Leaving the "Field"?

[jairic]

I've had a job interview for something that made me curious. Right now I do desktop support (and make about as little money as possible), but I interviewed for a Point of Sale support position. Now it's something that would utilize a lot of my skills, but I"m worried that leaving the I.T. field would make it hard to get back in.

What I mean is, if I were to take a job doing POS support, or something else that's not really end user desktop support, would I hurt myself in the long run? Do you guys think I'd be able to take a job that's somewhat outside of a typical IT position and then a few years later be able to get back into it?

The only reason I want to consider it is because I make no money doing IT support now, and it looks like I could make more going into POS support, but if it where to go out of business or something I don't want to be stuck in that area and not be able to go back into I.T.

Thanks a lot to anyone who can offer any sort of opinion. I don't even know if I've got a chance of getting this job, but I want to be forward thinking.

Thanks!

 

[S0ULphIRE]

I'd say you'll be fine. Most places actually look favourably on diversification.
As long as you can show how the skills you learn in your new POS job (e.g. communication skills) are still transferrable to your next IT job, you won't have any problems.

 

[Lexluethar]

POS is IT. Half of our IT department are people that support POS. It still is IT, just a specific field. YOu still do hardware troubleshooting, you still have monitors, cables, printers and terminals (mini computers).

I'm very familiar with POS as i work in the IT department of a very large casual dining restaurant. You will make a good amount more than desktop support and it still is considered IT. I mean realistically Desktop support is the highest you can get until you either start managing people or moving into more of a niche market like administration, server, networking, exchange, ect. All which are considered IT but all are more niche than Desktop Support because not every company has these positions.