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Whether you were the one in the office who just “got” computers or you actively pursued a college degree in Information Technology, everyone has a story about how they got their first job in IT. It could have been dumb luck or the promise of a bigger paycheck. You may have studied up for your CompTIA after spending your teenage years learning the ins and outs of Linux.

Or maybe you just wanted something different and have always loved tinkering with (and breaking) things. Whatever it is, now’s your chance to share your story about how you ended up in IT.

Take the poll below and share your story with the Spiceworks Community. And if you find yourself having fun writing your own abridged memoir, you might consider forwarding it to @lee-schlesinger , who runs our new My Career Story series.

Poll: Did you intentionally pursue a career in IT?
  • Yes, I specifically studied for and pursued a career in IT
  • Kinda, I knew I would end up working in tech somehow
  • No, I stumbled into an IT career by accident
0 voters
142 Spice ups
2

When I joined the Army I wanted a technical job, I told them that I liked electronics and computers. They matched me up with a job that dealt with radios and computers. I learned a lot while I was in the Army but I didn’t intentionally pick IT.

15 Spice ups
3

I started at an Administrative Assistant, and as the company grew, I became the local IT person, learning as I went. That was about 20 years ago.

7 Spice ups
4

After a few years of career soul searching, I finally made the conscious decision to go into IT. It really was my passion anyways, and has turned into a good career. So yeah, I specifically pursued IT.

5 Spice ups
5

Yes. I decided that IT was where I wanted to be when I was 12 and these new things called “computers” were appearing in the home. When I went to university I had the choice of Physics or computer science. I went with computer science as the Physics involved more maths and I’m terrible with maths so that was that…

15 Spice ups
6

My Dad started the first data processing unit for the local energy company back in the '60’s. From there he started his own company and still works well in to his 70’s. When I was in college I kept telling him people thought I worked in the computer lab because I kept fixing simple issues with the token-ring network. He convinced me that not everyone has the same aptitude for this stuff and offered me a job after I graduated.

2 Spice ups
7

Tinkering with computers was a hobby that stemmed from gaming. Originally I was a Graphic Designer until the dot com bubble burst and the market was flooded with designers. That’s when my career changed… I miss the creative work.

8 Spice ups
8

Always knew I wanted to do something in the IT field, Wasted 4 years of college and changed majors 4 times , finally went with the IT route. Should’ve stuck with my guts! lol

1 Spice up
9

Like Gary I decided when I was quite young that IT was something I was interested in.

Then I learned to code like a maniac. And I was always good with a soldering iron.

Went to school for Computer Engineering.

10

After spending much of my 20s in a terrible factory job, I wanted a respectable career, and settled on IT because hey, I’m pretty much always using computers in my spare time anyway. My degree has a “web and applications emphasis” because I found my relative skill in language to apply pretty well to programming and scripting, and I found those satisfying, but in practice I’m pretty much a generalist.

I didn’t exactly decide at age 16 that I was going to make a career out of IT, but I kind of just played to my own strengths.

11

I studied Music in college. Worked in computer stores as a tech from 1996 - 2003, when I got out of computers all together and opened a martial arts school. I taught full-time from 2003 until 2006, when the economy here kinda took a turn for the worse, and disposable income was the first to get cut. I was struggling to make it at the school, and a buddy of mine offhandedly mentioned at the garage one night that the company he worked for was looking for an IT guy. I interviewed and was hired, and within 3 months I had handed the school off to another instructor. That was 10 years ago, and I’m still at that company.

When I was hired in, each office was an island, with nothing but a Linksys WAP in place and cheap off-the-shelf switches. Since then, we’ve grown to a full DMVPN mesh, two data centers, internal SQL, Exchange, etc, and a fully virtualized server & desktop environment.

2 Spice ups
12

I took engineering classes in HS, and enjoyed that greatly. By the time I got to college, I learned how math-heavy and boring true engineering is, and I like tinkering more. And so IT.

2 Spice ups
13

Finished my degree in computer science, and jumped right into the field. I started out working in retail but quickly realized that I did not want to spend my life there. So I went back to school and finished and left that world. I’ve been doing IT for about 5 years now and haven’t been happier.

2 Spice ups
14

Yep. Went to school for it and everything!

1 Spice up
15

I’m the “tinkering and breaking” kind, and tech is the most commonplace and complicated thing we deal with on a day to day. I was never one for the shallow end of the pool, methinks…

2 Spice ups
16

My initial focus was to get into software development by way of my Computer Science degree. While I still do some software development from time to time (specifically internal web-based applications), most of my job involves what you’d expect in an SMB IT department of 4 people (e.g. user support, system administration, networks administration, etc).

17

I have a degree in Economics. When i finished college in the mid-90’s i started working in IT. Technology seemed a lot more interesting than accounting or management. Guess what? i am in IT and i use different type of accounting and management everyday…

18

After I got out of the military, where I was as far from tech as you can get, I got a job in retail sales and they happened to have a computer section (this was the early 90’s, that was still a novelty), I seemed to have a keen ability to help people understand the basics of a computer. I did really well at that and decided I could go to a VAR and make more money (some customer told me he wished I had been there to help him when he bought his business computers), I didn’t do well at the VAR (I hated cold calling!!!). One day a tech doesn’t show up and they needed someone to run to a clients and fix something, I told them I could do it and away I went. When I came back the boss called me into his office and explained he had planned on firing me that week due to poor sales, but would keep me on if I was interested in low level tech work. I found I had an aptitude for this type of stuff and started studying and getting certs and a mere 1.5 years later I had my MCSE and CNE certs.

1 Spice up
19

I fell in love with computers the moment I put the first quarter into an arcade game. I took my first programming class at 9, and was the only child of any age in a room full of adults. From there I taught myself BASIC on a Tandy Pocket Computer, fiddled around on a C-64, and at 14 began making money by teaching people how to use their Macintosh computers (which I did not own). My first contract gig was for an Access 5 database while I was a college student studying acting. I was 19.

So, yeah. IT is kind of in my blood.

3 Spice ups
20

Found myself to be a single mom and needed a career that I could support my kids with. Went to school, got an internship in my last semester & it turned out to be a full time job after I graduated. I have been here for almost 5 years.

3 Spice ups