Just a quick word of advice, both to anyone reading and myself as well. If you find yourself at a point in your career where you have some good experience/knowledge and some free time to spend either in your job or just at home when geeking out, keep your eyes open for new things and grab onto them with both hands. Look for something new, learn it, and become one of the early gurus. Things like PCI knowledge, PowerShell, wireless technologies, FDE, Python, AJAX, VMWare, and many other things I have had the chance to see kinda appear and grow in my time in IT. And those people who latched on early and became gurus definitely end up being go-to guys either in their own company, the community, and possibly beyond. People you know normally suddenly are the “first” to really offer good insight and knowledge get noticed for that.
Just a note to look for in the future as technologies, languages, and practices continue to move forward. This might not mean you can become a highly paid consultant or start your own business, but at least keeping the above in mind might really grow you professionally and get you noticed in the community.
I see new technologies in two classes:
* The Web 2.0 stuff that’ll never hit the enterprise (*ducks*) and just sticks to unstable startups.
* The technology aimed at corporate / enterprise that takes 5 years to be accepted.
If you pick the later, you’re able to miss the first few trains and still make a name for yourself. I’m in this boat — I’m getting tired of the speedy IT lifestyle.