Yes, i understand this so i dilemma in what fields i should go so that i can studies related certificate to enrich and sharpen my knowledge and skills.
Good that you asked. My recommendation for you is go join a software development house. Not a web design house. Join one that are in the realm of System Integrator. Don't join large MNC, start with SME instead. It will be good if the company has survived for a couple of years like between 4-6 years. They would have iron out most of the startup difficulties and a more stable roadmap and direction of the company.
Generally first into the company, don't expect yourself to be anything more than a development labour. Learn the rope of how software are designed. Learn the design patterns and enterprise execution like how to itemise your tasks, how to split up big set of works into chewable pieces. Learn how your superiors deal with customers, how they negotiate and how they play around the rules. There are a lot to learn in a SME. Times are hard, but I assure you learn more than you can possibility in an MNC. Why ? Too much red tapes in MNC, too much departments to deal with and too much danger zones. End up you learn how to play in the playground, but nothing too important about the technical stuffs.
Throughout my decade with an SME SI, I walk in and out of data centre like a piece of cake. I co-ordinate with vendors on how to place servers, I stand and work whole days standing in front of the servers installing software and doing test. I would say my greatest feat in the data centre is installed 7 servers of Redhat clustering single handled in a week. Testing up and down until it works without Redhat Network Support on any of the OS. Wink Wink...
Now all these skills don't come to me naturally, need to learn on the job too. I think my first few months of my work, I basically screw up a database, spend one full night having cold sweat running down, must fixed it. And to just let you know, it's an ongoing email database. So you can imagine how quickly I need to fix my code and work on a production system. Just tell yourself what could be the worst ? Lose a job ? that's all isn't it ? No big deal.
Set yourself in the mode of failure is no big deal and success is your win, I'm sure you will be able to get somewhere nice and comfy.
Without true understanding of the software stack, your knowledge about systems will be very limited. No matter you are talking about database, network, operating system, infrastructure, storage, you need to know how all these stuffs interact with each other. Studying just one part of them wouldn't give you the complete picture. Software development that works with all these different elements is the heart of the whole eco-system.
But you wouldn't get to touch the bare of these technologies if you are in an MNC. I'm sorry for folks that started out in MNC, too little hands on and too much offload into different departments. End up you are stuck in a corner that you are most familiar with, as you progress up the chain, you end up with little knowledge outside your realm but you are assumed to know the big picture to command. Commanding a ship without knowing the engine room is not knowing the capabilities of your ship, so how can you be a good captain.
Today cloud computing makes a lot of low level stuffs missing, and I must admit the Enterprises love it, so do I. However I totally see the part where it is going to get very difficult for some of the new blood because the opportunity to stand in front of the data centre might be soon out of your reach, yet the industry need people that can understand the full stacks. It will really be up to the management to realise that and find ways to innovate the training around it. So far I don't have good solution to this problem too, still hanging at the back of my head.
So I hope what I have shared make sense to you and will help in your career roadmap.
