if you are willing to learn and keep updating you skill for lifetime, you can think of joining the networking field.
If you want to get started, there are multiple video's available on YouTube.
Sachin recommends the following next steps:
Joyal Mendonca
Joyal’s Answer
1) Plan the network based on the current requirements of the customers
2) Design using the most appropriate technology.
3) Implement the above design.
4)Monitor the health of the network.
I probably might not do all the 4 tasks everyday but that should give you a general idea on what most of network engineers do day in and day out.
Sandi Austin
Sandi’s Answer
karthik M
karthik’s Answer
Computer networks function on a local area (LAN) or a wide area (WAN) based upon the number of people and the geographic distances involved. These can include a small business with two or three employees to major corporations to the Federal government of the United States. But computer networks exist in realms beyond business. Virtually every aspect of today's society depends on information that is furnished through computer networks. Companies can save millions of dollars by sharing resources via computer networks rather than by shipping or traveling. Individuals use computer networking to do their banking from home, communicate with relatives, and even to entertain themselves with music or by playing video games
Kapildev N
Kapildev’s Answer
i would say learn, collaborate and fun makes the better work place.
Brad Cameron
Brad’s Answer
Hi Izabella, I have 20+ years of experience in IT, started as a desktop technician and worked my way up to a Global Systems Architect. Computers and Networking are two different technologies. In a small organization you might be responsible for both, in a larger organization, you would specialize in one or the other, with many more specialized layers in either technology! A day in the life of either is Dynamic. You will be expected quickly respond to issues, maintain and build IT infrastructure (PC's or Network devices) on a constant basis, LEARN new technologies almost constantly and sometimes be on-call for issues during nights and weekends depending on the role. IT is critical to most mid to large companies business operations, but you are expected to keep things running without necessarily receiving a lot of accolades. You MUST love the work to get into the field and be a truly top-tier performer. Running Systems or Networks is complex and demanding. Every day brings new opportunities to learn and new challenges. Constant training will be the norm as long as you stay in the field. Think of it like being a nurse or doctor who has to constantly re-qualify in order to stay relevant. There are management and senior management careers that can lead out of these roles as well as sales opportunities. Good luck in your career.
Sri Athithya Kruth Babu
Sri Athithya Kruth’s Answer
Hello there,
Depending on your role in the company, you would be doing a variety of things on a regular work day:
- If you work in design and deployment, you would be looking at a lot of customer communication, network requirement gathering, and then designing an effective network based on the requirements gathering. This role would need broad domain knowledge, as well as critical and design thinking. These skills would enable you to create a good design that would satisfy customer requirements.
- If you were working in services, then you would be taking calls from customers who'd be working on fixing a problem in their deployments. Such a role would require deep knowledge of a few topics depending on the team you are in.
- If you work in Ops, then you would be in charge of the day-to-day operations in a network. This would include immediate work in case any issues crop up, and also collaborate with a variety of vendors (depending on your deployment) to solve these issues. You would also have to handle any additions to the existing deployment.
I hope this was useful to you. In general, networking roles mean meetings, discussion and collaboration, with plenty of technical knowledge applied to troubleshooting, design and deployment.
UMESH KULKARNI
UMESH’s Answer
I would like to share my own experience and roles so that you can understand how Computer/network engineer roles and responsibility.
At early stage of my carrier 1 to 3 Years of Experience, I was working as L1 engineer in Service based IT Company which was providing managed services.
As a L1 Engineer, We used to monitor Customer Network Environment using network monitoring tools. If any alarm observed on tool then we used to open tickets and inform responsible/concern teams of client. Also we do initial troubleshooting and try to find out cause of problem. Update incident tickets and keep posted to client regarding progress of ticket and take required actions to resolve the issue.
As my experience and skills are developed, I was promoted to L2 and L3 Engineer and I change my organisation. I joined company where we were mangling enterprise network of that particular company, This role was involve multiple roles and responsibilities like Incident Management, Change Management and Request Management. Basically we were work on projects which required plan, design and implement required network infrastructure for-customers and partners. Support L1 and L2 Engineer for resolving escalated issue.
When your experience is more than 10 or more years then you mostly work as Network Architect where your responsibility changes. As a network Architect you may work on above responsibilities but you should be able to convert Business requirements to Technology solution and provide solutions as per business needs. Provide technical solutions to customer requirement and plan and implement required solution for customers.
I hope it will help to understand roles and responsibility of Network Engineer.
Carol Kampf
Carol’s Answer
Izabella;
Hi
I have recruited for professionals with computer networking experience but I have not done the job. As you may be aware, <span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: white;">network engineers and network or systems administrators, install, configure and maintain local area networks, wide area networks and Internet systems that enable businesses to connect with employees and customers. </span>They <span style="color: black; background-color: rgb(239, 239, 239);">perform general system maintenance</span>, deal with system failures, apply software updates and fixes, to attending to network related PC support issues.
There are different roles working on this side of technology from administering/supporting the network, to building all the servers in the network to now even automating the building of the servers. There are servers that are housed on the client site as well as servers that are what’s called off premise or in the cloud. I have found that the best way to find out about any career is to go online and ask.
https://work.chron.com › Careers › Engineering Jobs
As far as a day in the life of a Network Engineer, I went on Google and asked if there are You tube Videos. This is what I have found so far.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_CubB8lPJ0
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7PLvwkT5_U
<span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34);"> </span>
There is more information out there that will tell you what people do in certain careers, other sites that might describe a typical day in the role, jobsites with openings and job descriptions as well as salary ranges for the positions, etc. YouTube may have videos explaining the same. If you look at multiple sites, look for consistencies in what they say. This should help you feel more comfortable that the information you are reading is accurate.
Hope this helps. Feel free to reach back out.
Carol
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Carol recommends the following next steps:
Anupam Singh
Anupam’s Answer
It would be unexpected very often in networking field. If you really love doing networking , you be taking challanges as adventure. Otherwise , it might scare you if any expected network down takes place. In Networking fields, more complected network directly proportional to responsibility. Any network down impacts business a lot , so might be having small pressure of that, but your interest , dedication and involvement in networks wins over any type of pressure.
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Lorraine Brown
Lorraine’s Answer
I am have worked in the Information Technology field in various positions. I was never Network Administrator. However, I did study this and worked with Network Administrators. If you were to be come a Network Administrator, you would be responsible for keeping the company network up and running 24/7. Example, you would have a cell phone and laptop so you could monitor software to ensure the network is always up and running. This job requires a proactive approach. You would be heavily relied on.
Govindaraaj J
Govindaraaj’s Answer
Hi Izabella,
This is good query but it depends up various factors and differs from person to person as, All fingers are not same !
A simple tick i would suggest being an network consultant from a global leader, Always love the work you do, work with passion, be thirsty about your technology you work on, irrespective of networking.. Be an optimist and try carving for opportunity to grab and learn as much as possible because learning is the only WEALTH that none can steal from you..
Networking is one of most interesting and admirable field that i have witnessed and beyond profession, you always have something to give others in as make their work ease or happy..
Wishing you all success for your future endeavours
Abhishek Nahar
Abhishek’s Answer
In my opinion, it really depends upon the nature of your job and what responsibilities you are given.
There are multiple different roles in Computer Networking Field and their job responsibilities are different as well. For an Engineer, a typical day would start and end with working on technical aspects of the tasks presented to him such as working on a project to complete a network setup for some client, working on their backlog for different tasks assigned to them. For a manager, it would be to make sure all the tasks assigned are being performed on time, address concerns from customers and their team . At the same time, anyone in IT industry has to keep upgrading their skills every few years to keep up with the ever changing technology.
Hope this helps.
ABHISHEK DWIVEDI
ABHISHEK’s Answer
If you are interested in networking every day might be cheerful .
Hardik Shah
Hardik’s Answer
Amol Palde
Amol’s Answer
Hi , it depends on your profile.I am having 10 years of experience in Networking field.so if you are in operation support profile then it might be busy day for you in the networking field and that is also depending on the issues that is coming day by day.If you are in Project ,Design or implementation team
then the work varies as per project stage but in any of the profile in the computer networking field you will learn the new technologies and you will enjoy it.
Viraj Munoli
Viraj’s Answer
Typically, in the networking industry, the nature of work depends on the role really. These are already explained above my many others.
An additional point is the type of company as well - its always better to work at a Product company (taking nothing away from Service based companies as they work very hard as well) as the perks tend to me more in comparison.
Guru Swaminathan
Guru’s Answer
Its super fun!! Trust me, you get to solve things instead of just rebooting the box!!
Corley Efurd
Corley’s Answer
A good engineer is a lazy engineer. This means that if you design your systems correctly and have appropriate failsafes, backups etc. Your days as a network engineer will go smoothly.
Corley recommends the following next steps:
Debjeet Basak
Debjeet’s Answer
shweta gandhi
shweta’s Answer
It depends on the type of profile you are in .
Aditya Uthappa
Aditya’s Answer
Hi.
I have just started out in the field after working in support for a while. So i would say every day is a different challenge. No two problems are the same. Its interesting and if you enjoy logical and analytical thinking you'd love the field without a doubt.
Daniel Deepak
Daniel’s Answer
Support services - You will get the cases and need to restore the traffic.
Engineering Team - You will be more focussed on one product and will work on testing different codes/New feature support etc for particular platform
Sometimes it is challenging but it is rewarding.
Mridul Kumar Sharma
Mridul Kumar’s Answer
You can go through this video
https://www.cbtnuggets.com/blog/technology/networking/guide-getting-networking
Hi Mridul, Gurpreet here from CareerVillage! Although I understand that you are trying to be helpful, sending a student to another link isn't the best approach. Students are looking to hear about personal insights from professionals. In addition, this link does not help answer Izabella's original question
Gurpreet Lally, Admin
Vuk Mutapovic
Vuk’s Answer
Hi ,
It depends of position and job.
I can share my experience as networking engineer.
It is always dynamic, every day is different. It is never-ending story when it comes to education.
I have a great team and we support each other all the time.
Sometimes it is challenging but it is rewarding.
Sujit Patil
Sujit’s Answer
Computer Networking field is vast. It depends on which part of the team you are working with, At times it can be very busy day for Operations support engineers. But it's also exciting as you get to solve network issues. If you are a network consultant you would be out in the field meeting customers to gather requirements for the Network Designs and solutions. If you are working in Implementation team you would be working live on network devices and configuring networks. Its really interesting to work in Networking field. Technologies are evolving rapidly and network Engineers need to cope up with speed and transform themselves to adapt the new technologies.
Pradeep Kumar Yadav
Pradeep Kumar’s Answer
Support services - You will get the cases and need to restore the traffic.
Engineering Team - You will be more focussed on one product and will work on testing different codes/New feature support etc for particular platform
Operations Team - Design review/Implementation etc.
BR
Pradeep
Brent Morvan
Brent’s Answer
Hi Izabella,
Probably the most honest (but perhaps least helpful) answer I can give for this is that it varies significantly with different jobs in the industry. For example, working for a vendor often means learning in depth knowledge on specific products but not necessarily gaining a lot of experience as a user of the products to deliver specific outcomes and projects. On the flip side, working as the end customer may mean that you can't become incredibly in-depth technically but are more focused on delivering outcomes.
That said, as the computer networking field is so diverse there are plenty of jobs to try and see what you enjoy.
Qindi Bao
Qindi’s Answer
I have been working in computer networking industry for over 15 years and I still have big passion for learning and playing new computer networking technologies because it is really a big fun. Computer networking evolves quickly and my knowledge has to be refreshed every a few years. But I like challenges as well as the accomplishments got from them. So it really depends on what kind of person you are. If you like new things , new challenges, this career is definitely for you.