Hey guys. I am needing some general insight from everyone who might have been in the same situation as me -- or know someone in the same situation. Basically, I graduated college in the spring this year with a double business major in Marketing/Management. I really want to go and do graduate school ... but I want to do it in information technology or information systems.

I don't want to dance around forever wishing I did this field, so I am thinking of applying for graduate school and getting it done. Here is something I am wondering -- what kind of disadvantage does going straight to masters for MIS with no MIS undergraduate degree put me in? I am worried that even though I have two business degrees, my lack of "fundamentals" that I should have received with an MIS bachelor's degree is going to put me in a situation where I am skipping way too much important information I am needing to know to be successful in the field.

I hate to say it, but I am really regretting my college situation right now. I pursued my undergraduate degrees not really understanding what I might want to do in the future once I graduate and it is catching up to me as now I know exactly what it is I want to do and feel it is too late to get into the field I want to. I really want to work with computers and concentrate on technology. Right now I am qualified to do selling, telemarketing, and other tedious fields of work that I realized I just am not interested in nor have any business doing by holding a marketing/management degree. I started a job as an account manager with a company and they are already screwing me over and forced me to voluntarily end my probationary term with them (they took me off salary and restructured my pay during my second week with them and started paying me less). Stuff is really chaotic and I'm trying to map my future and have a plan. HALP

Look back at your life and realize that really, an undergraduate degree is completely unnecessarily weak in the "fundamentals" area. A few months of concentrated study can easily catch you up with what you want/ need to know and it seems like you're passionate enough as it is. Think about it; I'm getting my degree in Business Entrepreneurship... there are about 120 units total necessary and maybe 40 of those are actual "entrepreneurship" classes. The same holds true for the rest of the Business concentrations as well (I'm at CSUF... a double accredited university... the best this side of the Mississippi apparently.)

Now if you want to do graduate school for something else, just fucking do it. There is absolutely no reason to put it off or hem-and-haw away from it. It's what you want to do so do it. Find out from alumni/current students what they learned in their first semester of coursework and what they felt were the necessary aforementioned "fundamentals" and get those down pat. Guarantee it won't be anything you can't handle.

TL;DR: JUST DO IT MANG.

Didn't you just get this job? ("I got a job!!!" thread -- June 30)
I think that grad school is fine, but you might want to work for awhile before going back to school. If you don't like this job, look for another and hopefully find a company that will help you pay for your graduate degree.
Sooner or later you're going to need to leave the school environment and function in a work environment. These are two very different worlds.
More school will not necessarily prepare you any better for the work world.
School prepares you for school -- it doesn't prepare you for work.

Thanks for the advice guys. This field is definitely something that I've been interested in doing for some time now. At the point of realization I was already way too burried into my existing degree to turn back -- so I finished it out and looked for a job that could serve as a gateway into a future opportunity with information technology. This job I just quit had that opportunity, but the company was just a mess in a way that was hard from an outsider to see and they didn't respect their employees. I found this out quickly from other employees and when my pay structure got changed in a day, I was out. I wasn't going to subject myself to that treatment. It almost felt like a bait-and-switch operation and was horrible.

I just feel like now would be a great time -- I could consolidate all of my debt and just get it paid off from start to finish and not worry about taking out other loans later, paying back while I'm going to school, and other things like this. I feel that while I go back and get my masters it would also be a great time to seek out internships (something I didn't do in undergrad by being too focused on grades and not enough on employment opportunities), or finding a part time entry-level position somewhere that could orient me towards a full time opportunity once I graduate. This is a pretty ideal situation, but if it pans out this way I'd not only be familiar with the company and the people but I'd know exactly what I'm getting myself into job wise and will be able to know the right people at the right time to ease that transition. I hope that this makes sense.

I'm not going to lie - I am a bit wary towards going into full-time "career" mode with a flip of a switch. I think that's understandably something that any recent college graduate feels, but I don't believe my decision to go back to school is driven by this feeling. I just look back on what concentrations I chose to do in undergraduate and I am just not satisfied. It's unfortunate that I discovered this at a late point in college, but I suppose the good thing is at least I know now. I know it's probably going to be a tough ride from here on out and it's going to take a lot of tactful planning and consideration. I feel though that if this path gets me to the type of job I'm looking for then it'll be worth it. The good thing is I don't care what I have to do job wise to get to that point (except getting screwed over or lied to). If I get paid dirt cheap as an entry-level whatever but it has promising opportunities into an IT career full time, then I'll do it happily. The idea of working for enormous pay in a job I hate scares me to death and I'd much rather focus on a career potential I'd love to do regardless of the income potential. Luckily for me, IT probably pays better anyway.

Anyway, I appreciate the tips. I decided that my life is worth doing this work for. I settled for a lot of things getting to this point but I decided that my career is not going to be one of them.

No experience beats real-world experience, IMO.
Some will disagree, I'm sure. Certainly plenty of companies only hire people with degrees and don't even bother to look at comparable real-world experience. Personally I think those companies are filled with idiots and I would rather not have anything to do with them, anyway.

In my mind the best avenue is to get a job at a company with a lot of paths; sales, marketing, R&D, engineering, customer service, etc. Go into whichever area best suits you now, at whatever level job you can get. Then grow yourself within that company. Start at the bottom if you have to, learning not only your position but how your position interacts with others'. Become a name across departments and you'll get allies, job security, and the capacity to branch out.

I started at the company I'm with when it was small and I had to do equal parts R&D, engineering, and customer service. I started at maybe 40k/year. As the company grew I kept involved with all the different parts. I now have friends in literally all the departments I listed above. When I thought I might leave R&D, two of our other groups tried to grab me up.

No better thing than to be a go-to man and have a name most everyone in the company knows.