Kevin Apolinario is an IT professional with eight years of IT support and system admin. He created his own YouTube channel, Kevtech IT Support, which has 44,000+ subscribers.
Kevin has also launched Udemy courses that have helped 8,000+ individuals.
Kevin works as a Cyber Mentor for Cyber Mentor Dojo, Information Technology Instructor, and so much more. Find him on LinkedIn.
Here is a summary of key takeaways from the episode:
- Kevin Apolinario is an IT professional with eight years of experience in IT support and system administration. He has a YouTube channel, Kevtech IT Support, with over 44,000 subscribers. He has also launched Udemy courses that have helped over 8,000 individuals. He works as a Cyber Mentor for Cyber Mentor Dojo, an Information Technology Instructor, and more.
- Kevin emphasizes the importance of health and fitness alongside a career in tech. He shares his personal journey of losing weight and maintaining a healthy lifestyle, which includes walking 20,000 steps a day and doing kettlebell training.
- Kevin’s career journey started in the restaurant industry, where he worked for 12 years before transitioning to IT. He also worked for the NYPD for four years. His first job in IT was as a support technician with ASI System Integration, which he attributes to his strong soft skills.
- Kevin believes in the importance of having a plan of action when starting a career in IT. He advises newcomers to first understand the basics of IT before diving into a specific field. He also recommends building a home lab to gain practical experience and showcasing this experience through project work on platforms like GitHub or YouTube.
- Kevin emphasizes the importance of networking and building genuine connections in the IT industry. He suggests reaching out to professionals who are already in the role you aspire to and learning from their experiences.
- Kevin also highlights the importance of certifications in the IT field. He himself has an A+ certification and an Apple Certified Macintosh Technician certification. He suggests that newcomers research the certifications required for their desired role and work towards obtaining them.
- Despite his success in the IT field, Kevin does not have a college degree. His journey demonstrates that it is possible to have a successful career in IT through self-learning, gaining certifications, and leveraging soft skills.
Check out the full transcript from the fourth episode of the TechGuide podcast, featuring an interview with Kevin Apolinario.
Ryan Atkinson: [00:00:00] Kevin, thank you so much for being here. Super excited to have you on. Thank you.
Kevin Apolinario: Hey, I’m happy to be here. Let’s, let’s chop it down and let’s get to that conversation.
It’s gonna be fun today.
Ryan Atkinson: Yes. I’m super excited. And before we do that, we gotta ask a kickoff question because your Twitter bio has health, fitness, and tech. Those three in a line, what type of exercise do you do to like de-stress from the day it was a long day? How do you de-stress with any sort of exercise or anything health wise?
Kevin Apolinario: So that’s a, that’s a very good question. I, I was, so my backstory, if you were to look me up online some of my old pictures, I used to be almost 200 pounds. Wow. And I dropped from a, a size. 40 pence to a size 32. Wow. And the secret to that success at the end of the day, it goes back to your diet, goes back to being consistent.
So I have this daily habit of mine that I actually do and you’re gonna look at me like I’m crazy, but I actually do 20,000 steps a day. So I literally walk 20,000 steps a day. I do about close to 10 miles a day, and I also do some kettlebell training. And, uh, yeah, that’s pretty much my routine. I, I do 10 miles of walking and I obviously not in one shot, but like throughout the whole day.
And then I, I do kettlebell training, so I, I’m more about fitness because. What happens is when you go into it or you break into it, or you get a job in it, a lot of these jobs, they’re not really like your typical, like running around, moving around . Typically you’re in the office like eight to five or you’re somewhere, um, in your, in your house just sitting down all day and it’s not healthy.
Yeah. Our body’s not designed to be sitting down the whole time, so it’s very important that you take the time to take care of yourself because I don’t know, like I don’t know you, but for me personally, For me, like health is more important than anything else then yeah, obviously you could do all the other stuff.
Like you can’t take care of anyone, especially if you have family, especially if you know people and you have friends. You can’t really do much if your health is all messed up. So it’s very important that you take care of yourself.
Ryan Atkinson: Yeah, and even the [00:02:00] mental, uh, benefits of like going for walks, it is very like stimulating your mind is less, way more active when you’re done.
So I applaud you for doing that cuz that is actually like phenomenal. Mm-hmm. . to set the stage for your career. Let’s go back to like the 2008, 2009, 2000 timeframe. Can you give us a little bit of like, insight, like what is Kevin doing at this time?
Kevin Apolinario: So, I, I, I’ve been working my backwards it’s, it’s crazy because, yeah, I’ve been, I’ve been working since, since I was nine years old.
So my background is insane. I’ve been working since I was nine years old. 2004 I was working at a Pia. This was a long time ago. Yeah. I worked in a picture as a delivery boy, uh, and, and I worked restaurant for, I did like 12 years of a restaurant experience. I worked 12 years of restaurant experience before I got into it, and, um, I used all my soft skills and I transferred over to it after that.
So that’s, that’s literally how I got my first job in it was because of soft skills. And I also did about four years in Y P D, so I did work for the Y P D for roughly four years. So I did, I do. . So I say my background’s a little weird because I do have 12 years of restaurant experience. And then I also did like the N Y P D as well.
And then now, now I work in it. And yeah, so to answer your question, like from 2004, 2008, I was working restaurant. And then, uh, 2014, like going fast forward, I got into it after that. And um, the reason I got hired was because of my soft skills. At the end of the day, I got hired because of my personality. I didn’t get hired because, I knew what memory was.
I knew what rim was. I, I don’t know, like hard drives. You know, certain technical jargon, like literally the, the hiring manager just hired me because of my personality. Nothing to do with what, nothing to do with my technical skills.
Ryan Atkinson: That’s really interesting. So yeah, so you have this great experience in the restaurant.
You work with N Y P D. Then July, 2014 comes around and you get a job as an IT support technician with asi system integration. And you contribute that to just having great personal, like a great personality and like great [00:04:00] soft skills to land. This your first job.
Kevin Apolinario: Yes, that’s, that’s correct. Cause I, so I, I went to, if we go back in time again, I went to that, I went to a school and I studied my first certification.
So at that day, at that, at that time, yeah, I, I literally was being asked like I, I literally was stuck. I was stuck at my, like, I didn’t know what to do. I worked in a restaurant. I wanted to try something different. So she literally was like, okay, how, what do I do next? And I, and everyone, everyone online is literally like asking me, oh, go get the A plus.
Go get the a plus. And I’m. I don’t even know what that is. That sounds like a grade, like you mean like eight plus, like the, like your grade or ? They’re like, no, the comp tier certification. So I was a huge gamer back then, so I was into Counterstrike, Counterstrike Source or Counterstrike 1.4, um, Counterstrike Source and Steam and all these video games, like back in the day talking about back in the.
Team Fortress. Team Fortress too, like all the old games. They go like, James Bond, golden. I, in town 64, so I, I was really a gamer. So then I had friends that played video games just like me, but they were a lot older than me. Most of them were military veterans. So I, I used to have, like, I know, I know not, I know I wasn’t 21 at the time, but I was having a beer with my, with my veteran buddies, and they all recommended me like the a plus.
So I’m like, okay, let me go look at the a plus. And I went to a school after that and I studied the a plus, and my, my teacher really liked me because like, I literally took the time to actually like fix and repair computers for the school. Interesting. He actually asked asi, the manager of ASI to actually come in and interview me.
So as a favor, he like, okay, I’m gonna interview Kevin because you got recommended by your or your teacher. That’s a high recommendation because he, that means you have talent or you know something, or you know how to do something or you’re worth. the time to actually come in and mm-hmm. , his interview questions were, were all non-technical, all personality questions, like, what would you do if you had, what would you do if a customer was upset?
How would you handle the situation? What would you do if you have a team member you don’t get along with? Or, um, how would you learn how [00:06:00] to troubleshoot this issues? You’ll know how to fix it. And, and literally all the questions were non-tech related. And towards the interview, I literally told him, You could teach the IT stuff, but you cannot teach the soft skills.
You don’t have it or don’t have it, or you learn it over time. So with me, it’s like, I have restaurant experience, so a customer could throw a fit at me. Like I’m so used to people throwing credit cards at me in a restaurant that it’s like nothing for me If I were to go and do this field technician work, and he just laughed at me and he is like, okay, I’ll give you a chance.
We’re gonna, we’re gonna, we’re gonna work together. Well, and he hired him and he gave me a chance after that. So I, I worked for the doe, department of Education and literally I was just, um, It’s a long story. Yeah. But literally I was traveling across different boroughs of the, of, of, of New York, and I was a field technician, so like I would go to sometimes Manhattan, sometimes the Bronx.
Interesting. Sometimes like the, the other side of Long Island. So like I had to be up like at five or six in the morning. Oh. Um, as a field technician because I had to be there a certain time. And yeah, that was my first job. So hopefully that answers your question.
Ryan Atkinson: Yeah, absolutely. So it sounds like, yeah, you were getting the certification, but like at the end of the day, it just was your people skills and having this person take a chance on you.
And you mentioned they didn’t ask you like one technical question even though you’re getting this certificate. It was just like, take a bet on me because I can talk .
Kevin Apolinario: Yeah. So that they, they, they asked me like, what did I know about computers? And like, if you’re in this school, you should know something cuz you’re at a school with the teacher.
So I was like, I’m not gonna ask you technical questions because I, I, if he recommended you, you probably at least know something about computers. So, . Yeah.
Ryan Atkinson: Yeah. And so let’s, so you land this role, you’re with ASI now. I mean, take us through that time. Was it like, was it like scary? It’s like, oh my God, this is my first time, like now working like the indu, like in the restaurant industry, but like, I’m actually like working like it support now.
Kevin Apolinario: Yeah. So I, I was, I was a little afraid because I was scared because for me, one, I didn’t know about computers, I didn’t know about. Memory hardware. Um, yeah, hard drives, motherboards. It’s just like, I’m completely clueless. It’s like, I don’t know what this is or that is. So [00:08:00] that’s why when I, when I got the a plus that really com a plus, which that really helped me out because like I understand hardware after that and, and I’m talking specifically based on me because yeah.
I don’t have a IT background, so I don’t, I’m not like everyone else. And there’s some people that go get a computer science degree. Mm-hmm. . There’s some people that, actually I don’t have a college degree if you guys don’t know that, but I don’t have a college degree, so I’m a little different from everyone else.
I just have a certification. Yeah. That’s it. And some people go like the traditional route and they go and do a bootcamp like W G U, right? It really depends on the person, but me, I didn’t know about it stuff. That first job, like I was a little, I was scared as hell because it’s like, I might not, I might get fired because I don’t know how to do this job.
Because obviously if you’re brand new and you, you’re not, you’re not doing your job correctly. You may not, you know, you may not stay there for a long time. So the good thing with me is that I had a very good trainer in that company and that job. So, He taught me everything. This is, there’s, so it’s a long story, but, and I’ll get straight to the point, uh, with the story.
But in the school, there, there, the schools I worked at, before I got into the schools, I did actual technical training. Mm-hmm. . So the company themselves sent me to, to Manhattan, cuz this is based in, I’m based in New York, send me to Manhattan. Yeah. And It is really cool because like I had this super duper smart guy, like he’s German.
He’s a German guy. He’s like, yeah. In his mid sixties. Right. And, um, he’s showing me everything. Hardware, parts, computer parts, laptops, PCs. Exactly. He was showing me how to, how to break down a printer. Like we were literally, like, I had like a printer in front of me. And we will literally break down the printer to the point that all the parts are separated.
And then we put it back and then we do a, a test page to see if it actually works. It’s supposed to print out again with the same result after you put it, put it back and take it apart, you know? So I did that with him and he, he was so like, he was so smart. Uh, they wouldn’t even, they wouldn’t even like repair it.
He would Sutter the living hell out of the park. So, like, for example, like there’s a computer that’s messed up, he’ll utter. Yeah. He wouldn’t even like replace it or throw it out every, he had pieces everywhere. Like there was like [00:10:00] motherboards. That’s rapid cars, hard drives everything. And I’m over here like astounded by it because like, wow, this is very interesting.
I didn’t ever seen this before. And yeah, he was my first, he was my real, real first trainer besides my teacher. And, um, that man like. Super smart guy. Um, I was there for about a month, two months of training. Danny, he is like, okay, I think Kevin’s good to go. Let’s go, let’s go. Have him go over the field and shadow some techs.
And I did, and I shadowed some techs and then they trusted me and then they like, let me do my own thing. And I just, after that, I just became known as the IT guy for, for the department education. That’s, and, um, being in the school, I being in the asi, they gave me the chance to get my AC M T certification, which is the Apple certified.
Macintosh technician certification. Cause you cannot, so if you guys don’t know, like if you have a plus or you have like, you have certain certifications you have to have because there are contracts with vendors and doe mm-hmm. . So if you don’t have a plus, you cannot work there. If you don’t have network plus you cannot work there.
You don’t have security plus you cannot work there. So it really depends on the company, depends on the certification. You have these different vendors, they ask for specific certifications because they need to have. Otherwise they, they get in trouble. So you gotta have that certification. So for me, I had to have the a plus and I had to have the Apple certification because I was fixing Apple products.
So I did, I did that, I did laptops, I did Google Chromebooks. I dealt with printers, I dealt with MacBook Errors, MacBook Pros, like back in the day, back a long time ago. And yeah, yeah, it was good. I had, I had really learned a lot. Um, That was my first job. It was just like swimming of knowledge, just learning stuff.
It was very interesting.
Ryan Atkinson: So, yeah. So I’ve, I’ve been hearing you’ve been like, so you’ve been got like your certification, you got it more certifications. Is that the route, like you would recommend someone to take that says like, Hey, I wanna break into it, but I don’t have the experience. Where should I start?
Kevin Apolinario: Yeah. So that, that question’s hard for me to answer because like, if you’re brand new to it, like first I would [00:12:00] like you like on you to create a create a plan of action. So create a, a pattern of action for yourself because mm-hmm. A lot of people, what they do is they, they, they immediately go and, and they do, they start chasing.
So they start, they start chasing a bunch of search. You can’t do that. It doesn’t work that way. Yeah. So it’s very important that you create a plan of action. That’s number one. Number two is, okay, I know the plan, the plan of action is created now, right. Number two is, uh, what field do I wanna work on? When you say, I wanna be it, it’s like saying, I wanna be a doctor.
What kind of doctor? Right? So it’s like, it is so big. So it’s like, what do you wanna do in it? So it’s extremely important that. You pick something that you wanna do and then go based on that. Once you go and pick that specific rower or job or whatever you wanna do, that’s where you do the research again, and you figure out what certifications you need to know for that job.
So, okay, uh, this job’s asking for security, plus I’m, I’m applying for a SOC analyst role. Okay? Yeah. What skills do I need to know? Now comes the skills part of it, like actual skills for the job that, to the, that way you could prove to the hiring manager that you know to do the job, right? Yep. Okay. I have to pick out these skills, right?
Sock analyst, these skills. All right. Next thing I would do, if it was me, is just specifically talking to me, like I’m talking, talking about what I would do is my plan of action. Now I know I wanna be a sock analyst, I gotta have security, plus I gotta know these skills. Next thing I would do is I’ll, I’ll do my, my, um, I’ll do a LinkedIn hack, which basically what that means is I’ll go on LinkedIn and I’ll go and reach out to someone that already has the job that I want.
So like, okay, this person. Is he has a sock analyst role. Let me, let me try to build a relationship with this person to see how they got that job. Okay? I build a relationship with them. Let me take them out for a zoom and, and a virtual coffee, and we’ll have some coffee and talk and talk. Okay, that’s money.
So what certification did you get to get this job? And he told me more information about that. Okay, now I have everything I need, I need to know to actually go and land for that job. But besides all that, like, besides the plan of action, all that, like the first thing. , uh, I gave you all the, I gave you all the tricks now, but before that, taking a [00:14:00] step back all the way towards the beginning.
Yeah, yeah. Which is very important is learn fundamentals. So the fundamentals is very important. Like I, I know you wanna do all these IT jobs, like so many IT jobs out there, but. It’s important. Is it very important that you know the basics first before you dive into something? Because then you don’t know.
You don’t know what the hell you’re doing. It’s just how it is. Yeah. So fundamentals is very important. So you may wanna, you may need to look at the a plus. You may not need to look at the place like a plus. It could be a, a specific certification that that way you’re well rounded because then I don’t want you getting lost.
So then, You go get a security job and they ask you, okay, I need you to go and open up, um, Splunk and open up the console. And you look and they look at you and you look at them and you look at them like they have three heads. Like, what are you talking about? How it is, right? So fundamentals is very important.
Then after that, you could do everything I just said. Build a plan of action. Focus on what job you need. Focus on the job you wanna get. Yeah. Focus on the skills you wanna get, and then also to connect with someone that already has the job that you want. So hopefully that that answers your question.
Ryan Atkinson: Yeah, it does. But like, how do you build those fundamentals where it’s like, oh my God, like I don’t have any IT experience for me. I’ll, I’ll take me an example. Let’s say I wanna get an it. I don’t know anything about hardware. Literally, I’m so clueless when it comes to hardware. How do I learn these fundamentals?
Kevin Apolinario: Yeah. So that, that goes back to building a home lab. So like you could literally build a home lab from scratch. So if you’re brand new to it, and I, I’ve been asked this question a lot on, on like through LinkedIn all the time at AGA, think like, I have no job experience. How am I supposed to show job experience?
Right? Yeah. So it goes back to project work. So we have something called project work. So what, what does that mean? Uh, build a home lab. So set up, set up if you’re doing help desks about it, support what I, what I teach students on. Learn about active directory. So go ahead and, and spin up a, a vm, a virtual box and install virtual box and set up server 2019 and then in install active directory.
Okay. I don’t have active directory install. All right, now I wanna, I want to in implement it, support, how do you implement it? Support. I’m gonna set up another VM with Windows 10, [00:16:00] and I’m gonna join it to the domain. So now it’s in that domain. Now that server 2019 is talking to Windows 10, now they’re talking to each other, right?
Okay, now let’s recreate a, a real life scenario. You start, you start unlocking the account, resetting the account, doing a bunch of stuff on, on the user account while they’re logged in. You implement group policy and stuff like that. Okay? Now I know how to do these skills. You and add, I’m gonna add it to the resume and I’m gonna start applying for jobs.
And now I’ll give you another alternative. Okay. I have, my computer sucks. My computer’s horrible. I can’t do anything on this computer is so bad. Okay? Do it on the cloud. So if you go online, you go on Azure. You could do it on Azure for free, you could do it on AWS for free. You could do it on GCP for free.
So there, yeah, there are so many resources out there. , you could actually implement something from scratch and learn it and then add it as project work and put it on your resume. And some people do it through a website, so like they have a, a, a whole website with projects that they have done. And then you have other people that use GitHub and you have other people that actually, they actually create a YouTube video and they actually link it to their resume and then they give it to the hiring manager.
So it really depends on the person, but there are so many ways to showcase your.
Ryan Atkinson: Yeah. Is there one that’s like, do you, would you recommend doing more if it’s through GitHub, YouTube, or is it just put putting it out there and being able to link to it, is
Kevin Apolinario: there, put it, put it, put it, putting it out there and get it?
Because cuz the thing is with, with it is that nobody knows what you know, so at the end of the day, you have to show what you know. So if you have. . If you’re nameless, like I, I know like cyber, cyber security is like, we like cyber security. We, we try to be like, we try to hide, right? And not get ourselves known, right?
But in it land, like specifically it land you people should know who you are, especially if you’re on LinkedIn, right? If you’re on LinkedIn, you’re branding yourself. People should know who you are. So then the hiring manager looks for you instead of you looking for. You should be able to bypass the ATS system if they know who you are and they know what kind of content you have or what kind of project work you’re working on.
So you could literally bypass the hiring manager and job [00:18:00] recruiters and everyone else if you actually have a good LinkedIn branding as it goes back to that. So if they find they could easily just find you online, okay, this person, I’m gonna hire this person because they know how to do the job. , they know how to do these things based on the videos that they created or based on the project work that they did.
I’m gonna give this person a chance, or I’m gonna send them an email, give them a job that I wanna hire for and wanna hire this person. So it really goes back to, to who you are. And, um, if people could find you online, it just really goes back to that cuz they, if nobody knows who you are, you know it’s gonna be hard for them to find you or give you a job.
It’s how it is. So, yeah. Can
Ryan Atkinson: you take us through the mix of like building a good personal brand for someone that wants to be in it? Is it push pressing publish on like all your content, but it’s also connecting with recruiters or what is like a good personal brand in it? Like really
Kevin Apolinario: look like per so like if you’re, if you’re doing like, branding on LinkedIn, it, like I said, it goes back to building genuine connections.
Don’t, don’t just add someone because you feel like it . That’s very important. The other, the other important thing is, Create a connection with someone, like whether it’s it, it’s this is, this is how, this is how, how my LinkedIn has grown so much because, uh, I literally take the time to respond to people in the comments section.
So sometimes you don’t even gotta make a post, you could just respond to people that are asking for help. So literally, I, I spent the time and I help people online. Like I see someone making posts about. I need access. I need to know how, how to get free resources for Compt A plus. I’m like, oh, go look at Mike Myers.
Look at Professor Messer. Look at Jason Delan. They all have content on the a plus. Or could someone ask me some? Can someone help me with this? Like I have, like I have this home lab I’m trying to set up and I can’t find the i s O for server 2019. I go on Google. All right, Google iso, sorry, 2019. Reply to him.
Here you go. Here’s the iso. So like if you literally take the time and just reply to people, People will see that genuinely that you’re helping them. They’re like, okay, this person’s trying to help us. And you, if you do, if you spend your time doing that commenting and also. [00:20:00] Posting stuff that helps other people.
Like literally if you go online and you you, you see like a special on, on, on you, Demi, right? Yeah. Like this training is free and it’s free right now for the next, for the next three days, I will literally copy and paste that and put on the LinkedIn, okay, this person’s, this person is free training right now.
That’s sweet. It’s free. It’s free for three days. You guys wanna take advantage of this? Go take advantage of it. Like I’ll post it on LinkedIn. Like, that’s another thing you could do. And also another thing you could do, which is really cool that I’m gonna share right now here too, is. if you spend, if you spend two hours on a dumb issue Yeah, like a lab or whatever, you spend two hours write about that.
So that way if the other people go on your, on your LinkedIn post, they see it. Then they avoid the two hours that, that you spend on that issue. So then they don’t have to spend two hours on the issue. They know exactly how to fix it now. So then if they go do it, it only takes ’em five minutes. Right? You can, so anything, anything useful that you post online is gonna help somebody.
You just gotta, you just, just post it and see what happens. And it does not have to be tech related at all. It could be health related or exercise or whatever. Yeah. .
Ryan Atkinson: That’s amazing. Um, I love like your mission statement. That’s like on your Twitter. I don’t know if it’s your mission statement. It’s your mission statement.
I’m gonna call it on your Twitter and like your website. It’s, I help people build a career. , I help people build a career path in it because no one helped me when I first started. And I think that’s really cool because now you built a YouTube channel with like over 44,000 subscribers. You’re a killer on LinkedIn.
People know you as the IT help guy. Like people just know you as that. And it goes back to like building that content, building that personal brand. So take me to the YouTube channel. Take us why this started and how it’s evolved over time.
Kevin Apolinario: Yeah, my, my, my YouTube channel was a long story, but I created my YouTube channel because, and like, I, like, like I wrote on my header is, um, I asked for help.
Like, I literally asked for help. Nobody would help me. It’s just, wow. That’s just how it was for me back then. So like, nobody would help me. So it’s just like I. . I have like, I have like, like it, [00:22:00] it veteran horror stories because I’ve been in it for over eight years. So I have like, I got like, I have like stories.
I have a lot of stories in it. Yeah. Um, and then one of them that I, before I even go on YouTube and talk about YouTube, why don’t you start say something straight up that’s not to say anything bad, but like sometimes in it land, like, you have to figure out how to find the answer yourself because.
Uh, specifically talking about my personal experience, not anyone else’s experience. I don’t know how, how, how it’s worked for anyone else, but I’ve been in scenarios and jobs that I asked for help and nobody would help me. So you have to figure out how to find the answer your yourself. You have to figure out how to use Google and you have to figure out how to swim because otherwise you, you will sink right in the water.
Right. So like my personal jobs, like jobs I had before in the past, nobody wouldn’t help me at all. So then I, it was either sink or swim. Wow. So, I mean, some jobs, they will not help you. If you go and ask for help, they will not help you. And I’m going based on me. But I’m also going based on the, on the 1000 students I have trained, I have trained over a thousand students.
Um, and I’m talking about, because I do, I’m a trainer, right? So, that’s very important. Having strong analytical thinking and having the, the ability to Google the answer and having the willingness to find the answer, that’s very important. So going back to YouTube now, , I’m going back to YouTube, is happen to me.
I’m just gonna give you, like, I’m gonna drop gems here. This is happened to me. So, YouTube, uh, was created because I couldn’t find people giving me, like the right answer. So like, people were giving me wrong answers and it’s, and I, and you go to Reddit. Reddit is a rabbit hole of information. So when I went to Reddit, when I was back in the days I went to Reddit, it’s very toxic, very bad information.
Yeah. And just like, you know what, I’m just gonna make a, I’m, I, I literally like, did like the Avengers, I grabbed the, the. The, the glove from Donald’s. I’m like, you know, I’m just gonna, I’m just gonna do it myself because it’s getting extremely annoying. Right? So I literally just created a YouTube channel.
I’m like, let me just, let me just share my story and share it with what I know. Yeah. And share what, how, how has it affecting me? And I’m gonna share everything I know about it. And I share it for free on YouTube like, You won’t [00:24:00] find anyone, you will not find another YouTube channel that shares their personal information.
Yeah. But also shares what they learned in their job. Like I’m the only person that does that. There are people that don’t do that. Like interesting. You’ll have people in it, and this is another gem right here. You’ll have people in it that they hide information from you and the reason why they hide information for you is they’re scared that you’re gonna take away their job.
So, interesting. That’s another thing in talking about like, cause I’ve been in it for a very long time, so my mind is a little different because I’ve been in it for a long time. , I’m sharing my information because I have worked in environments where when you’re the person that knows a lot, people get scared of you because they think you’re gonna take away, you’re gonna take away their job.
It’s just, it’s just how it’s so, it’s just my job, brother Jam right there. But that’s why I started my YouTube channel because I had people that gave me bad information. I wanted to share my story, and I wanna help other people break into, at the end of the day, it goes back to, it goes back 360. Um, I wanna help other people because, I’m, I’m good.
I’m good. Where I am in it. Like I figure we give it back. Right. Why don’t you pay, pay it forward. Right. So like, that’s why I started my YouTube channel. So interest.
Ryan Atkinson: Interesting. So let’s just say someone lands on your YouTube channel. They’re like, okay, like I’m in it. Like, what can they expect to like find in there?
It’s basically a free promo here, but what can they expect? Like find, like in your YouTube channel, uh, once they do land on it?
Kevin Apolinario: Yeah. Yeah. So I, I, I do cover, um, office 365 active directory. Two, five gentrification. I, I, I recently started making cybersecurity content. It’s extremely random. . Yeah, . I do cover resume writing as well, like how to, how to create a it resume.
Mm-hmm. And I have about 33 in 33 videos on Java interviews. Like what questions you may be asked if you go for an interview. Uh, an actual like job interview questions. And I also have videos on me interviewing other YouTube channels, like big YouTube channels, small YouTube channels. YouTube channels.
Um, one of them, if you guys don’t know, I, I interviewed I interviewed John Hammond from Cyber Security. I’m not sure if you guys know who John Hammond is. Mm-hmm.[00:26:00] , I interviewed Mike Myers, the, the book writer of the C plus. So sweet. You’ll find a little bit of information there. Just. It’s a wealth of information, of interviews, interviews with text, uh, resume writing skills.
You need to know if you’re trying to break into it. Yep. It support stuff like that. So that’s, that’s just what it is. So,
Ryan Atkinson: yeah. And so you have like this resource here and I’m just curious of like the community you’ve built and like the feedback you’ve received. I mean, what are some of like the comments that people like give to you?
It says like, oh my God, like this is a great resource. Like this is exactly what we needed. Or like, what’s like some of the feedback they give to you, cuz it sounds like you’re really like a pioneer in like the IT world cuz this was not. happening beforehand.
Kevin Apolinario: Yeah. Yeah. So I, you, you, you’ll go, you have your ups and downs, so you do have, sometimes you’ll get negative comments like, oh, this, you’re going too fast.
Like some, like, so when I first started my videos, when I was brand new to, to creating YouTube videos mm-hmm. , um, and I don’t blame them. It’s, it’s not their fault, it’s my fault, . Because I, like, I, I drink too much coffee. So like I have the tendency of teaching too fast. So like, over the years I have like, slowed down my videos a little bit because.
I go way too fast and on the video, like, wait, he’s like, he, he was here now he’s over here like, like, like in one minute. This doesn’t make any sense. Can you slow down please? So that was like some criticism. I, I get and I, I get criticism like, not a lot, but I do get criticism and I, I read the comments, like I read the comments section.
It’s not like I don’t ignore the comments section. So, That’s some of it. And the other half of it I see the majority of it is like, wow, this is, wow, this is free. Boy. Yeah. , this is free. I’m confused. That’s, and they ask, this doesn’t make any sense. This is free. And I had people that I met, like in the comment section that I, I, I personally met in person, like I’m talking about like, oh, that’s cool.
I went to another state and they know who I am. Or I, I, I went to, to like, I’m from New York, I went to Manhattan. The guy knows who I am. Like, I literally like, . I went to a restaurant and they didn’t let me pay anything. Like, I literally stepped into the restaurant and I sat down. [00:28:00] He’s like, is that, is that the guy from YouTube?
He’s like, yeah, that’s from, from YouTube. He’s like, oh, what, what is he doing here? And then, and they, uh, they, they didn’t let me pay anything. Literally. I just hang out and just talk to people. So, yeah.
Ryan Atkinson: That’s amazing. And I wanna hit on like one little tidbit here. Before you wrap up, uh, I’m curious, like, so if someone goes into a job interview, they’re in it, they’re wanting to break into it, like what?
What should they bring to the table? What, how do they stand out in like their first interview within
Kevin Apolinario: it? Yeah. For, for I, for it, like I always say, look at the job description. Mm-hmm. , because they may ask you questions on the job description. That’s number one. Number two is whatever you have on the resume is fair game, so make sure you don’t lie on the resume.
So if, if, if he says the resume says active directory, right on it. And you know nothing about active director, you start asking questions about that, you’re gonna get destroyed. Just letting you know right now, . So don’t lie on the resume. Make sure you, whatever you put on the resume is fair game. That’s very important.
If the job description is very important too, that’s one. And two. Number number three is your personality. Like just show the hiring manager that you’re willing to learn. Um, , you’re a good, you’re a good team player. Yeah. Um, I, I interviewed myself and I’ll, I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you my story. I interviewed 2020 managers and directors last year.
Wow. So I interviewed a bunch of managers and directors last year, and they all gave me the same answer. Like, I literally, they all gave me the same answer and the, the same manager was a personality part of it. Like they told me I could teach you the technical stuff, but like, if at the, at the end of the day you’re in a, you’re, you’re gonna be working with my team and.
if I, I have to see your personality. Like if you working eight to five and if you’re a douchebag and you’re eight to five working with me, I don’t want you on my team at all. So it goes back to your personality, like, can I work with this person eight to five or am I gonna strangle them? So this is very
That’s awesome. It’s very important, like make sure you have a good personality because nobody likes working with a. Nobody likes working with a know-it-all, and everyone likes to work with someone as a team player. It goes back to personality. [00:30:00] Um, that’s, that’s my tidbit for that. But also my, my final tidbit.
My final, final tidbit. Yeah. Before we wrap it up. For someone that’s brand new, specifically someone that’s brand new, like all the people that I train, like my, the students I train, the first thing I teach you about is mindset. , the mindset is very important because when you’re brand new to it and you have no job experience, you’re gonna get rejected a lot because you have no experience at all.
So if you cannot, if you cannot handle rejection in it, It’s probably not for you, just just straight up, because you’re gonna get rejected a lot when you’re brand. You’re gonna get, you’re gonna get these job postings and stuff like that. You’re gonna say we, I’m sorry we didn’t, we didn’t get you, we, we went with another candidate.
Or, I’m sorry, we’ll move on with someone else or whatever. You, you gotta have the strong mindset. For it. You got it. Specifically it, you will get rejected a lot, but I promise you that first job you get will open the door for you and then you’ll move up from there. That’s it. That’s, that’s what it is. But it goes back to your mindset.
Your mindset is very important. So hopefully that answers your question.
Ryan Atkinson: Yes, absolutely. And that will wrap us up. Kevin, you were awesome. Thank you so, so much for joining us. We got a lot of good gems in here, a lot of good questions in, so I wanna thank you so much for coming on.
Kevin Apolinario: Thank, thank you for having me.
I appreciate it.