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Idella, Network Analyst, Central Region
Please realize that each job opening for which Getronics hires is different, so the duties of anyone profiled herein may not correspond to those of another person with the same job title.
Q: What's your on-the-job philosophy?
Idella: My main priority is "customer first". I feel as strongly about providing excellent customer service within the company as I do for an external customer. If we provide excellent customer service to ourselves as a customer, they will notice it. That's very important.
Q: It sounds like you have a positive, proactive approach to your work.
Idella: If a customer calls in for any network related issues, I’m always cooperative. I'm here to resolve problems, not to create problems.
Q: How do you deal with problems on the job?
Idella: We have occasional meetings called Corrective Action. We review topics like HP Openview [diagnostics to facilitate monitoring of a network and troubleshooting/analysis of problems] and Vantive [our trouble ticket system]. We hold such group meetings at end of our shift, covering basic reminders. As a team when there is something that needs to be handled, we find the best resolution for it. Being proactive can help meet or exceed the SLA.
We all cooperate. When help is needed, we assist. I know all the systems, so I can help on any of the contracts or tools we have. I know such tools as CiscoWorks, at the analyst level. I’ve been cross-trained. I can jump in and help with any contract.
Q: How does cross-training work?
Idella: Once you're up to speed as an analyst, trainings are often only a few hours. We recently did training for VoIP. Before that, we went to DSL basic training, which focused on troubleshooting by checking equipment configuration and functionality.
Q: What's the initial training for network analysts like?
Idella: Our trainer provides a 2-3 week personal training period, which includes working first shift –- the busiest time –- alongside a senior analyst for a week or two. That analyst is then assigned to where the openings are in order to learn the routines on a particular contract. They shadow a veteran.
The hardest problem for new analysts is knowing what to communicate to the carrier about the problem, and what we expect them to do on their end. It's helpful to explain what we see on our end, having a little carrier knowledge beyond the network. We suggest things to them, certain tests for loss of signal, out of service/out of frame errors, CPU utilization, etc. We can suggest areas to investigate within the carrier network. The carrier support folks are receptive. Our senior analysts are very experienced dealing with the carriers. They are excellent and really know their job. Some contracts have a system where we can go in and run preliminary tests to see what’s going on; others don’t have that advantage. The telco carrier can call in and say we see x,y,z. They use a lot of acronyms that we would spell out here, so you have to learn to communicate with the carrier in their language.
Q: So what's next in your career development, and how did you get to where you are?
Idella: I'm in the process of renewing my CCNA. My CCNA lapsed before I passed my CCNP, so I have to restart. I've been here over five years. I started off on a helpdesk and was promoted to network analyst.
Management was interested in me because I was interested in networks. I had my book and was studying. People would observe me studying, and would say it's a hard exam to pass. My contract ended, and as one of the manager's top Tier 2 helpdesk analysts, he highly recommended me for a network analyst slot. I went through a strenuous interview I'll never forget. They drilled me on ISDN. If I hadn't been studying, I wouldn't have known the right answers. I felt good about my chances after the interview because I answered the questions correctly.
I like it; I want to excel further in my career. I want to continue to broaden my skills, continue educating myself and achieve more certifications while the IT industry is still slow. Once the field opens up again, companies that have been afraid of investing in technology will, such as VoIP, and I will be ready, trained and knowledgeable to provide great customer service in those areas.
I love Getronics. I brag about this company and take pride in it. Personally, I think it's a great company to work for. We take pride in our work, strive every day for excellence. We have great staff from the helpdesk to line management and most of us put in 110%. We have a lot of good things to offer.
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10:30pm: I'm an early bird. I'm due at 11pm [for third shift but] I arrive at 10:25 or 10:30. I was like this when I worked first shift. Why? I like to log in to make sure all my tools are available and functioning properly [because] you start receiving calls immediately when your shift is on; the network is already getting congested. I want to review the tickets in the inbox. Because of the fact that we work as a team, other analysts are not annoyed that I’m starting earlier. When it's busy we appreciate any assistance.
Anything needing my immediate attention, I'll work first. Otherwise, I'll work on the inbox for each contract [customer]. I don't really have a preference on contracts. I go through each and every ticket. I read the notes in the ticket. I think it's important to familiarize yourself with every contract and keep up to date in regards to any changes.
We work the normal outages. I'll analyze to see what's going wrong. We check the SysLog, which generates data about the devices at the [customer's] corporate office. If we see potential problems, we go to Cisco's SysLog interpreter which recommends the next course of action. If it doesn't recommend anything but you think there's a problem, we have other options, such as escalating it to the primary engineer.
11:00pm: I review the TOPO Dump [system topology report]. This shows all the devices that are down. I make sure we have an open ticket on all the devices on the TOPO. It takes about 15 minutes to do a TOPO Dump if it's only for one major contract, but if you have several smaller ones it can take longer.
Then we move on to the inbox. I start escalating tickets. You can have a normal day or a major problem. If there are no critical issues, you can be done with first updates by 12:30am.
2:30am: Even if you’re not receiving phone calls, you keep an eye on the HP Openview map and other tools. We can’t rely only on the audible [status and issues reported verbally to us]. Machinery is tools, so vision is important. For one [major energy industry] client, we have a tool to monitor their [Microsoft email] Exchange servers. We have VoIP monitoring systems for two other major customers [in the financial services and pharmaceutical industries]. It checks for jitters in the VoIP circuit. There may be a problem with the phones; calls not being transferred properly.
4:00am: I like to troubleshoot problems. I'm proactive, I like to collect data. If I see something out of the ordinary, I collect data over a few days or a week on a day-to-day basis to see what happened.
We had a situation (sleeping tunnels -- where the tunnel is still up, but is not passing traffic or communicating with the equipment) with customer acceleration units that seemed to continually occur only on third shift. I forwarded the data to the primary engineer. The fix was to upgrade the IOS.
5:00am: I may run reports around now. We use SAP to generate reports for a client to check if the services are functioning. We have a spreadsheet where we input that information. If we see any errors, the procedure says to leave a message, or if it's critical, to escalate to the point of contact on their cellphone or at home. We might need to send the spreadsheet report to the client contact.
7:00am: It's time for pass-down, when we pass information to the analysts on the next shift: Anything you need to pay close attention to, any issues needing work. If it was a second shift analyst who passed the issue onto me, I'll also review it with them at the beginning of my shift. If I have questions, I ask.
7:30am: It depends on the manager when meetings are held. After a shift, we may have a short meeting. If things are running well, we may go a couple of weeks without one. Most communication is by email. That daily interaction often addresses issues to preempt the need for a meeting. Otherwise, I'm on my way home in the sunshine!
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