What Is A Network Engineer

From the outside, the whole data technology profession can seem mysterious. Mentioning It summons various images ranging from artificially lit cubicle farms to young professionals roller skating straight through well decorated lounge spaces that feel more like a coffee shop than a work place. Both are valid, and examples of both can be found. However, there actually is quite a bit of difference.

For example, network engineers are the habitancy who keep the internet running. Either it is a web page, voice communications, or email message, network engineers are responsible for keeping the data flowing. They work both with the hardware of the internet as well as the software that manages it all.

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At entry to mid level, network engineers can be found in any environment with medium to large data networks - banks, airlines, universities, etc.. They might have job titles like network administrator, network operations center (Noc) engineer, or unified communications engineer. At higher levels, they often work as consultants and are called implementation engineers or network architects.

Most engineers have a computer science undergraduate degree with a masters in computer engineering. However, that's just the start. Following university education, most network engineers then advance straight through various certification programs.

These certifications range from relatively easy study courses followed by a test to monstrous certifications that take months of study and cost thousands of dollars. The Cisco Certified Internetwork expert Certification is often referred to as the PhD of network engineering. There is one certification that is harder to achieve than the Ccie, the new Cisco Network Architect Certification, however it is so new that no one has earned it yet.

The exam for the Ccie is a multiphase process. To begin, there is a difficult written exam that must be passed to take the lab exam. The lab exam is given in two parts. In the first session, the prospect must build and configure an highly high-end internet backbone under time pressure. If they are successful, the prospect leaves for the day. Overnight, instructors break that newly built equipment in every creative way possible. In the morning, the prospect returns and has a petite estimate of time to fix every newly created issue.

In terms of compensation, certifications without work experience means little. However, with experience, these certifications can mean major increases in take home pay. The Ccie can mean an added thirty-five thousand a year for an experienced network engineer.

What Is A Network Engineer