Systems Administrator, Sit Investment Associates

Tad T. Johnson
Major(s): Political Science
Minor(s): History
Current Job Title: Systems Administrator
Organization Name: Sit Investment Associates

Brief description of your job:
Database administration, network administration, desktop support

Other job titles you have held:
Legislative Intern, Legislative Page, Campaign Manager, Committee Legislative Assistant, Director of Research for Statewide Campaigns, Help Desk Supervisor, Help Desk Support Technician

How have you found these positions?
Internships, promotions, networking, headhunter. My first three years of employment were all directly descended from an internship. I'm still in contact with those people almost a decade later. The rest has been from networking, a headhunter, and a desire to change careers. The career change took a year of work, study, working odd hours for experience, and general disruption of my life. It was worth it.

What skills from your degree do you use in your current work?
Relatively few. Nobody cares what my GPA was or about Nixon's China policy during his first term. The flip side of that is that a CLA student who is paying attention can learn how to learn, how to solve problems, and how to integrate knowledge. This broad thinking is much of the justification for those pesky distribution requirements, particularly the math. Learning a new form of symbolic logic (algebra, computer programming, foreign language) can be difficult but you can learn a whole new way of thinking that you can apply later in life.

What advice do you have for current students?
Graduate quickly. Don't waste time with double majors. Employers don't care WHAT you studied. They care THAT you studied enough to graduate. As a liberal arts major, you don't have a specific skill, so study something interesting that you'll do well in, but don't double major, because it adds little value.

Only go to grad school as part of a plan, not a substitute for a plan because you can't get a job and don't know what to do. Otherwise, it's a huge waste of time and other resources that you can't afford. Get your employer to pay for it later, if possible.

Network, network, network. Keep in touch with people. Help them, and they might be in a position to help you sometime down the line. Be honest and open and show integrity when you search for a job. Nobody can help you if you don't tell them what you want. Nobody will want to help you if you lie to them. Make yourself easier to contact and hire so people don't even have to do a search.

Do an internship or three while in college, even if unpaid. There are many groups that would love what you can contribute. The nice folks at CCLC will be happy to help with this. They rarely bite. The worst that happens is that you find a job that you don't like. Much better to do that now than to have to leave under difficult circumstances after you graduate. Intern after college if you have to. Swallow your pride and plan for the future. It's easier to make less money now than it ever will be in the future. Eat at Big 10 a lot. It's cheap and you'll never have easier access to it.