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I passed my first MS exam today earning myself MCP status. I'm very very
happy and cant wait to visit the MCP website.

My current job which i see myself doing for about 12 months is titles
Account Maintenance or Lan Account Administrator. I create, modify and delete
network accounts which also involves giving users permissions to files and
folders on the servers. i do this for a client base of about 13000 users and
im learning new tricks everyday. when i look at job advertising websites i
cannot really find jobs specifically like mine, do they come under another
name? what is the cloest title to my job?

i have huge incentives for me to get my MCSA 2003 as ill get a pay increase
and my exam costs are all paid for. so by completing my 70-270 exam today im
on my way to this goal.

i have a questions about the elective. i want to know what other people
undertaking this path are doing for their elective. i previously had my mind
set on 70-620 as it would give me a tick for one of my MCITP EA requirements
but then i sat down and looked at my current situation. i work on a contract
which has 2 more years and we are not going to server 2008 in this contract.
with the ever increasingly discussed windows 7 will vista and server 2008
even last long or will this new technology replace it quickly?

the only other consideration for my elective is doing the exchange 2007 exam
70-?36 which i have not or will not get to work with in my current role but
im very interested in it as my account work has a impact on the messaging
guys jobs.

are there any other electives that i should consider that will aid me in my
current role? or im my future role goal being a server support engineer?

thanks
Craig

"Craig Rachow" <Craig > wrote in message
news:098910F4-418D-4A59-827D-...
>I passed my first MS exam today earning myself MCP status. I'm very very
> happy and cant wait to visit the MCP website.
>
> My current job which i see myself doing for about 12 months is titles
> Account Maintenance or Lan Account Administrator. I create, modify and
> delete
> network accounts which also involves giving users permissions to files and
> folders on the servers. i do this for a client base of about 13000 users
> and
> im learning new tricks everyday. when i look at job advertising websites i
> cannot really find jobs specifically like mine, do they come under another
> name? what is the cloest title to my job?

Part of your challenge, Craig, may be that because you're working in a very
large environment (13k users), you've been delegated one specialized set of
tasks that comprise a much larger set of tasks in a typical job description.
Most likely your employer did this because it actually takes 30-40 hours per
week just to maintain accounts for 13,000 people, so rather than share (and
potentially duplicate, or corrupt) work among a staff of network
administrators, your employer has delegated specific functions to individual
full-time employees.

Your Title of "LAN Account Administrator" is very accurately descriptive of
what you say you are doing, but the duties you're performing are one of many
performed by a the job known as "Network Administrator".


> i have huge incentives for me to get my MCSA 2003 as ill get a pay
> increase
> and my exam costs are all paid for. so by completing my 70-270 exam today
> im
> on my way to this goal.

Excellent! Good luck to you.


> i have a questions about the elective. i want to know what other people
> undertaking this path are doing for their elective. i previously had my
> mind
> set on 70-620 as it would give me a tick for one of my MCITP EA
> requirements
> but then i sat down and looked at my current situation. i work on a
> contract
> which has 2 more years and we are not going to server 2008 in this
> contract.
> with the ever increasingly discussed windows 7 will vista and server 2008
> even last long or will this new technology replace it quickly?

Your thoughts are certainly valid. But Windows Server 2008 may have less to
do with your elective than you're thinking.

First, 70-620 is a Vista exam. Vista hasn't been deployed widely in the
enterprise up until now, but Windows XP is rapidly reaching it's end-of-life
for mainstream support (April 2009), and organizations are going to have to
do something. Many will continue to run Windows XP, as many are still
running Windows 2000 Professional; some will, because support from Microsoft
is important, actually upgrade to Windows Vista simply to ensure they still
have supportability (I would think an organization with 13k desktops might
be in this category), or they may just write a big-fat-check to Microsoft to
keep their XP machines working. Now, this little trivia digression is
relevant to your scenario, but I think there may be something even more
relevant.

You stated that you're working on a contract -- a long-term contract it
seems (or perhaps this is just a general employment contract?). (I come from
Texas where employees don't have contracts, and "contract" jobs are normally
measures in months, not years.).... you need to be thinking about *your*
career marketability, not just the needs of your employer (although you need
to think about that, also, since they're footing the bill).

The biggest mistake an IT Professional can make, in my *experience* (I made
this mistake), is failing to keep up with technology in the real-world
because the employer doesn't use it. I found myself unemployed in February,
2001, not having a clue about Windows 2000/Active Directory because my
previous employer was a Unix shop with a couple of NT4 servers. I got lucky,
I found another employer who was a Unix/NT4 shop. Then I left there in
October, 2002, and then I was in really deep ka-ka about my skillset.

The question here is about your elective for MCSA 2003. You're looking at
70-620, Vista, which I think is a good choice. Here's why:

- You have to take the elective to get the MCSA.
- Exams are experienced based. Do you have experience in any of the other
options for an elective exam?
- Even if your employer doesn't implement Vista, Vista skills are a
marketable commodity (as is the MCSA itself).

and, as you note, you get two plugs for one exam.. the elective for MCSA,
and one of the requirements for the MCITP:EA.



As for Vista and Windows Server 2008 -- Vista's days are numbered... but
it's still a long-term number. Service Pack 2 (for Vista/Win200 is in
beta, and due out sometime next year. Vista's biggest problem now is a bad
rep; the product (w/SP1) is actually very stable (I've been running Vista on
my personal desktop exclusively for about four months now, and as a
secondary desktop since Jan '07).

Windows 7, despite it's "announcement" is still a long way away, certainly
not before many organizations have to decide how they're going to continue
to support their thousands of desktop systems -- and what OS they're going
to use to do that.

Windows Server 2008 is a mainstay. It's a good, solid, server operating
system, and not likely to be replaced with a new server OS for another five
years.

> the only other consideration for my elective is doing the exchange 2007
> exam
> 70-?36 which i have not or will not get to work with in my current role
> but
> im very interested in it as my account work has a impact on the messaging
> guys jobs.

Not to discourage you.. but without a *LOT* of hands-on experience in
Exchange Server (any messaging), trying to take the Exchange 2007 exam "From
the book" would be a painful exercise for you, not to mention a great
disservice as well. What's the point in having a certification on a product
you functionally have no experience with? In fact, the presence of the
Exchange certification (and no viable Exchange experience) might even serve
to undermind the credibility of the rest of your MCSA (where you *do* have
experience).

> are there any other electives that i should consider that will aid me in
> my
> current role? or im my future role goal being a server support engineer?

There's one other possibility you might look at:
70-557 TS: Microsoft Forefront Client and Server, Configuration

Microsoft has made a significant investment in Forefront, and it's not going
away anytime soon, and this is a cross-platform skillset that will serve you
regardless of whether the OS is Windows Server 2003/2008, Windows XP, or
Vista.




--
Lawrence Garvin, M.S., MCITP(x2), MCTS(x5), MCP(x7), MCBMSP
Principal/CTO, Onsite Technology Solutions, Houston, Texas
Microsoft MVP - Software Distribution (2005-2009)

MS WSUS Website: http://www.microsoft.com/wsus
My Websites: http://www.onsitechsolutions.com;
http://wsusinfo.onsitechsolutions.com
My MVP Profile: http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/pro...awrence.Garvin