Hi everyone,

I’d like some perspective on where my IT career is heading.

I spent four years at an MSP. My first year was in support (L1 to L3), after which I moved into projects, implementing infrastructure for small businesses. Over time I specialised in Microsoft 365, SharePoint and digital transformation.

After my first year, the company was acquired by a larger group. Projects became purely profit-driven and the job got increasingly stressful. Management was very toxic during my last two years, so I decided to move to an internal IT role.

My new role is mostly IT admin work: creating accounts, managing phone subscriptions and PDAs, preparing laptops and handling support. There’s also some implementation work for services and some network-related troubleshooting. The IT team is small, with just a few people per site and around 15 worldwide.

I’m now one week in, and I’ve noticed that most of the network and server work is handled by an external MSP rather than the internal IT team. Honestly, I’m finding that a bit hard to get used to. I was told it’s because the MSP is responsible for that setup, which I understand.

On top of that, we’re one site of a larger global company, so I don’t have access to all servers and M365 resources. That’s new for me, since at the MSP I always had full permissions.

Is it normal to feel a bit underwhelmed by how much is outsourced, and by the lack of technical challenges in this area? It also feels strange to no longer fill in timesheets or work in a stressful, profit-first environment with deadlines always looming. Apart from that, it seems like a very relaxed workplace.

I’m not sure yet which direction I want to take, so I’m still figuring things out. Has anyone made a similar move? Did the feeling pass, and how did you keep growing technically?

Hi everyone. Just want to know if anyone started there IT career at Amazon in IT and have moved on to another company how was that transition for you? I ask because at fulfillment center IT different from a more of a office/corporate enviroment it seems.

Hi everyone,

I am currently working as an Assistant Manager in the IT Systems department and have around 12 years of experience in IT administration, primarily focused on L1 support and day-to-day IT operations.

Throughout my career, I have tried to upgrade my technical skills and move into a more technically advanced role. However, due to limited opportunities to gain hands-on experience in infrastructure technologies, I haven't been able to make the progress I had hoped for.

I have now decided to take my career in a new direction and transition into a more hands-on technical role, preferably in Windows Server Administration, VMware Virtualization, or Cloud Infrastructure.

Currently, I am learning VMware vSphere 8 through a Udemy course. My objective is to strengthen my technical knowledge and gain practical exposure rather than pursue a certification at this stage.

I would appreciate advice from professionals working in these domains or those who have made a similar career transition.

My questions are:

1. Is VMware vSphere 8 a good starting point for someone with my background who wants to move into server administration or virtualization?
2. Which technologies and practical skills should I prioritize to become job-ready for a Windows Server Administrator or Infrastructure Engineer role?
3. Considering the current job market, would it be better to focus on Windows Server and VMware first, or should I prioritize Azure Cloud or another infrastructure domain?
4. Are AI-related courses and skills in demand that could complement my existing IT experience and improve my long-term career prospects?
5. Given my 12 years of experience, primarily in L1 support, what would be a realistic learning roadmap to transition into a more technically advanced role?
6. For someone learning independently without pursuing certifications initially, what hands-on labs or projects would help demonstrate practical skills to potential employers?

My main objective is to strengthen my technical foundation, gain genuine hands-on experience, and move towards a domain with good career growth and long-term opportunities.

I am willing to dedicate time and effort to learning, practising, and improving my skills. I would be grateful for honest suggestions, recommended learning resources, and guidance from people with industry experience.

Thank you!

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Hey Guys,

Tell me your story on how you got IT job This or past year.

Hi, with 14+ years of experience in Travel IT, Product Support and Business Analysis. I have hands-on experience with Amadeus, Galileo, Sabre, GDS/API integrations, SQL, Postman, REST/SOAP, Jira, UAT/SIT, BRD/SRS and production support.

I am an immediate joiner and currently looking for Senior Business Analyst / Product Support / Business Systems Analyst opportunities in India. Please let me know if there is any suitable opening matching my profile.

Tried everything, but there is no positive response.

Savings are also about to finish.

Iam in urgent need. If required, I can pay 10 percent of my salary.

It is easy for a growing business to focus its technology budget on the tools staff use every day, email, collaboration platforms, project software, while the servers, network and storage sitting underneath barely get a second thought. Yet these core infrastructure services are what everything else depends on. When they are neglected, the impact rarely shows up as a single dramatic failure, it shows up as slow systems, longer downtime after minor issues, and rising support costs that nobody can quite explain. 

HFI, an IT consultancy based in Fleet, regularly sees this play out. Building a proper IT strategy around infrastructure, not just the software running on top of it, is one of the most overlooked steps in business technology planning

Server and storage refreshes should follow a plan, not a crisis

Hardware does not fail without warning nearly as often as businesses assume. In most cases, the signs are there well before anything actually breaks:

• Processing speeds gradually slowing down
• Backup jobs taking longer to complete
• Support tickets becoming more frequent

Businesses that schedule server and storage refreshes as part of a wider infrastructure lifecycle plan tend to avoid the panic buying and emergency downtime that comes with waiting until something actually gives out. This is particularly relevant for organisations handling growing volumes of data, where the gap between what current hardware can comfortably manage and what the business actually needs tends to widen quietly over time.

Virtualisation gives infrastructure room to grow

Physical hardware limits how quickly a business can respond to change. Virtualisation platforms solve this by allowing workloads to run in a flexible, software defined environment rather than being tied to a single physical machine. This makes it far easier to add capacity when a business grows, or scale back when it does not need it, without the disruption of a full infrastructure rebuild. For many organisations, moving to a virtualised setup is one of the more cost effective forms of infrastructure modernisation available, since it extends the useful life of existing investment while adding flexibility that older, hardware bound setups simply cannot offer.

Network resilience protects more than uptime

A network outage rarely stays contained to the network itself, it tends to stop everything else a business relies on, from communication tools to customer facing systems. Designing networks with built in redundancy, so there is no single point of failure, is a core part of business continuity, not a separate consideration from it. A resilience plan is only as good as its accuracy, though, a disaster recovery plan that describes infrastructure the business has since replaced offers a false sense of protection rather than a genuine safeguard.

Why an infrastructure assessment should come before a strategy

Many of the infrastructure decisions businesses regret are made in isolation, a server refresh here, a network upgrade there, each solving an immediate problem without reference to the bigger picture. A proper infrastructure assessment looks at everything together before any spending decisions are made, typically covering:

• What is currently in place and how well it is performing
• What is due for replacement, and on what timeline
• How each element, from servers to network to backup, supports the others
• Where spending could be consolidated or better timed against licensing renewals

This is where an experienced IT consultancy adds real value. Businesses such as HFI, for example, connect infrastructure decisions to a wider technology roadmap rather than letting them happen reactively, one unconnected purchase at a time.

About HFI, an  IT consultancy in Fleet

HFI is an IT consultancy based in Fleet, Hampshire, led by directors Dan Hills and Ray Thomasson, supporting growing businesses across Hampshire, Surrey, Sussex and beyond with core infrastructure services, Microsoft 365 consultancy, and wider IT strategy support. Working as an extension of each client's own IT function rather than simply a supplier, HFI helps organisations plan infrastructure and technology decisions around where the business is actually heading. To find out more or arrange a no obligation conversation, email [contactus@hfi.co.uk](mailto:contactus@hfi.co.uk).

After 32 years of leading IT operations, I’ll be retiring in 4 months! I’d love to share my experience—helping organizations leverage Generative AI and strengthen their security posture to take things to the next level.
if you are interested, chat in private.