Paths you can follow in Computer Science.
Hey there TechDiva!
My name is David and I have worked for Verizon as a Security Engineer for 24 years. I started out with a Computer Science degree in 1982. I’ve worked for Fidelity Systems, Digital Equipment and Verizon over my career. The wonderful thing about a degree in computers is that you can go in a lot of directions with the skills you acquire.
As I look back on my career I believe that I did many things well and I wanted to start off this note with that advice for you. The first thing is that I went into technology and computers. The second thing is that I found areas that interested me and I pursued then (e.g. Network Security). The third thing is to learn as many technologies as you can and don’t be afraid to constantly train yourself on anything new. The forth thing is to be optimistic and positive as a worker. And the final thing is to volunteer for projects that help the business because you never know where that takes you in your career.
To summarize the five points above, I will tell you a little of my story to let you know that there are many paths that you can follow in Computer Science. I figured that when I went to college, I could not go wrong by learning to program. I took one course my senior year in High School and programming and languages were easy for me to learn. When I was in college, I got an internship at Fidelity in Boston and accepted a job once I graduated. I liked Fidelity since it allowed me to be a programmer for Brokerage and Business systems and my undergraduate minor was in Business.
I moved onto Digital Equipment as a programmer and kept learning new things like mini computers performance and operations. I volunteered to help with Information Security in 1986 and 36 years later I am still doing Security. I had no idea about security but I learned over the next 10 years Security Engineering and Security Consulting as the Internet took off for business use.
I moved to Verizon and have done many types of jobs as a Manager and an individual contributor to the business. Over my career at Verizon, I kept a good attitude and the projects I volunteered to do, because others did not want to do it, became very important to the business. For example, I volunteered to help with global project clearances and then the world added all kinds of cyber regulations and laws. It became important to make sure that the project was developed and implemented securely for global deployment. Having a computer science background and good networking background really helped me to evaluate the data, technologies and projects as they implement the appropriate security controls.
So in conclusion, I don’t program computers any more. But I use all the skills that I learned starting in High School onwards to help the business. I now even mentor younger security professionals along their journey.
