With this growth in the Information Technology (IT) industry, the demand for specialised and trained professionals has increased. Students have started considering the IT industry a new career option because of job stability and ever new opportunities.

Here are some key tips to get you started:

1. List your interest and research roles

The IT industry is known for its diversification in the number of specialties available. You need to research the positions with the highest demand and then decide if that position interests you. This will help you narrow down the focus and evaluate your career goals.

2. Learn entry-level IT skills

Learning entry-level skills like JavaScript, Oracle, CompTIA, and HTML will increase your productivity and confidence. You can start by enrolling in a respected IT school and learning entry-level skills to get started with an IT career. You can learn about desk support,  Microsoft Azure fundamentals, wrap your head around the Microsoft domain and learn more about network technologies such as VPN, firewall, etc.. These basic skills will help you in choosing the correct career path in the IT industry.

3. Work on open-source projects

Open-source projects are where the designs are accessible publicly, and people can inspect, modify, enhance and share the design. Open-source projects provide a platform for newcomers to gain experience in coding and building their skill-sets. You can also add these projects to your resume. But before starting an open-source project, research the platforms and decide if you want to contribute to a subsisting project or create a new one.

4. Network

Your career in the IT industry will grow based on your relationships so do your best to find opportunities to network with other IT professionals. Attend seminars and events where you can meet more IT professionals and businesses relevant to the IT industry. By doing this, you can increase the possibility of getting referrals which is crucial in this competitive field. You can acquire leads on such events in business publications and local professional associations.

5. Freelance to gain experience

Freelancing is a great way to gain experience in the respective fields, get paid, and understand technicalities that might arise in the fieldwork. It will also help you build your network, and maybe you end up bagging a permanent job offer from the company while working as a freelancer for them.

6. Create a professional social media page that reflects your interest and passion for technology. Your social media page must depict your professionalism and capabilities to the employers.

7. Strengthen your resume by adding work experiences, certification relevant to your area of expertise, short-term courses, and coding languages.  A CV maker could be useful.

8. Finally, consider getting the degrees and certifications relevant to your preferred area of IT.

Concluding thoughts…

The IT industry is a fast-paced industry where technological changes are taking place constantly. This industry requires you to update your knowledge and keep pace with the breakthroughs. Whether you aim to become a cyber security specialist or ethical hacker, you should embrace as many opportunities as possible through training, education, and networking to prosper in this industry.

Information technology is a broad field. It’s also a very exciting career path, brimming with opportunities for growth. You get to play with the latest advancements in one of the fastest growing fields out there.

Although a career in IT is exciting, it often requires considerable time and effort to get into. You want to be very clear on why you want to pursue an IT career or else your motivation will burn quickly and you’ll give up.

Here are 6 good reasons to dive into the world of IT:

1. IT has the perfect combination of high demand and low supply.

Every company in the world uses technology today, which means there’s a huge demand for IT professionals. IT services that an average company needs includes managing software, creating new IT products, maintaining security, and helping out non-technical folks of the company.

Couple that with a rise in e-commerce business and a boom in remote working and you get an even larger demand for IT services.

Now, you’d think that a service that’s so in demand would have a huge number of people trying to sell it. Luckily, that’s not the case. According to several estimates, there are more IT jobs than people who can fill them. The reason? Lack of qualifications.

This creates the perfect combination of a high demand and low supply for IT professionals. As the COVID-19 pandemic forces the world to adopt technology to an even greater extent, now is the perfect time to get educated in IT. 

If you feel you could use some IT knowledge to open new career avenues for yourself, there are plenty of great resources available out there and you might want to look into online courses.

2. You don’t (really) need college.

Speaking of online courses, the greatest advantage of an IT career is that lack of formal education doesn’t restrict your entry to the field.

Unlike medicine or law, which require a ridiculous amount of formal training, IT can be learned online. There are several obvious benefits of this. First, you don’t have to spend a crazy amount of money on university.

Second, you can start learning IT at an early age and at your own pace. This allows you to explore a wide range of sub-fields and determine where your interest lies, which is something difficult to pull off with traditional university education.

Third, you don’t need advanced basic science knowledge for a career in IT. Many people believe you need to be a STEM whiz or the world’s greatest mathematician to get into IT. In fact, you only need basic knowledge of maths to code.

Now keep in mind that not all sub-fields in IT are easy to get into. Some do require formal training but hey, you can always get into the advanced stuff later once you ace the basics via online learning!

3. You can apply your skills to a wide range of roles.

There are over 21 different types of IT jobs. Although this creates the problem of too many choices, it means you’re never going to get bored of IT. Why? Because many fields require more or less the same training, and your skills can be easily transferred from one role to another.

If one day you wake up and decide you’re bored of being a computer programmer, you can simply switch to quality assurance. Or become a web developer, a systems analyst, or a support specialist. 

Since IT is something that can be easily learned online, even if you lack the skills to transition into a new role, an online course or two will hopefully do the trick. Before you take an online course, here are some tips for more secure online learning. 

The certainty that your career is not going to get monotonous and boring that IT gives you is rarely seen in other career paths, which is a solid reason to choose the field if you’re a young student!

4. You get to be the modern Thomas Edison.

A career in IT is bound to push you to your creative limits. Just like Thomas Edison created solutions for problems of his time, IT professionals are expected to create technological solutions for modern problems.

Uber was created because people needed a hassle-free travel solution. Google was created so you can read this article and enrich your life. Every app on your smartphone was created to solve a problem, and an IT career will allow you to create similar solutions for countless problems that still exist.

What? You’re not the creative type? You shouldn’t worry because the wide range of IT roles mean there’s something for everyone in it. If you don’t consider yourself the creative type, you can take on roles like troubleshooting technological problems and providing IT support to company staff or customers.

5. IT careers offer a great earning potential.

This is what you were waiting to read, right? While money shouldn’t be the number one reason behind your career choice, it plays a great role in keeping you motivated and allowing you to live a fulfilling life.

Since the supply of even entry-level IT professionals is limited, there’s a good chance that you’ll be paid well by your company compared to other fields. 

An average computer programmer in the US makes $80k a year. Other roles in IT pay even higher, especially when you reach senior positions. Compare that to the $80k that business occupations pay and the $64k that arts and designing fields pay, and you’ll see why IT with all its flexibility and minimal amount of required training is a great option.

6. There’s great potential for remote work.

If there’s one industry that has the greatest potential for online work, it’s IT. Thanks to cloud-based solutions and digital workplaces (and the COVID-19 pandemic), you can enjoy a very flexible IT job if your company allows remote working.

If you’re really into a nomadic lifestyle and don’t want to get stuck in a company for years, you can work as a freelancer. There’s a huge market for freelance IT services, especially on credible and secure freelancing platforms like Fiverr and Upwork. After a simple sign-up process on these platforms, you can bid on thousands of jobs posted daily and kickstart your freelance career.

Companies today are more open to working with freelancers since they’re often a talented group of people and provide high-quality work. Unlike in-house employees, freelancers don’t have to be trained and can work on a per-project basis, which saves a lot of money for companies.

If you’ve always wanted to be a freelancer, IT might just be the perfect career option for you!

This was a guest post by Rebecca Lee.