Congratulate yourself that you’re on the right track! A fraction of the population enjoy their work and find it stimulating, but vast numbers simply moan about it and take no action. Because you’ve done research we have a hunch that you’re at least considering retraining, so you’ve already stood out from the crowd. Take your time now to research and follow-through.

Before you make decisions on any career courses, discuss your thoughts with an industry expert who can help you sort out which area will be right for you. Someone who can get to know your personality, and find out what types of work suit you:

* Do you like working on your own or is being in a team environment an important option?

* What do you require from the market sector you work in? (Things do change – look at the building trade, or banks for example.)

* Is this the last time you imagine you’ll re-train, and if so, do you suppose your new career will allow you to do that?

* Would you like your study to be in an industry where you believe your chances of gainful employment are high until retirement?

We would advise that you consider Information Technology – it’s well known that it is one of the few growth sectors. It’s not all nerdy people looking at computer screens constantly – naturally some IT jobs demand that, but the majority of roles are carried out by people like you and me who get on very well.

The perhaps intimidating chore of securing your first job is often made easier by training colleges, through a Job Placement Assistance service. Often, too much is made of this feature, as it’s relatively easy for well qualified and focused men and women to get a job in this industry – because there’s a great need for skilled employees.

However, avoid waiting until you have completed your exams before bringing your CV up to date. As soon as you start a course, enter details of your study programme and place it on jobsites!

It’s not uncommon to find that junior support roles are offered to people who are in the process of training and haven’t even passed a single exam yet. This will at least get you into the ‘maybe’ pile of CV’s – rather than the ‘No’ pile.

The top companies to help get you placed are generally local IT focused employment agencies. Because they get paid commission to place you, they have more incentive to get on with it.

To bottom line it, as long as you focus the same level of energy into securing your first IT position as into studying, you’re not going to hit many challenges. A number of students strangely spend hundreds of hours on their training and studies and then just stop once qualified and would appear to think that businesses will just discover them.

Don’t get hung-up, as many people do, on the certification itself. Training is not an end in itself; you should be geared towards the actual job at the end of it. You need to remain focused on where you want to go.

Don’t let yourself become one of the unfortunate masses who select a program that seems ‘fun’ or ‘interesting’ – and end up with a plaque on the wall for a career they’ll never really get any satisfaction from.

Never let your focus stray from what you want to achieve, and build your study action-plan from that – avoid getting them back-to-front. Keep your eyes on your goals and study for something you’ll enjoy for years to come.

It’s good advice for all students to speak with an industry professional before following a particular study program. This gives some measure of assurance that it contains the commercially required skills for the chosen career path.

In most cases, your normal person has no idea in what direction to head in a computing career, let alone which market they should be considering getting trained in.

How can we possibly grasp the tasks faced daily in an IT career if we’ve never been there? Often we have never met anyone who performs the role either.

Getting to the right answer really only appears through a thorough investigation of many unique criteria:

* Personality plays an important role – what things get your juices flowing, and what are the areas that really turn you off.

* Why you’re looking at starting in Information Technology – it could be you’re looking to overcome a particular goal such as working for yourself maybe.

* How highly do you rate salary – is it of prime importance, or do you place job satisfaction a little higher on the scale of your priorities?

* Learning what the main work types and markets are – plus how they’re different to each other.

* The time and energy you’ll commit your training.

In all honesty, it’s obvious that the only real way to research these issues will be via a meeting with someone that understands Information Technology (as well as it’s commercial needs and requirements.)

You have to be sure that all your exams are current and what employers are looking for – you’re wasting your time with programmes which provide certificates that are worthless because they’re ‘in-house’.

From a commercial standpoint, only top businesses such as Microsoft, Cisco, Adobe or CompTIA (as an example) really carry any commercial clout. Nothing else makes the grade.

(C) 2009. Pop to LearningLolly.com for smart career advice on IT Jobs News and Comptia News.