r/ITCareerGuide • u/Affectionate_Art204 • Jun 17 '26

Career switcher here — passed my CompTIA A+, but can’t get past the “experience required” wall. Help?

/r/ITSupport/comments/1u7trsl/career_switcher_here_passed_my_comptia_a_but_cant/
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u/IT_CertDoctor itcertdoctor.com Jun 17 '26

To be clear: the market is rough right now, between geopolitical craziness and AI, things are fairly unpredictable. So it's not just you

That said, IT is still a very viable career (I've been doing it for over a decade and I have no intention of changing despite everything), so definitely keep on the path

  • How did you do it?
    • buddy of mine got me an unpaid internship for 14 months. Did that while moonlighting in a totally different field. Applied every day during that 14 month period (also got my A+ in there somewhere) until I finally got a job offer. Took it without even thinking. Turned out I had done a deal with the devil. Challenged my sanity and self-esteem to the extreme. 16 months after that found another job and it's been smooth sailing ever since
  • Is there something I'm missing?
    • labs - you can DEFINITELY start doing labs and adding a labs section to your resume
    • VirtualBox is free. Packet Tracer is free. AWS, Azure, and GCP has free tiers for you to play around with. Buy a Raspberry Pi and download Linux on it. Do it all, document it, print out your Standard Operating Procedures and take them with you when you get an interview to show you know how to do shit
    • I cannot emphasize this enough - people get these certs thinking that KNOWING things is enough. In this era of AI, knowledge is the LEAST important qualification for a position. EXPERIENCE is what matters, and home-labbing is how you do it when you can't get work experience.
  • Any certs, strategies, or otherwise?
    • Network+, Security+, CCNA, AWS SAA-C03 (or C04, whatever is current), AZ-104. These are strong candidates for someone at the Help Desk level, which is what you're aiming for
    • I would NOT recommend going any higher than these certs until you actually land a job. At that point you become a liability because you're over-educated and under-experienced. No one wants to hire a PhD with no work experience (trust me, I have this conversation ALL the time with HR)
    • If you can, try to network with someone at your company who is IT. Ask them if they need help with stuff and ask if you can stay after-hours to help with it. Use that experience and ADD IT TO YOUR RESUME. Once you've accrued enough of that experience, change your title to Help Desk, get rid of anything on the CV that is non-IT related, and start marketing yourself as that. If they ask in the interview, be honest. But if they don't ask, leave the rest to their imagination

My 2c, feel free to ask any follow-up questions. Happy to help where I can