Network Engineer

Network Engineering is a promising field. Although we have been automating things (which is for good), and we continue to do so, but we would still need people to look after the operations, implement and design network. Network engineers are here to stay because computers are not going anywhere.

Salary growth might not be the greatest, but it is certainly not bad. I would put it in above average category on par with average software developers.

Any hike that you are going to get in the market will purely be on your last drawn salary. When I had 5 years of experience, I had 10 LPA salary, after 1.5 year I had 13 LPA, and that time I switched to a new company and I was able to get 20 LPA. But again, that was me. I knew a colleague who just had 3 years of experience and he was able to get 12 LPA in the market.

Now, since India has a lot of jobs for operations oriented jobs, it is a little difficult to skip odd shifts, but certainly not impossible.

But there is one thing. As a network engineer, I feel you need to keep investing a lot of time in reading, getting certified so that you stay relevant. Although we might say the same for other IT fields, but I feel that struggle is more for Network engineers when compared to others.