About this time, last year, by boss was relieved of his duties and we went until 03JAN09 without a replacement. I applied for the job, and they indicated I would have an "inside track." About half way through the process, I was told that they were going to move forward with me. In that four month period of time, we made more positive changes than our company had ever seen (in our area, IT), led by me.

Fast forward a year later, and my "new boss" has resigned. Now, I want to apply for the job again, and I think I need to find some good mid-career counseling to help me in this process, in an effort to have a different outcome. I have never used any career counseling, so I am a little unfamiliar with this. One of my colleagues suggested that I talk to the career counselor from my university, but I tend to think of them more along the lines of help-this-student-get-a-job-straight-out-of-school kind of thing.

Also, I have had a "title" promotion since last year, and I have always received substantial raises, which gives me the impression that they like the work that I do. In addition, I have moved more towards mentoring our junior staff, delegating tasks, and doing more project management.

My basic approach is: "what do you have to lose?" I am thinking of asking them to give me an "interim" position. I would assume the role of IT Manager (although the former position was IT Director), and I would fill that position until the end of the year. If I prove myself, I get to follow a track that will give me the title of IT Director a year after assuming IT Manager. If I do not succeed, they hire an IT Director, and I keep my IT Manager title and work on my management skills set, and maintain a manager position over a portion of our IT staff. Another option is that if they hire me to permanently fill the role, I receive a $12K raise on 01JAN10, otherwise, I retain my present salary.

Here is my plan for the next four months, if they proceed:
1) Further develop relation w/ support vendor that will provide some of functions I provided in my old role (they currently provide our off-hours helpdesk support, and they are going to do a wireless site survey for us in the next month, I would ask them to provide support for our network equipment and backup support for some of our systems, perhaps on a flat rate with certain guarantees (SLA).

2) Train our senior helpdesk person to replace me (previously, I was the Network Administrator, but my present title is Senior Infrastructure Architect). I would hope to promote him to Systems/Network Administrator. I have already been working with him to get his Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA), and perhaps I will expand that to include the new MCITP (new Microsoft certifications replacing the MCSE, but more specializations).

3) Help our junior helpdesk person begin college. He currently has a couple of aging certifications, but no post-secondary education. I would try to help him receive tuition reimbursement (we presently of have none), and get him to take 2-3 courses per semester at our local community college (they offer online courses). If he can get his AS, then I will be happy. He has about 10 years experience, but always very entry-level; also, he followed the current boss that is resigning from job to job his entire career. I would like help him stand on his own. I did that for three jobs early in my career, and it finally motivated me to get my degree and do some certifications.

4) Once promotions have been lined up, find another helpdesk person. This could happen sooner if our junior helpdesk person bails and follows the boss again, which means I would eventually hire a second helpdesk person. Then, develop a career path for this person.

5) Work with our current Pick programmer to develop project management skills further, and maybe more cross-training into .Net and SQL Server.

6) Resolve current issue with vendor that provides a staff-augmentation position that .does .Net programming and some SQL Server support, or hire another person that does this. I like the person they have placed with us, but he tends to work on things without anyone's knowledge, and I would certainly love to have someone that knows SQL Server better than he does.

7) We have a lot of projects lined up for the end of the year and the beginning of next year. My goal would be to keep these all on time and under budget, and to look for means to improve at least one of those aspects, dramatically, for each project.

8) Work with our new (since April) parent company in implementing their global initiatives, which presently focus on an IT Security Policy to be deployed to all companies. In addition, I would like to work with them to develop some synergies in regards to licensing and equipment procurement.

9) Work on team building. Being that we are IT, it may seem a little weird, but we only have one "social outcast," and I would like to improve that situation. There has been a lot of strife between her and the rest of the department. She also is very sensitive (read: don't even think about something insensitive without 300 yards or her, or she will flip out), and I would like to help that in both direction: 1) help her to understand that people are joking and that it isn't as big of a deal (nothing is ever sexist, nor is it directed toward her... mostly just among the rest of the folks in the department), and 2) get the rest of the department to tone it down and to minimize the insensitivity in her presence. Beyond being sensitive, she tends not to be a team player. She has oft times said that something "isn't my job," but I like to emphasize the "duties as assigned" portion of the job description. These things have typically been very small things, like upgrading your own software (you are in IT, after all), or just answering a phone and taking a few notes. She is very intelligent, generally means well, and is good at what we need her to do on a day-to-day basis; so no, I don't want to ditch her. Besides, she works on something where we may only be 10 people in our state that do this (aging technology is great...).

So, I know that is a very long post and it addresses my overall goals, but my basic question is: where can I find mid-career counseling to assist me here?

UPDATE: If I seem like I am over analyzing, please keep in mind that I have gone through this once already. I am trying to make something happen that I failed at doing, previously. So, I am sure I am over analyzing things... I tend to do that when I am stressed about something. Typically, I later realize that I may be over prepared... but it hasn't hurt me, to date.

I'll give you some "mid career" counseling for free

stop trying to over-analyze everything

plan less, do what is in front of you very well, and work on being a nice person just by appreciating people for who they are rather than the pigeon holes you put them in

germanpope said:I'll give you some "mid career" counseling for free

stop trying to over-analyze everything

plan less, do what is in front of you very well, and work on being a nice person just by appreciating people for who they are rather than the pigeon holes you put them in

I would say that is pretty valid. However, I am not pigeon holing anyone. I happen to have worked with these people for quite some time, so it isn't as if I am sitting up high casting judgment...

As part of my current role, I am providing mentoring, and these are some of the things we are already working on, based on discussions that we have had.

EDIT: However, I do not find it very common (read: I have NEVER seen it at all) for companies to ask their managers to focus on the moment. Managers are leaders... or at least, they are supposed to be. This means strategy, motivation, vision, etc.

Sorry, if you don't want to provide constructive criticism, please pass. I don't mind criticism, but don't just bash me. I feel that I am a balanced person, and that I can manage the needs of the company and those reporting to me. For the most part, we all work well together, already. I think, along with some of the downsides, my experience as a peer with these people helps me to understand their needs a little bit more.

My advice? Stop trying to treat career issue like an IT issue. People aren't logical.

ZenNUTS said:My advice? Stop trying to treat career issue like an IT issue. People aren't logical.

Thank you. Can you elaborate?

Obviously, there are certain desires that the hiring manager (the CFO) has that aren't logical. If I want the job, certainly I have to take those into consideration. Things like: "I want a 17" screen on my laptop with a huge hard disk because I want one." He can easily state preference on screen size and how it may be productive... but not so much on the hard disk, as he doesn't actually need it, and we want things on the network so that the are easily backed up. However, he is the boss, and sometimes we just have to do those things.

What aspects are you thinking.

I'm aware of career counselors that deal with people who say "I've been a ditch digger/teacher/sidewalk repairman all my life and I want a change, What should I do?"

You, on the other hand, know exactly what you want and have a fourteen point plan to get there. I can't see how a career counselor could help you. How about a mentor within the company?

I agree that I don't think a career counselor would help you. They are generally for people who need help in choosing a direction and in finding employment, not in moving from one safe job into the next obvious level on the company's career ladder which the employee has no doubts that he/she wants to do.

I only skimmed your message (it's late, and your post was very wordy, not to mention confusing: paragraph one says you got the job you applied for last year, then paragraph two implies that you are going to apply for that job again? As if you didn't get it last year?), but anyway...

It appears that you are mainly looking for people in your industry to listen very closely to you and then to tell you that you are doing things right, even though they don't know you, your company, etc.

The person who said that people aren't logical may have meant that a lot about getting promotions, giving a good impression, and relating well with your superiors is in the social/soft sides of things, and can't be obtained just by writing it out in a mathematical formula or compiling a verbose argument.

I don't think that anyone who is not familiar with you and your company could help you (although I don't quite grasp what help you are seeking).

To look like manager material at your company, maybe you can concentrate on expressing your thoughts in an "executive summary" kind of way. This is often one of the big hurdles for IT people when they are moving into management.
For example:
Your topic headline didn't really match your post's content.
Your thoughts are kind of scattered (even if you think they aren't) - my brain turned off when you jumped from implying that you got a job in January to saying that you are going to apply for it again now. This illogical jump gives a bad impression.)
You imply in your headline that you want simple and quick advice, but once your thread is clicked on, you ask for a huge amount of attention and time of the reader/helper.
You don't have a very specific, quickly-actionable thing that you are asking we time-starved strangers for help with.

It's obvious that you care a lot about your job, and think about it a lot. You want to make improvements for the good of your company, and you are ambitious for yourself.

However, you seem to be over-thinking and ruminating too far down the track on some possible future scenarios, whilst probably overlooking some aspects of the "soft" side of corporate promotions/politics/psychology.

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Results on the Myers-Briggs test usually don't change radically, so maybe you are answering the same questions differently each time.

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If you want someone thoughtful to listen to you and give advice and support, I'd suggest you see a "life coach" for 3 or 4 sessions.

Can't you just ask the CFO what he's looking for in an IT Director and explain to him why you're capable of doing the job? At least then you'll find out exactly why you're not given the position instead of just wondering. Otherwise, I think OmegaDeal hit it right on the money.. if your goal is to move up the chain and they don't consider you after the 2nd try, it's time to move on. If you're really good at what you do, you shouldn't have too much of a problem finding another company to try again.