From El Salvador to Vegas Casinos IT with Oscar Diaz | Episode 010

In this engaging episode of Career Downloads, host Manuel Martinez sits down with Oscar Diaz, a seasoned tech professional with a unique career path. Oscar’s journey in the world of IT is both inspiring and informative, offering valuable insights for anyone looking to build a successful career in technology.

Episode Highlights:

1. Early Beginnings: Oscar shares his story of emigrating from El Salvador to the United States as a child, eventually settling in Las Vegas.
2. Discovering IT: Learn how a fortunate accident led Oscar to discover his passion for information technology during his college years.
3. First Tech Job: Oscar recounts landing his first IT position and the crucial lessons he learned about adaptability and continuous learning.
4. Casino IT: Dive into Oscar’s experiences working in the fast-paced environment of Las Vegas casinos, where downtime is not an option.
5. Networking Tips: Discover the importance of building professional relationships and leaving positive impressions throughout your career.
6. Government Sector Transition: Oscar explains his move to a government IT role, highlighting the benefits of job security and work-life balance.
7. Embracing New Tech: Hear how Oscar’s willingness to tackle emerging technologies like virtualization opened up new career opportunities.

Throughout the episode, Oscar provides practical advice on seizing opportunities, staying curious, and adapting to new challenges in the ever-evolving tech landscape. Whether you’re just starting your IT career or looking to take it to the next level, this episode of Career Downloads offers valuable insights and inspiration.

Don’t miss this opportunity to learn from Oscar’s experiences and gain actionable tips for your own career growth in the technology sector!

🎧 Don’t forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share your thoughts on this episode. Your feedback helps us bring you more valuable content!

Website: https://careerdownloads.com
YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@careerdownloads
X/Twitter https://twitter.com/@careerdownloads
TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@careerdownloads
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/career-downloads
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/careerdownloads
FaceBook https://www.facebook.com/people/Career-Downloads/61561144531249

#CareerAdvice #TechCareers #ITJobs #ProfessionalDevelopment #CareerGrowth #NetworkingTips #Virtualization #VMware #LasVegasTech #GovernmentIT #CareerDownloads

Manuel: Welcome everybody to another episode of Career Downloads. My name is Manuel Martinez, where each episode I basically hit the refresh button, bring on a different guest to learn more about their background, their job history, and really uncover any different tips and tricks that they’ve used along their way to kind of manage their career so that you can find value out of this. So for today’s episode, I have with me a friend of mine that we’ve worked together. We’ve gone to college together. His name is Oscar Diaz. And we’re going to learn a little bit more about his background. And we’ve had similar experiences. We’ve been at similar roles. We’ve worked at the same places a couple of times. So really getting to know it and understand it from a different perspective I think will be beneficial to everybody because even if you’re working at the same place in the same role, your experiences are not always going to be the same. So with that, plug in and download the knowledge and let’s welcome Oscar.

Oscar: Thank you. Yeah, it’s going good. Thanks for having me, man.

Manuel: Of course. So to start off, I kind of mentioned that we went to school together. We’ve worked together a couple of different places. So what I’ve been doing with all the different guests is if you just take, and again, you don’t have to go in detail, just kind of a quick summary of kind of where you grew up and then eventually kind of how you got to Vegas. And then I know that you went to college, we went to college together. So they just kind of fast track it into that point and then we’ll start at your college experience.

Oscar: Okay. Yeah, sounds good. So, yeah, I was born in a small country in Central America, El Salvador, and I was there to maybe about three. That’s when, you know, it was a big civil war going on there. So my parents, you know, always wanting the better, better life for us kind of pulled us out of there. You know, they left that country, it was definitely not safe, not a safe place to be. [Laughter] So they moved this to Hollywood or the Los Angeles area. I was there through all my elementary and then as even back then, it was not affordable to buy a house or to move to move ahead, right? And my parents, like I said, they were always looking to just have a better life for us. So they decided to move to Las Vegas. So when I’ve been here since, yeah, maybe about sixth grade. So they went from Hollywood to Las Vegas. I don’t know. They were trying to be in the limelight or something, but that’s just, you know, Vegas was more affordable. It was a good place to raise a family, be able to buy a house. And that was, that was always a big thing for them to have a house. So yeah, that’s what brought us to Las Vegas. And then I’ve been here since, so.

Manuel: Nice. And so I know that you went to UNLV when you first kind of enrolled, well, actually, I’ll take a step back. You actually went to CSN first to get some credits and then eventually transferred over to UNLV. When you did that, when you kind of enrolled in college, did you have an idea of what you wanted to do or is it something you discovered once you were at college?

Oscar: Yeah, for me, I didn’t have a plan. Like I’m not somebody who says, oh, I had a plan. I knew exactly what it was going to take for me to get there. That was not the case at all. I knew I was going to go to school. That was never a question. My dad taught me early on if, you know, education is key and if you don’t want to be doing the jobs that I’m doing, you need to attend school. And I saw the jobs, two, three jobs that he would have to have and how hard they were working and the odd hours that they were working. So I knew for sure that was not for me, you know, that I wasn’t going to let that go to waste all this effort that he was putting in that they were putting in. So I knew I had to go to school. I didn’t know what I was going to study. So initially I was like, oh, I’ll go into business. Like I’m sure a lot of people do, right? They want to own a business. Seems easy. So that initially that’s what I started to go to school for is business administration. I said, oh, when I get out of here, I’m going to be a business owner. Like somebody was just going to hand me a business to to open when I was done with school. But as you know, that’s not the case. School is really not that’s not really what school is for, right? Or going to college. So um so yeah, I was going through business, all the business classes. And maybe I think it was my junior year, I was like, okay, what am I really going to do with this? Where am I going with this? And, you know, I talked to my counselor, I said, what are my options? And at the time I was working in an office, I had like an office job a couple of hours a week. And I was really into the computers. And as a matter of fact, I broke the computer there at the office because, you know, I was [Laughter] editing some files, I was trying some things. And that’s really what I like. But little did I know is like, I was able to delete files, but I couldn’t add files to it. So there weren’t permissions for me to re-add those files. So that’s how I actually broke it. I changed some system files, I was able to remove them, edit it. And I was like, oh, I’ll just replace it. At the end of the day, when I’m done, well, at the end of the day, I try to put these files back and I didn’t have access to create, I didn’t know anything about computers, right? I was just trying to learn. That’s what I was doing. And I was like, oh, man, let me just restart it. Restarting always helps, right? So I restart it. Well, all those files that I edited it wouldn’t let it boot back up. So it was just, it was a DOS prompt and it just couldn’t get past that part. So since then, you know, that’s why I went to talk to my counselor. I was like, what are my options? What else can I do without being set back two, three years? You know, I don’t want to extend my college career that long. And that’s when he suggested, you know, information technology and I was like, oh, really? Okay. And it would only maybe add another semester or so. So that’s, that’s how I switched over to be in IT. So I got my business degree and I got an IT degree. So I have double bachelors though, but initially it was just going to be business.

Manuel: Yeah. No. And we’ve, I’ve talked about that with different people where they’re always like, oh, I’m just going to go college. People are going to hand me jobs. It just, that’s kind of the way it’s painted at least like, hey, go to, go to college, get a degree because that’s what’s going to help you, you know, move on and get another job. And it’s definitely not the case. [Laughter]

Oscar: At least it wasn’t for me.

Manuel: Yeah. Me either. And so then once you decided to go and you went into information technology, I think and junior year sounds about right. Cause I think similar around my sophomore year, I was actually going to be an architect talking to an uncle of mine who was in IT and he was just, you know, kind of pointing me towards a path of information technology. And I want to say it’s around our, my, our junior year that, that we met started taking classes together and then eventually we graduated, right? And then after graduation, what was that process like for you to graduate and then go and try and get your first job?

Oscar: Yeah. So for me, it, it, I don’t know if it was luck or what it was through a connection that I had made at school. Um, I kind of just walked into a job. Um, didn’t have any real experience, you know, other than school, school, you know, go through some programming classes, several IT classes, but it’s nothing like the real world, right? Um, so through my connection, he was going to be leaving that job and he said, Hey, Oscar, I know you’re an IT, do you want to take over this job for me? You know, you just have to go, um, interview with the owner, see if he likes you, make sure you guys are a good fit. And then you just take over this job for me and I was, okay, I’m going to be at a school here in a little bit. Yeah, of course I’ll take this, um, not knowing really what an IT job was, right? I had no idea. Um, so I showed up, I interviewed, I never shy away from a challenge. So you know, I talked to the owner, he liked me. He’s like, okay, um, I can offer you this much fresh out of college. I was like, yeah, that’s great. You know, I was going to take whatever, but the number was higher than I anticipated. So I was like, yeah, of course I’ll take it. Not even really knowing what to ask, like what does this job entail, like what am I going to be doing? I just didn’t care. It was an IT job and I was going to do whatever it took and I was going to learn whatever I needed to learn. So yeah, that’s how I landed that first job and I kind of had to do it all. I had to do some network administration, systems administration, web design, um, even some training because obviously the C… the owner didn’t know much about computers. So I had to teach them how to simple stuff, you know, word processing, Excel, those kind of things. So that job kind of threw myself out there and it was just sink or swim. I had to learn everything right then. I mean, I was, it was like Windows NT. I hadn’t dealt with a server before. It was a ISDN connection. I had no idea how to manage a router or a switch. That’s not what they teach you in school. You know, you go for information technology, but they don’t really teach you those things, right? Unless you’re focused in those areas, but um, yeah, so it was fun. I mean, I like the challenge.

Manuel: And that role was it like, did he tell you it’s, you’re going to be an IT technician? Was like, was there any role of it? Or he was just like, Hey, it’s an IT job and come in and do it and it sounds like you’re the sole IT person. So there’s nobody to train you. Like I don’t know if he was there and kind of did a handoff to you. Or if it was just like, Hey, you started two weeks later, he’s gone, figure out.

Oscar: It wasn’t even two weeks later. It was just like, okay, he likes you. You start on Monday. Let me know if you need anything. If you have any questions. And he no longer showed up, my friend, he, he was done. He was moving on. He was going to go into accounting. And so he had a big accounting job coming up. He just didn’t have time for that job anymore. Um, as far as the position itself, it was IT. Like it wasn’t specific. It was just anything that encompasses a computer I had to do.

Manuel: And during that time, so I know now it’s easy. People are just like, Oh, I’ll just Google it and figure it out. So I know when we were coming out, this is early 2000s, there was the internet. It was shortly after, so I remember when I was in college, I was still on dial up, right? And there wasn’t really broadband. So like, if you did look something up, I remember, you know, it just takes a while for that to load. So what were you doing? Like you said, ISDNs and all the stuff that you had no exposure to, what was your process to try and learn it or figure it out? Like, who did you contact?

Oscar: Yeah, when I really got stuck and it had to be up, like then and there, I would either email my friends and say, Hey, this, I know you set this up way back. Do you have a list of IP addresses or do you have a list of connections that these guys are supposed to connect to? And you know, when he had a chance, he would respond. Other than that, I would, you know, I would read, I would get a book, I would, um, you could search the internet. It just wasn’t as vast, right? Like it wasn’t as easy to get. So the documents I was reading weren’t maybe the most detailed or I learned visually. So let’s say a lot of pictures, they didn’t have a lot of pictures. So I would definitely have to read and just trial and error. You know what I mean? When I first had to set up, you know, TCP/IP settings and I was like, what are these like, what is all this? Like, how does it actually connect and get out of this, um, area like how do I, I know they want to talk to other offices? How do I do that? And yeah, just through trial and error, just kind of figuring it out, knowing that they needed it done and they needed it to work. I just read, read as much as I could and, and nope, it’s not this number. Okay. Let me try the next number and just that’s, I think that’s where I gained a lot of my trouble shooting skills to where sometimes even when you have the instruction steps one through 10, doesn’t always go that way. Right? And then you get to step four and it’s like, wait a minute, this is, this goes completely different direction than what these steps take me. And yeah, that’s what that, I learned a lot of troubleshooting there.

Manuel: And how long do you stay in that role and kind of what propelled you to go on to the next job? I mean, was it just, Hey, similar to your buddy, did you find something else? You know, were you just kind of done with that place? What made you move on? And then, you know, kind of how did you prepare for like the interview process again? So here it sounds like you had your network connection, right, a friend of yours that was the one that kind of helped get you started and bring you in. What was that process to get on to the next role?

Oscar: Yeah, that, that job was a blast. It was fun. It was actually owned by a professional poker player. He was the one who actually funded that company and so it was a fun time. It was a fun time in that they made it real easy. It was a lot of work and a lot of learning. Obviously the friend who recommended me obviously has some trust in me, right? Like he knew that I wasn’t just going to leave them high and dry and that I could learn whatever they needed me to do. So I would have stayed there. I was learning a lot. I mean, it was, like I said, it was a deep end for me coming out of school. It was a lot of responsibility. They don’t want to lose money. They want to make money. So I would have stayed, but he went on to other ventures, right? He was going to close up shop. He wanted to try his luck in different, in a different business. So they gave it a heads up. So I knew that that was going to be drying up and closing. So I knew I had to go get a job. So I just started interviewing. I was going to take whatever IT job. I thought I had good experience. You know, I mean, that’s all the experience I could have. So I just started interviewing and I was pretty confident not that I knew everything, but I was confident that I could figure whatever they threw at me. [Laughter] So you know, I got a few other jobs, like some help desk jobs for an ISP and it was, I learned early on that that was not going to be for me, like a call desk, a call center to where the calls just answer automatically for you. You have a headset, like the call comes in. It’s not you picking up a call. It’s like, Hey, you’re on the phone with a customer. So I knew early on that that was definitely not for me. [Laughter] That’s not the way I operate. I’m pretty methodical. I’m kind of slow. I like to make sure I know what I’m doing. And in those jobs, it was just like, Hello, hello, somebody’s there and they need your help. And I did learn that I like helping people. I do like, I’ve been there stuck not knowing what to do and I like to help people and I don’t make them feel like what you don’t know this, you should know this. It’s like, you know, I don’t like to make people feel that way. And I think that’s why I’ve always had a good relationship with my customers. So, so yeah, when I left that job, like I said, I had a few help desk jobs and that’s when I went to work for, it was like a, they do credit card processing and that was weird because I had never had, it was like a round table interview. All the candidates were sitting in one, one room, like it wasn’t me just going in there and meet with a panel and you’re sitting with your competition and a round table and the owner, the owner is there and he’s just asking everybody questions, which is hard because sometimes the person in front of you gives the answer that you were going to give, right? So you’re like, do I just want to copy this guy or so that was, that was a strange interview, but.

Manuel: And for that, so they were asking the same question to every candidate or was it, well, they’ve asked a question and you had to be the first to answer, like how did, how did that work?

Oscar: It was different ways. Like they would ask, they did ask the same question to all of us go around the table. So I feel sorry for the last guy, right? Because there’s only so many answers you can give, but or at times they would just pick a person. What do you think about this or what would you do in this scenario? And you know, I just, all I could do is answer from my previous experience, which wasn’t much, maybe one or two jobs, or I would answer with how I wanted to go forward, right? And I think when I sat down with the owner after obviously I got that job, he said, you know, that’s one of the things that I liked. Everybody answered with everything that they’ve done in the past. You answered with where you’re going in the future. And he’s like, and that’s what I’m looking for. It’s a help desk job. It’s, you know, a call center. If you’re just, this is your end goal, then like, I’m no good there. You know, he’s like, that’s not what I’m looking for. He’s like, you were looking past. What’s the next job? Where’s that going to, where’s this job going to lead me? So he was looking at it in his eyes as a benefit, right? He wants to then hire me as a higher level job and even higher than that. So yeah, he told me that’s what I liked about your answers is that, yes, you answered what you’ve done, but you also told me where you’re trying to go and where and what you’re going to do to get to those spots, so.

Manuel: So, the fact that you kind of had a plan, right? It wasn’t just like, Hey, this is what I’m doing. I’m answering your question, but you’re like, again, not planning out a long term career, but at least the short in the short term, like, Hey, once I get this role, here’s what I plan on doing within there. It sounds like he wanted somebody that wanted to grow within that company at least. And as opposed to like, Oh, somebody that’s happy at help desk and maybe they stay there or they stay there until they leave to go somewhere else and maybe do the same role.

Oscar: Right. And like I said, it wasn’t like I had plans. I don’t really operate that way, but I knew what I didn’t want to do. That was a help desk job, right? So I knew I could do it, but I knew I didn’t want to do it long term. So and that came through, right? I said, I can do this job to the best of my ability, but this is not my end goal. I want to move forward, whether that’s a System Administrator, whatever positions they had afterwards. And at that time I was really into web design. So he liked that I had some experience creating websites and being a web designer or a web master at that time. Right. [Laughter] That’s what it was called at that time. Now it’s a web developer, but at the time it was a web master. So he liked that I had that experience. But yeah, like I said, I didn’t have a plan like where I wanted to get to. I just knew where I didn’t want to be. So answering calls, answering the phone, not that there’s anything wrong with it. That’s a great job. It was fun and you learn a lot, but that’s not the way I wanted to help people. I wanted to help them in different ways. So yeah, so as much as my plan goes, I just knew where I didn’t want to be.

Manuel: And that makes sense. I agree with you there. Like it’s fun. You do learn a lot, but I learned also quickly is I don’t want to be stuck on a phone all day every day for eight hours a day. It’s too much. So in there, did you kind of, what you told him about kind of moving up within that role, did that happen? Did you eventually move up? And I know eventually you left, but did you do like one role, a couple roles within there and then eventually move out? Or was it you learned enough and then moved out?

Oscar: Yeah. So that job, I met some good people there. One of my coworkers who later became my manager there. You know, he kind of pushed me to learn, to continue to learn. He’s like, hey, how come you haven’t gotten your MCSA or MCSE? He’s like, how come you’re not going for these certifications? I was like, oh, I have a degree. He’s like, yeah, that’s great. You know, for later on, when you’re a manager, you’re a director, those degrees will help. He’s like, but right now you should probably be getting certifications. And before that, I didn’t think anything of certifications. You know, I was like, I didn’t really know much about it. So he got me, you know, we would come into work and he’s like, every day in a slow time when there’s no calls, let’s go ahead and study a chapter a day or whatever we can get in in this eight hour shift, right? Because sometimes we’d work late night or like the graveyard or like swing shift and graveyard. So there would be some downtime. He’s like, instead of us just sitting here twiddling our thumbs, let’s just read these chapters or read it the night before and then we can discuss it, you know, when we come in the next day. And I was like, OK, I could do that. I mean, I was fresh out of school still, you know, I’m still in the learning mode. So yeah, he got me going. I remember I got my Windows XP book and that was going to be the first Microsoft certification exam that I would go take. So yeah, he got his he got me reading and he kind of fed that to me to just keep learning. You know, I mean, you want to move on and that’s great that you say that. But you have to put in the work, right? Nobody’s just going to come hand you a job. So yeah, he showed me that to keep to keep learning. And actually, you know, it paid off. So I did that job for maybe I think it was like eight months. And then it was time they had an opening as a implementation specialist or like a trainer. You train the customers on how to install the software and you trouble help them troubleshoot. And yeah, I interviewed for that. And luckily, I had read all those books and taken that Microsoft certification. It, you know, that’s the operating system that those customers were using. So everything was fresh. And the terminology was good when I met with the owner again to interview for that position. He was like, yeah, he’s like, I see where you started. And you’ve you’re not just sitting here answering phones and knowing our software, which is good. But not only do you know our software, but you know the operating systems that you’d be working on. So yeah, that’s that’s how I got promoted.

Manuel: No, and that’s that’s pretty cool. I didn’t realize that you were doing a kind of vaguely remember some of the training part and being able to kind of explain how that works to other people. Now, is that something that they trained you to be the trainer? Or did you kind of have to come up with your own material just based on your experience? Like, hey, I know how the software works and you’re just kind of coming on the fly. Was this like a training class? Or as as the software gets installed and they’re doing the credit card processing at their office, you’re just basically doing like that hands on, you know, side by side, like, hey, let’s do this. Click here, click there, kind of what when you say trainer, what does that mean?

Oscar: Yeah, so it would depend. Sometimes it would be for hotels, right? So sometimes it would be CFOs in there. Sometimes it would just be controllers. It would be accounting people. So there’ll be times it’ll be one or two people on the other line. There’ll be times there’s a whole room full, right? Everybody needs to know how the software works, how we’re going to do it. This is the issues we’re having. We can’t get it installed every hour that goes by. We’re losing money, right? Like, or if we’re submitting our statements to the credit card processing company, we’re getting charged fees for every transaction that’s incorrect because you submit it, if they reject it, then you have to submit it again. Now you’re paying that fee over and over and over. And so it was critical for me to teach these people how to use it correctly, how to troubleshoot it so that they don’t have to call support and spend an hour or two hours. So, yeah, sometimes my training was one on one. Sometimes my training was to a broad audience, to a big audience. And, you know, they trained me as far as, you know, they give you some guidelines, they tell you, this is what you should be covering. But all that goes out the window, right? When they’re, once you’re training, not every training is the same. So every time I had to do a training, it was a little different. People have different questions, people have different experiences. Some people know computers and sometimes that’s the worst, right? Because they know enough to get in trouble. And they’ll be like, oh, Oscar, I’ve already changed this, this and this. And I’m like, OK, well, now we need to spend 45 minutes of me trying to figure out what you’ve done so that I know how to how to help you move forward. But yeah, that training was I like training. Like I said, I like helping people and they were always so grateful at the end of the end of the training or at the end of the session, because then they can move on with with their day to day job. And they can go to their management saying, OK, we resolved it. Right. So yeah, that part was fun.

Manuel: And then what did you do as you’ve kind of moved on from there? Right. So did you have any more roles or after you did training? You know, you kind of shot your way off into another role.

Oscar: Yeah, for there, I I just I left. It was just I had I had learned as much as I could learn there. There was no other position for me to move up to. And that’s one of my recommendations is once you had a job, you feel like, OK, you’ve mastered it or you’re not pushing yourself anymore or you’re not really learning anymore, then maybe it’s time to to move on. Right. And early on in my career, I did jump around job to job searching for that. Like I wanted to keep learning. But yeah, that’s that’s what I did. Once once I saw that there was really nowhere else for me to go there. Other than maybe be a manager, which I didn’t want to do. Yeah, that’s when I decided to just go and keep keep learning and keep looking for other positions.

Manuel: And when you were looking for other positions and based on knowing that you you want to grow, I know that you were studying for your certifications, you know, kind of doing the MCSA, you know, those set of certifications. Did you were you being a little bit more selective now? Like, hey, I want to do something with regards to Microsoft or training. You know, I know you want to grow, but did you have an idea of what you want to grow into and were you working on skill sets to move into that role? Or you’re like similar to in the past ones, like, well, I’m going to push myself and I’ll just figure it out when I get there.

Oscar: Yeah, that’s always been the case for me. I usually jump in and I’ll try and figure it out when I get there. But I was looking for positions. I didn’t know where I wanted to go. I didn’t know if it was networking. I didn’t know if it was on the server side. I was still dabbling with websites. I didn’t know if developer was the way I wanted to go. I kind of like that. But I could see that there wasn’t going to be much money, right? There was companies coming out who would create websites for you. I mean, you can just go. It was what you see is what you get. Like you drag stuff over and you create your own website. So I kind of saw that and I was like, OK, I can’t compete with those kind of big companies of me creating little websites for you, right? So I knew the website stuff was probably not going to work out. I like the computer side, whether that was troubleshooting, troubleshooting the network, making sure the computers are working correctly. So that’s kind of the way I wanted to go. I just I wasn’t sure yet. I wasn’t 100 percent sure how I wanted to go.

Manuel: And where did you end up going? So like what what position? So what was the position that you ended up going to? And just kind of what was the like the industry of that company that you ended up landing a job with?

Oscar: Yeah, so from there, like I said, we’re in Las Vegas, so I landed in the casinos right there. That was a sought job at that time, right? I was like, oh, yeah, you get into the casinos, you’re golden, right? You’re like, it’s everything is great, you know, until you get there, right? I mean, the casinos were fun. Everything was fast paced. I love my job there. Everything from dealing with the pit bosses, the managers, the VPs, everybody was awesome. I mean, that job was a lot of fun and very fast paced, right? Like they couldn’t be down at all. Like every even if a printer was down, it was a big deal. It was so I was like a computer technician, but you have to troubleshoot the network, the computers, the printers. You kind of like most of the jobs I’ve had is kind of been you kind of have to do it all. You have to know a little bit of of a lot of things. All right, so yeah, I got into the casinos and actually the way I got into that is one of the people that I trained when I was at my previous job was that casino. And I said, hey, if you’re ever looking for somebody, just let me know and I’ll apply. And he’s like, hey, hey, I like the way you trained us. You know what you’re doing. You mind coming in for an interview. So yeah, that’s that’s how I got that job was through a connection from my previous.

Manuel: And really just being, I guess, kind of straightforward, right? And not being timid, right? And again, you don’t have to be an extrovert, but just kind of going through and putting that out there. I’m like, hey, if if you’re looking, you know, not demanding a job like, hey, let me know when there is. But just say, hey, if you’re if you’re looking or, you know, if you’re interested, just being not being afraid to ask. I guess it’s kind of what I’ve gone through. So, you know, I had another guest on here, Matthew. And the way that he got started in his career is he just asked somebody like, hey, what do you do like not being afraid to ask like, hey, I don’t know. Or, hey, is this available? Like what what’s going on? Sometimes you never know what we’re just asking somebody a question will will lead to.

Oscar: Yeah. And it’s definitely something you have to be really careful, right? Like I treat everybody with respect because you never know. It’s a small town and you never know when you’re going to run into that person again. So for me, it’s always leave a good impression with these people. And obviously I did with him because he he reached out afterwards, you know, and he said, hey, we have a position open. I would like you to interview for it. So obviously I did a good job in the training. I didn’t break anything. And he’s, you know, he liked the way that I made him and his staff feel right. So in the way I answered their questions and he’s like, yeah, that’s somebody who could work for me or work to do work for me. So yeah, that’s one recommendation is always leave a good impression. I mean, you may not like what you’re doing. You may not be happy with what you’re doing, but do it to the best of your ability and let your work speak for itself. Right. That’s the way I always try to leave a job is let them be upset that I’m leaving, but happy that I’m moving, moving on, right? Knowing that I want somewhere else to be. And so yeah, so again, another job I got through a through a connection, right? You still have to interview, but a lot of times just getting to those interviews is is what’s difficult, right? I mean, you don’t have the crazy experience. You don’t have all the crazy certifications because at that time I didn’t have those. All I could do is I had worked with him and he liked the work that I did. And yeah, that I wasn’t shy to ask, hey, if you ever need somebody, just let me know. You know, I didn’t say, hey, give me a job whenever you need. You know, I just said it, I will do my part. Just get my foot in the door, you know, open that door for me.

Manuel: And it’s very true. So just knowing somebody having a good work ethic, we’ve worked together a couple of times. And that at that casino back back when they were still around, right? So Coast Casinos when they were still a thing, obviously having that relationship with you, knowing that we went to school together, you know, we had taken different career paths. But at some point we were doing the same thing for different companies, right? Essentially, and I brought it up in another episode where, you know, just us talking like, hey, what’s it like over there? What’s your experience? And at some point, you know, we started talking about money, right? Like, hey, you know, how is it over there? And again, it wasn’t like I was asking like, hey, what are you making? It just it came up in general conversation where doing the same job the same thing you were making about $10,000 more. And I was like, well, wait a minute, how’s that? We’re doing the same thing for the same industry, right? Different companies. And like you mentioned, right? Just having building that network at some point, getting that foot in the door, I could have applied and probably never gotten the job. But you and I think that’s some of the things that people don’t realize. Like it’s good to have a network, but you also have to in order to be able to recommend somebody, they have to have trust in you and believe in you and understand that you if you’re recommending somebody, it’s somebody that they obviously they have trust in you. So what would you think is what would you say is that process for you? Or, you know, what do you think is the experience for recommending other people? Because I’m sure you don’t just recommend everybody that asks you for a job.

Oscar: Definitely not. Like I said, it you you still have to do your part, right? And those people that do recommend you, they’re putting their name out there. I mean, that’s what you’re doing when you recommend somebody, right? You’re saying, hey, if I was the owner here, or if I was paying, I would pay this person. You know, go ahead and sign my name. I would sign, I would vouch for this person. So, yeah, I’ve had people ask me, hey, can you recommend me this job? Or can you get help me get this job? And usually what I’ll say is, all right, show me that you really want this. Like, what have you done? Or can you, what’s your experience? Or what are you doing to get to this job? And they’re like, oh, well, once I get there, then I’ll, I will study or I will pass the certification. I’ll, I’ll say, well, go pass this certification first and then come talk to me. Because that’ll show me that they’re serious about it, right? That, okay, he’s trying, right? Because sometimes you can’t get those interviews like I said before. I think, you know, we were young and we try to get into the casinos for a long time. And I don’t know why the application just never makes it to the right people. You know, I was like, if they could just talk to me and just let me try, they’ll see that I’m a good employee. But sometimes you just don’t, you don’t get those opportunities. So, yeah, recommending somebody for sure. They have to have confidence and because it’s their name on there. And you don’t want to make them look bad, right? And if you show that, ah, you don’t care or it’s not a big deal to me. Why would they put their name out there? If it’s not a big deal to you, that means when you get there, if you keep the job good, if you don’t, you know, I mean, that’s their name. They’ll never be trusted again to recommend somebody. So, yeah, whenever you ask somebody, hey, can you recommend me? You know, you want to make sure you’re in good standing with those people when they you’ve done your, your part as much as you can do. But yeah, like I said, when people ask me, can you recommend me? Or can you help me out with this? That’s fine. I could, I’ll do my part, but what are you doing is your part? I’m not here to hand things out. I don’t want to ruin my connections because, you know, like I said, it’s a small town and I never know when I’ll deal with those people again. [Laughter] So, yeah, it’s, it’s difficult for sure.

Manuel: And especially in that situation, right? Where that’s the first time like we’ve never worked together. We knew each other. We knew kind of our careers, but to kind of put your name out there. And it’s something I didn’t, at the time, I probably didn’t realize it. I didn’t realize the like the impact that would have to you to me. It’s just like, oh, hey, can you can you help me get over there? You know, if they have an opening, you know, and I think, I don’t know that I had done anything specifically to prove other than you kind of knew what I was doing. We were similar, right? We had that similar mindset of like, I know I don’t want to be here. You know, hey, I was in help desk. That’s not for me. And, you know, we had kind of moved up and moved around. Now, what was it like for you? So I know that you mentioned we’re at the same place that we had similar experiences now it’s not, we’re doing the same job at different places, same job at the same place. But what was your experience there and kind of what do you think you took out of in that role? What was your experience? Like, what did you, how did you feel that you grew as part to just like, just being a PC technician and learning more about more general stuff? Is there any particular area where you’re like, hey, I’m going to start focusing here? So I know for me, well, I was there. I started to hang around the network guys and really thought, hey, maybe I want to do networking. Eventually I ended up going to the slot floor system, which is more of the database side and took a role, a job there. So kind of what did you take out of that position?

Oscar: Yeah. So out of that position, like you mentioned, we started talking to the networking guys, right? And that’s what I would do. I would pick all the senior guys. That’s who I would pick their brains, right? Because I wanted to see which way do I want to go. So I would ask endless questions. I’m sure the guy who was managing me at the station where I was, I would ask him every day, everything. I’m sure he got tired of me asking questions, but he was super nice. You know, he would let me know. He was a senior guy. He had been there quite a long time. Super smart guy. And that’s what I was doing. Just all the senior guys, I would just ask him as many questions as I could. And that’s when I saw, okay, I’m going to ask him. And that’s when I saw, okay, networking is something I really like. You know, I liked it from before. I just didn’t have a lot of experience with it to the level that they were doing. You know, they were connecting WANs. They were doing a lot of advanced configurations that I hadn’t done. I hadn’t even had access to. And they let me shadow. They would let me walk along with them when they’re doing switch upgrades and router configurations. They would let me sit behind them and kind of watch these things, right? And they liked that I was asking questions, right? Because you’re curious. And then our manager liked that also. So what I learned is that, yeah, I like networking. And obviously to get any of these applications working, rely on the network. So that’s something that I liked, that I picked up there.

Manuel: And then now around this time, you know, you picked up the networking and you decided to move into, left there to go into government role. So what was kind of your thought process? What made you decide that you wanted to go that route, as opposed to kind of staying in the casino or finding, you know, kind of moving up there, moving to a different property? Just what made you or what enticed you to go towards a government role?

Oscar: Yeah, at that time, job security, right? The casinos I saw, you know, some of my friends get laid off or just work crazy hours, getting called in at all times of the night, you know, and you have to come in. It’s a casino, right? They don’t close down. They don’t care that you’re having dinner with your family or that it’s Thanksgiving. You know what I’m saying? It’s none of that matters. Like we’re open. We’re making tons of money. You need to come in. And I was young. I was okay. But at that time, I was, I think I was just just married or just starting a family. So job security was a big thing for me. I never, at that time, early on, I was never chasing a big paycheck or I just wanted to learn. And everything was paying, you know, adequately. It was, it was fine. It was, I wasn’t becoming rich or anything like that, but it was paying enough. So yeah, the government job, I decided to go because of the job security, and it paid more and it gave me the freedom to do what I wanted to do.

Manuel: And when you say the freedom to do what you want to do, was that in the role or even outside of that? Because I know within the government, right? There’s holidays, you have your weekends, it’s a set hours, right? Once the building’s closed, sure, maybe occasional, and I would say occasionally, there’s maybe an after hours upgrade. But for the most part, you’re working your eight to five and you’re done, right? So is that kind of when you say do what you want to do? Was it that or was it also the role gave you the ability to do what you wanted to do and learn and progress?

Oscar: Both, right? So yeah, that freedom at home and for me to be able to be present with my family, that was key, right? I wanted to be there. I don’t want to be missing, you know, getting home when my kids are going to sleep and not only seeing them in the morning before they go to school, like that’s not where I wanted to be. I wanted to see my family and be present in my family. So that was good, but also in the role itself. When I talked to the manager there who hired me, he told me, you know, you come in here, I’m going to need you to learn as much as you can, as fast as you can, and kind of take the reins. And he’s like, you do what you want to do here. So if you want to learn networking, you want to be our networking guy, that door is open. If you want to be our server guy, that door is open. And at that time, I was, yeah, I’ll take them both. I’ll take the networking and server. And that’s what happened. You know, I went into that government job and I saw the way, I saw some inefficiencies that they had. Like it was a government job, right? [Laughter] So I was like, this could run so much more efficient, right? Not only for myself, not only because I want downtime, but I just want to make it easier for everybody who’s working. So, yeah, I started automating some things. Saw some things that they were doing by hand that were taking hours and hours. I’m like, I could be done with this quickly and just move on to something else, go learn something else. So I started deploying servers and it was only taking me, you know, maybe an hour to whereas before it was taking them half a day to maybe two days before they can get a server deployed. And I rattled some cages, right? Because I’m coming in here disturbing things. And we have a good thing going here. Why are you coming here trying to show out, right? But that wasn’t what I was trying to do. It’s just I was still in a learning mode, right? Like I was still hungry for knowledge, right? So for me, it was I wasn’t doing it to mess with anybody else. I was just doing it to keep feeding my need for knowledge. So if I’m automating this and I don’t have to spend time deploying some mundate, clicking next, next, next. Like what am I really learning by clicking next 10 times? You know what I’m saying? So I was like, let me just automate that. Have something else click next for me while I go learn this other thing. So I caught on to, you know, I was doing server deployments. Networking, I was doing phone systems, which I didn’t know anything about PBX, but I’ll learn that too. And that’s what my manager liked. He’s like, no matter what I throw at you, you know, you don’t tell me, oh, I don’t know how to do that. Or that’s not for me. That’s below me or anything like that. I was like, yeah, cool. So when it was time for promotions or for, I remember one time he reached out to me, he said, hey, Oscar, we’re doing this whole virtualization thing, right? Like this was just coming around and he’s like, everybody’s kind of like scared of it or don’t want to do it. And I was like, yep, I’ll do it, send me to the training. And nobody else wanted to do it. Like they, they were like, no, we have the physical servers. Why do you need to virtualize anything? What is this virtualization thing? And I was like, no, this is the new latest thing. Yeah, send me. And yeah, so that’s, that’s the way a lot of opportunities opened up. I knew I wanted to learn. And when they were to ask, is anybody willing to do this? I’d be the first to raise my hand. Go ahead, send me, even though I know that was going to be grueling and new and scary and you don’t ever want to mess things up, right? But I was like, yeah, go ahead, send me. So on that, that sparked a love for me, virtualization. That was something that, thanks to that manager, like he, you know, he was willing to send me. I was fairly new and he was willing to send me to that training. And I just didn’t look back that, that set off like a love for me and on the server side and networking, that like combined everything for me, right? Virtualization had everything. It had the server side, had the networking, had the troubleshooting, and it was fast paced. So it was like feeding everything for me. So that was, I’m very grateful to that manager for sending me to that training.

Manuel: So it’s like the perfect mix of just everything, right? Because there is a number of that. Plus it’s a brand new technology. Like that was something that just was unheard of before, right? Just, you know, like they mentioned, like having physical servers and they’re like, well, we have this. Why are we going to try and improve? And a lot of the automation that you went to implement and you were trying to go through and bring in a lot of efficiencies, how did you learn a lot of that? Was it there at work? Were you now that you have kind of your set hours? Are you still learning on your own, on your free time? Kind of how did you build a lot of the skill set? Or was it just so much? Because it sounds like you’re doing everything. It also makes it hard to kind of pinpoint and say, okay, well, I’m going to automate, excuse me, the automating servers. I’m sure you’re doing a lot of that through kind of Windows, as opposed to trying to automate networking. And it’s at that time, they were different applications, different skill sets. So how did you kind of build those skill sets? Was it, you know, building labs at home, at work? Just were you doing, you know, I’ll figure it out and I’ll just deploy it in production. Because, you know, some people that’s, I know a lot of people, if that’s how they learn, they use production as their test environment. So kind of how did you build that skill set?

Oscar: Yeah, I may have been guilty of doing some stuff in production, but for the most part, like I said, this job was, I have free reign, right? So it would let me study while I was there on live environments. Like I would have a test lab there that wasn’t going to take anything down, but I had real equipment that was comparable to what we were actually running. And I had the freedom to do it. I mean, I didn’t have that money to spend $10,000 for a server at home, and let like three or four different servers. There was no way I was going to have that. You know what I’m saying? I was still early on in my career. So at work, yeah, they would let me, any of the old servers that would get replaced, that would go into my lab. I would never think of throwing it away or, oh, it’s so slow or anything like that. Nope, I’d put it right in my lab. I’d implement it there. I would test, do my testing there. And then at home, when my kids would go to sleep, I like to be up late at night. So that would be my alone time. And yeah, that’s when I would either work on the lab, read my books, study for more certifications. That’s when I would take time. I was definitely eager to keep learning and studying at that point. But yeah, like I said, that job gave me that opportunity to just keep learning. And they were happy with it. You know what I mean? Some of the employees may not have been happy because now they have to do more. But the ones that wanted to work, you know, you raise them up, right? They see somebody else work and they’re like, oh, I can do more too. So yeah, that job opened itself up for that.

Manuel: And I know we’ve talked a little bit about certifications in the past and kind of what are your thoughts towards them? So obviously, I know that they are beneficial. But what’s the benefit you see? Is it having that on your resume to try and get another role? Is it, you know, I’ve talked to different people. Again, everybody has a slightly different idea of what the benefit is to you. So is it having something to put, you know, a couple of letters to put on your resume? Is it going through and forcing yourself to learn, you know, that technology? Sure, you can learn it hands-on. But I think with the certifications, it’s a very almost a prescriptive way. Like you have to know this material.

Oscar: Right.

Manuel: So what did you, what are your thoughts on certifications, I guess in general?

Oscar: Yeah, it’s a double-edged sword with certifications, right?

Manuel: All right. Thank you for listening to the first part of this episode. So I’m going to break it up into two pieces and you can catch the rest of the interview in part two the following week.