Career change from scratch

[vedderx78]

Hi there, I recently joined daniweb and I am reading through as many posts as possible at the moment. I thought it worth posting though as I haven't quite found anything that exactly describes my situation so far.

I am currently a financial advisor, have been for 8 years. I use computers a lot and have a better understanding of them than most but only from a practical perspective I. Terms of dealing with my home network and what I can do at work - so pretty basic. I qualified to degree level in biology, with maths and chemistry at a level.
I have a few friends in various aspects of the industry and have chatted to them. It seems that the entry level point I should aim for is either support or perhaps in a team dealing with systems for financial advice as I have the end user experience here. I Have started to look at websites to see what type of jobs are offered and in my position feel getting a basic qualification would be advisable, I have spoken with CompuTeach so far about what they can offer. I can't really afford to stop work completely and go back and do another degree. My impressions are that things become considerably easier ( though not easy) once you have experience so the key is getting your foot in the door.
So my current thinking is to speak to as many contacts in the industry as possible, start a distance learning course for a basic qualification and then apply for a support role. Work hard at that job, while continuing to study either at my own expense or the employers ideally to move into a new position.after that.

End game for me would be networks and management rather than a programming or specialist role ideally.

I am a sponge at the moment soaking up any advice or information available. So if you have anything you feel you can contribute I would be hugely grateful and thank you in advance

Matthew

[MindSter]

Well you're a financial advisor. Why switching COMPLETELY to IT stuff ??
Try building expertise in Business Intelligence (a trendy topic). After all, you'll be practicing in your field with, advanced tools!

[vedderx78]

Well you're a financial advisor. Why switching COMPLETELY to IT stuff ?? Try building expertise in Business Intelligence (a trendy topic). After all, you'll be practicing in your field with, advanced tools!

That's an interesting idea and one I hadn't even thought of and why I thought a post here would be a good idea! I will see where that takes me. Thanks very much for taking the time to reply.

[MindSter]

You're welcome;
The BI world is WIDE, very wide. I'm no BI wise-kid, but I'll suggest you check some BI experts and some links >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_intelligence
http://www.businessintelligence.com/articles.asp