How To Become A System Administrator

A system admin is an essential part in the IT department in every company. They are highly regarded, well paid, and also have a national day named after them! Learn how to become a system administrator in this article.

What Is A System Administrator

Let’s begin with determining exactly what a system administrator actually is.
A system administrator performs in the operations part of an IT department. This section is liable for monitoring the company’s IT systems, providing a help desk or support purpose, and setting up and upgrading various parts of the system.

The system administrator is responsible for building and supporting the computer system for a business. They update it whenever it gets out of date, they repair it when it crashes, they make it run better if it’s having problems.

How To Become A System Administrator

Like some of the roles in the IT sector, there isn’t really a particular degree you can acquire to become a system administrator. Quite a few system administrators have degrees in computer science or computer engineering. Several system administrators don’t possess a degree - they have gotten their positions from internships or promotions from other areas. It’s a role which you don’t always need a degree for, nevertheless it certainly helps.

Other than getting a degree in computer science or computer engineering, the next best way to become a system administrator may be to work your way up. A number of system administrators start off at service desk jobs or desktop support roles. This can be an effective move for the long term - the expertise of handling user issues, figuring out system issues, offering solutions and researching a computer system is a big help to anyone planning to eventually be a system administrator.

I’m actually in the process of putting together a certification guide eBook which will get into even more detail about which certifications are perfect for which roles (and much more information) - but until I can provide that, you can consider certifications from vendors such as CompTIA, Cisco, Red Hat or Microsoft.

What Should I Learn To Become A System Administrator?

A system admin has a great deal of accountabilities and knowledge. In order to learn how to become a system administrator, there are several areas that you need to be knowledgeable in:
• Network technologies - areas which include TCP/IP, routers and switches and common network structures should help a system administrator
• Web servers - Apache and IIS technologies along with their capabilities
• Operating systems - Unix, Linux and Windows operating system understanding is helpful for system administration
• General Troubleshooting - the way to identify, test and correct various problems in a system

Understand more about these areas by going to web sites, gaining knowledge from other co-workers or people in the industry, reading through forums, magazines, along with other industry publications. The more you know, the better you’ll be at your job!

I really hope this information proves helpful to those of you planning to move into a system administrator role, and shows you how to become a system administrator. Good luck!