In recent years, there has been a sluggish depression in professional communities regarding the future profession of a system administrator . There are regular thoughts that local specialists will be forced out by cloud providers and outsourcers. But from the first mentions of cloud systems, 5 years have passed, the vacancies of administrators are still appearing, and they continue to communicate on professional topics on the forums.

And yet, the relationship of business and IT has changed. In this article I want to share some observations and conclusions from my own experience. Perhaps, it will help someone in communication with the management of a small company, and another will give a couple of thoughts about the future career path.

In the text there will be no subtle psychological advice from the sphere of HR, there will be no spherical horses in a vacuum - only own experience and reasoning about the place of an IT specialist in modern business. Join in the comments if you also have something to share.

Staff and freelance specialists

Why do you think outsourcing companies are closer and more understandable to the management of your organization than their own specialists? If we discard the effect of a “ person in shape ”, then the representatives of the contractor speak in a language understandable to the director and clearly show where and how savings will occur. That is, they talk about the benefits for business, and not about the trends of virtualization.

In general, these advantages are unlikely to incline the director to the closure of its own IT-department. Cutting people is not so easy and the process can eat all the savings. But promising projects may well give to third-party contractors, and you just lose control over some elements of the infrastructure . New CRM may well be introduced by someone from the outside using cloud technologies. Further support is likely to be given to him, because who will refuse the opportunity to regularly receive money and further?

Once I went to update Microsoft Exchange in one large St. Petersburg bank. At the same time, the technical director asked to deal with network folders falling off on his computer, citing the incompetence of local staff. As it turned out, the person simply ignored the policies of his own company and sat with a local account, using the saved and no longer current password to access domain resources. Of course, local experts turned his attention to the root of the problem, but for some reason, the opinion of a person from the outside was rated higher.

For less civilized companies, the rejection of their own IT department is also unlikely, even if technically it is easier to turn and a “gray” salary allows you to reduce a person with almost no losses. The fact is that the feeling of control over the situation will disappear and you will have to communicate with the contractor within the framework of paper agreements, paying for any retreats. In the case of your own staff, you can simply go into the office, “distribute priorities” and add responsibilities completely free of charge. It is unpleasant, but many readers will surely find confirmation of these words in their past experience.

For example, in one small 60-person malt company, the head of the IT department not only did its job and introduced a new one, but also managed the network in the owner’s country house, solved problems with his phone and helped the businessman’s friends with computers. It is obvious that the contractor so in turn will not take.

Total: it is unlikely that outsourcing in the near future will completely replace the IT units in small and large companies, but it will not be able to press with new projects.

Cloud Alternatives

Another fashion trend, the essence of which is already so blurred that even the banal farm of terminal servers is called the clouds. However, true cloud technologies have made great strides in recent years thanks to the efforts of major players in professional niches.

For example, traditionally cool to the clouds are large Russian companies with a mass of complex and intricate systems. But in recent years, a mass of specialized clouds have appeared that solve resource-intensive tasks:

• Unity Cloud allows software companies to abandon their own build server and test farm. Instead, programmers are issued accounts in the cloud, where magic happens. Meanwhile, support of your own build-farm usually involves the involvement of an appropriate specialist;

  
  

• With renderRocket and Autodesk A360, it’s not necessary to assemble a rack with powerful servers for rendering 3D animations and images. Even design tools are available by subscription, which is cheaper;

  
  
• One of the most popular CRM systems, SalesForce , relies on cloud web services for which you do not need to install client applications and hire an administrator. Moreover, they have an army of consultants to implement and change business processes.

For most business processes, it is already possible to select an external service. This service is likely to be cheaper, and with it comes technical support.

At one time he worked in a company that develops specialized software for mobile operators. They had a Starteam build and version control system, which was supported by a separate administrator. In essence, it can now be replaced by a cloud-based build, which does not require deep administrative skills and server hardware to work with.

For small companies, the situation is even more curious, since for them there are a lot of free or very cheap applications for solving daily tasks: mail and calendars-contacts from Google, tasks and collaboration in Trello, office and sales from Zoho. All this does not require the services of a highly qualified IT specialist, it’s enough who can install Windows on a laptop and connect it to the network.

I was interviewed at a St. Petersburg company that develops software for retail chains. They once reduced the person responsible for Active Directory and Exchange, as Microsoft’s mail system was replaced with corporate Gmail. Cloud office, calendar and documents were set up personally by the technical director, and the second administrator covered the remnants of the physical infrastructure and accounting. Do you know how they explained to me the transition from the all-powerful Exchange to Gmail? They said that the latter works stably, does not require large administrative knowledge and perfectly filters spam. The rest for them was secondary.

Stand alone are organizations with strict requirements for the geographical location of their data and the availability of FSTEC certificates. Perhaps, for them the cloudy future is unlikely to come in the coming years, although there are already providers with the necessary ticks in the description.

Total: do not treat the clouds only as a fashionable useless idea. Technologies have already evolved so that they can really be used in serious work. In the future, they will become more accessible, since the bulk of investments in the first years have already been beaten off and the pricing policy can be weakened. For narrow specialists, this definitely means fewer jobs in the enterprise, but more vacancies with service providers.

Who is to blame is clear, but what to do?

It is worth preparing for the fact that savings and new trends will sooner or later visit your leader and make him a tempting offer. But you can take the initiative and offer innovations on more convenient conditions. It’s not for nothing that the negotiation coaches recommend not to wait for the proposal, but to voice it yourself in order to get the most favorable conditions.

The next time you plan to justify an account for an iron upgrade, offer an option to save on less critical applications and transfer them to the cloud. If the cost of such a cloud for the next 3 years (the average cycle of iron upgrade) is lower than the cost of new servers, then this will already be a weighty argument. In addition, businessmen like to pay their bills with a maximum deferment, as money becomes cheaper over time . And the old iron can not just be written off, but with a profit for the budget to sell a profile company like Server Mall .

Initial invoice - the cost of your option + the amount for the sold old equipment = so much money you just saved the business

No need to be modest, be sure to emphasize such merits. This will create for you the image of a technical consultant, and not just a computer geek who is interested in iron. So, you can consult with you and you are unlikely to spend company money out of a desire to try more expensive iron or technology.

Once developed a new backup scheme for your company. Prior to that, a disk shelf was used there, and the plans were to protect against small disasters and “show masks”. Initially, for this purpose it was planned to organize a small additional server in the next building, stretch out the optics there and transfer duplicate backups. But the proposed version of the tape library and the transport of cassettes in the bank cell was significantly cheaper. The company received a guaranteed safety of critical data in any case and for less money (no need to rent a room and broach optics, which may not help with on-site inspection). I added to the summary of work with HP tape-class enterprise libraries and a product popular in those years from Symantec.

Speaking of "masks", there is a curious story about the server in the Gazelle . I do not know how true the story is, but what options only savvy does not produce.

Clouds are given as an example for a reason. Like any fashion trend, the technology is at the hearing and about it, anyway, your supervisor has heard. It is much easier to sell what the interlocutor internally agrees with and what is familiar to him. If the clouds do not fit - offer another software or another brand with favorable terms of purchase. The firm will win in money, and you will add new server applications and brands to your resume. In addition, the projects of migration or moving from one system to another have a greater weight in interviews.

It is useful to be aware of the main business activities and know about the tools used for this. If the company is bogged down in Excel spreadsheets and keeps track of customers in the mail, then it's time to offer a CRM system and demonstrate the following benefits:

• Saving time to process each potential customer;

  
  

• The ability to remember all the stages of communication with the client, which minimizes the percentage of lost deals;

  
  
• A lot of reports for the head that will allow you to keep abreast of sales and financial flows. Managers love reports.

And here you are already a useful technical consultant for business, and not just a "computer scientist" with an incomprehensible language. That is, you combine the advantages of a staff specialist and business people from outsourcing companies. In addition, you have already offered a lot of what they will talk about. Clouds saving? So we already have it all, we implemented it last year.

Plan b

I once heard a curious thought that any specialist should change the profile of his activity once every 4 to 5 years. This is necessary in order not to stagnate in the comfort zone and not to begin to hate everything related to IT. For myself, I once found a way out in the study of mobile development and writing texts about the clouds. The first became a hobby for some time and led to the rich world of Android, and the second ousted the main work and became not the next five-year source of income.

In addition, I met the highest concentration of curious projects on the part of the IT infrastructure only in integrators and providers. If you are not interested in the routine support of server systems, then think about working there. Nothing supernatural is demanded from candidates in such companies; first of all, enthusiasm and head on shoulders are important. In addition, it is an excellent base for further career development in a large Enterprise. One third of my former colleagues from the system integrator are currently working in companies of the Yandex, SAP, Aeroflot, Gazprom Neft scale. At least that's what LinkedIn says.

Have you already been advised to go to programmers? The same thing could happen to this industry, which happened to economists and lawyers who are now working anywhere and by anyone. While the situation is saved by a high need for personnel, as new tech start-ups appear daily, if not hourly. Even if you do not think about the prospects of the market, the profession of a programmer is good because it allows work for a customer anywhere in the country or the world. Freelance - an excellent measure of the difficult financial situation in the country.

If before administration was well paid and had a low input threshold, now everything has become the opposite. There are a lot of students of technical universities, they all want to earn some money and start somewhere. In terms of the ratio of efforts to income, the work of the tester looks interesting. You can get virtually no experience on the starting position and get quite the market salary .

At one time, I got carried away with the Pebble smartwatch, which in those years was available only by reservation. And it was so prolonged that I studied the C language and wrote several applications for watches of various degrees of complexity. By the way, Pebble offers a convenient cloud-based IDE with detailed and visual documentation. In my opinion, they invested in the SDK no worse than Apple in its platform for developers.

Who knew that after 3 years I would have to work on an import customer with Upwork, specifically for the project with Pebble. I did not earn much money, but it was the most exciting two weeks in recent years.

In search of new career paths, you can find a lesson for the next couple of years. Do not miss the chance to try even what takes time and does not promise instant income.

It is surprising that a person is lazy to spend several years on his own business, but he is not lazy to go to work in the mornings for decades. The phrase is not mine, but it is very conducive to getting out of the comfort zone, which is what you want.

Ps. I also thought of opening a cafe, only coffee-to-go is now at every corner, and for a larger project I’m not morally ripe yet. As one comrade said, "in Ekaterinburg, we don’t drink coffee except from irons."