Docket jockeys: would paralegal be worth it?

[DontSayBanana]

I had a real good friend from high school and college who was paralegaling for a big-time Washington DC firm.  He was making 65k a year and pretty much just banking it, working 8-5 inside the beltway.  He had a BS from Georgetown's School of Foreign Service, but no specialized legal training.  Just a hard-working filipino.

Wonder how it'll work out in my case. I'm quasi-fast-tracking, so barring a major setback, I should be graduating with an AS next December.

[Baron von Schtinkenbutt]

Don't tell that to the ACM.  They see a severe shortage of CS majors already, with it getting worse.  Part of the reason is the perception that the area is saturated.

I know; the market is definitely not saturated. As much as everything is running electronically these days, CS is still hugely in demand. The biggest problem I ran into is that there's a bottleneck on the entry-level market; everybody wants CS guys, but nobody wants a fresh CS guy. It's the "nobody wants less than 5 years experience, so how are any of the new guys going to get any experience" problem.

Ah yes, that is a serious problem.  I was being partly sarcastic, as this is a problem the engineering and computer science societies have not recognized yet.  Are shortages are not because we don;t have the people per se, but rather because the requirements lists for jobs have grown greatly in the last 10 years.  Its not just in the realm of experience vs. non-experience; most postings nowadays have long, specific sets of required skills, as if the hiring manager is looking for a candidate who comes pre-trained.  Its a troubling trend and makes some of this shortage self-imposed by the very employers complaining about it..

[Caliga]

I know; the market is definitely not saturated. As much as everything is running electronically these days, CS is still hugely in demand. The biggest problem I ran into is that there's a bottleneck on the entry-level market; everybody wants CS guys, but nobody wants a fresh CS guy. It's the "nobody wants less than 5 years experience, so how are any of the new guys going to get any experience" problem.

The problem is that the new guys with zero experience think they should be paid alot more money than they are actually worth.  Then they bitch about not being able to find a job.

[Caliga]

Ah yes, that is a serious problem.  I was being partly sarcastic, as this is a problem the engineering and computer science societies have not recognized yet.  Are shortages are not because we don;t have the people per se, but rather because the requirements lists for jobs have grown greatly in the last 10 years.  Its not just in the realm of experience vs. non-experience; most postings nowadays have long, specific sets of required skills, as if the hiring manager is looking for a candidate who comes pre-trained.  Its a troubling trend and makes some of this shortage self-imposed by the very employers complaining about it..

See my post, plus alot of the jobs that are pushed by recruiters are skilled and experienced only, because nobody is going to pay a recruiter thousands of dollars to provide a candidate with no experience.... yet recruiter advertising dominates the employment market, thus creating a perception that there are "no entry level jobs".

[DontSayBanana]

Gotta respectfully disagree, Cal. There are the guys who think they're going to go from ITT Tech to operating independently as an SA (system administrator). Their expectations are unrealistically high, but I don't think they account for that high a percentage of those entering the job market.

As to recruiters, the problem is more systemic than that. You've seen the recruiting end of it, and you're right that nobody's going to want to shell out that kind of money to bring in a $32K network troubleshooter; however, a lot of places don't even recognize the need to have an SA on hand, so most techs outside of digital industry have to take another position and dredge through years of "Computer problem? Let me take a look," to be recognized as competent technicians.

I gave up on the tech route after this lovely gem: at PBP, we were paid minimum plus commission. Despite it being a routed call center with about 50 computers running at once plus call and network routing equipment, our "tech" was the quality assurance guy who came from 40 minutes away, once a week to every two weeks. Two of us (myself and one other guy) started taking on some of the little maintenance like running cables and swapping out computers that absolutely refused to work. The other guy got an additional 25 cents an hour for doing that. I got nothing.

[Caliga]

Gotta respectfully disagree, Cal. There are the guys who think they're going to go from ITT Tech to operating independently as an SA (system administrator). Their expectations are unrealistically high, but I don't think they account for that high a percentage of those entering the job market.

As to recruiters, the problem is more systemic than that. You've seen the recruiting end of it, and you're right that nobody's going to want to shell out that kind of money to bring in a $32K network troubleshooter; however, a lot of places don't even recognize the need to have an SA on hand, so most techs outside of digital industry have to take another position and dredge through years of "Computer problem? Let me take a look," to be recognized as competent technicians.

I gave up on the tech route after this lovely gem: at PBP, we were paid minimum plus commission. Despite it being a routed call center with about 50 computers running at once plus call and network routing equipment, our "tech" was the quality assurance guy who came from 40 minutes away, once a week to every two weeks. Two of us (myself and one other guy) started taking on some of the little maintenance like running cables and swapping out computers that absolutely refused to work. The other guy got an additional 25 cents an hour for doing that. I got nothing.

A couple of observations:

* The reason the ITT Tech guys think this is because ITT Tech (and for-profit schools of its ilk) lie to applicants and convince them this is the case, and that's why they should shell out all that tuition money.

* I have certainly met people who earned a legitimate B.S. and expect to walk right into mid-level jobs (or at least jobs with mid-level salaries).  "But I just paid $100K for this degree, so I REQUIRE a job that pays more than entry level!"

* Your mistake was volunteering to do ANYTHING outside your job description in an office with zero growth potential.  NEVER DO THIS.

[DontSayBanana]

A couple of observations:

* The reason the ITT Tech guys think this is because ITT Tech (and for-profit schools of its ilk) lie to applicants and convince them this is the case, and that's why they should shell out all that tuition money.

* I have certainly met people who earned a legitimate B.S. and expect to walk right into mid-level jobs (or at least jobs with mid-level salaries).  "But I just paid $100K for this degree, so I REQUIRE a job that pays more than entry level!"

* Your mistake was volunteering to do ANYTHING outside your job description in an office with zero growth potential.  NEVER DO THIS.

I've since realized my mistake. And I'm aware those idiots come from all walks, I simply pointed out ITT for the same reasons you mention, so there seems to be a clusterfuck of idiocy surrounding them.

The experience bottleneck is present. CS is unique in that computers are so cheap now and so common in American households that a lot of people can get practical experience as an amateur long before they set foot in a college or tech school. How much experience do I have in CS? Depending on your measuring, you could come up with three different answers- none in title, per the "history" section of my resume, less than one year, per descriptions in the "history" section of my resume, or 12 years, per the "skills" section of my resume. I've been successfully dismantling, upgrading, and rebuilding PCs since I was 12.

At least in CS, many of the most talented people have no way to showcase their skills in print (FREX, no amount of tweaking my resume will show that I tend toward networking protocols and machine-level data translation), so I'm a firm believer that employers need to move toward a practical aptitude-based system for weighing CS candidates.

[Baron von Schtinkenbutt]

See my post, plus alot of the jobs that are pushed by recruiters are skilled and experienced only, because nobody is going to pay a recruiter thousands of dollars to provide a candidate with no experience.... yet recruiter advertising dominates the employment market, thus creating a perception that there are "no entry level jobs".

The Honorable Mr. Banana has covered most of the issues I have with entry-level jobs.  However, that was not what my post was aimed at; I was talking about experienced positions, and I'm talking about the criteria that determine if a resume even gets a second look.  There has been a shift to increasingly detailed requirements in job postings that automatically eliminate many people who are probably qualified for the job except for missing, and employers start complaining about the lack of engineers and computer scientists.

Also, I'm not talking about job seeker perceptions, I'm talking about what employers are saying.  It may well be that, if employers to rely so heavily on recruiters now, these recruiters are doing them a disservice.

[DontSayBanana]

On-topic, I'm mildly irritated. I have a follow-up with the WDP rep at the college on Thursday, but my counselor at LWD rescheduled my appointment, which was supposed to be today, to Wednesday. Unless there's no snags between financial aid and WDPP (not likely), this is going to stall my enrollment for the summer classes.

[alfred russel]

See my post, plus alot of the jobs that are pushed by recruiters are skilled and experienced only, because nobody is going to pay a recruiter thousands of dollars to provide a candidate with no experience.... yet recruiter advertising dominates the employment market, thus creating a perception that there are "no entry level jobs".

The Honorable Mr. Banana has covered most of the issues I have with entry-level jobs.  However, that was not what my post was aimed at; I was talking about experienced positions, and I'm talking about the criteria that determine if a resume even gets a second look.  There has been a shift to increasingly detailed requirements in job postings that automatically eliminate many people who are probably qualified for the job except for missing, and employers start complaining about the lack of engineers and computer scientists.

Also, I'm not talking about job seeker perceptions, I'm talking about what employers are saying.  It may well be that, if employers to rely so heavily on recruiters now, these recruiters are doing them a disservice.

Not to disagree with you or CC, because I really don't, but I'd like to add that the job market is what it is--no one is out there governing it. From my point of view, it makes a lot of sense to pay more to hire experienced people in IT because any inefficiency there doesn't only waste their time, but also the time of people actually running the business. Not to mention that a lot of IT systems are critical to the business and can cause major headaches with a hiccup.

It doesn't always make sense to bring in someone out of school for training: if there is high demand for experienced people, they are going to bolt unless you pay the market rate anyway.

[DontSayBanana]

Not to disagree with you or CC, because I really don't, but I'd like to add that the job market is what it is--no one is out there governing it. From my point of view, it makes a lot of sense to pay more to hire experienced people in IT because any inefficiency there doesn't only waste their time, but also the time of people actually running the business. Not to mention that a lot of IT systems are critical to the business and can cause major headaches with a hiccup.

It doesn't always make sense to bring in someone out of school for training: if there is high demand for experienced people, they are going to bolt unless you pay the market rate anyway.

Absolutely. The problem is that experience needs to be treated differently in the field, and hiring managers seem to have a lack of fundamental knowledge when it comes to "IT."

For starters, there's 4 distinct realms within IT: hardware, software, networking, and electronics. I've ordered them in terms of how likely you are to need them.

Your hardware techs could start as kids; they'll troubleshoot and maybe swap out cards here and there when one fails. You'll mainly only run into software people when you're using custom/proprietary software that's been designed from the ground up, since commercial software comes with support 95% of the time. Networking is where the bottleneck is, from what I've seen. A lot of people hired hardware personnel and think they can do the job of a network tech, but net techs should be in charge of optimizing a network, and working with hardware people to ensure the business' nodes in the network stay up and running. Also, your networking people handle boutique routing electronics, such as 800 routers in call centers, which your hardware techs shouldn't go anywhere near. Finally, there are a handful of businesses who use their own electronics, so they need people with electrical/electronic engineering experience to keep those up and running.

The biggest problem, and it seems VM's big complaint, is that many hiring managers try to lowball and use numbers for a technician with lower experience. Also, it should be noted that your fresh grads for upper echelons of IT should not be treated the same as an entry-level hardware technician. The scammy schools have contributed to that end of the problems.

[DontSayBanana]

Almost have everything set in motion now.

Amazingly, things went fairly smoothly this morning. As much of a hard time as my counselor at LWD has given me, she looked at my cost projection for a grand total of 10 seconds before giving me the approval paperwork.

The only snag I might run into now is that I'm trying to get Intro to the Legal System and Intro to Legal Research and Writing under a tuition waiver, so here's hoping those classes don't fill before August...