I had a summer job at a help desk once. Pretty much the only career progression for those guys on the phone were moving up to being the manager of them and stil

I had a summer job at a help desk once. Pretty much the only career progression for those guys on the phone were moving up to being the manager of them and still taking some phone calls when the lines were swamped. After that, there wasn't much else the company would do with you unless you had a bachelors and some certs. Just asking about the manager position would have been a pretty clear sign that its a dead end job. It wasn't a hard job and they all got paid pretty well for help desk but it wasn't that enjoyable for anyone there.