How To Become A Lead Support Engineer: What It Is and Career Path

What is a lead support engineer and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

3 min read

Quoted expert

Dr. Ariful Azad Ph.D.

The average lead support engineer salary is $112,919. The most common degree is a bachelor's degree degree with an computer science major. It usually takes 1-2 years of experience to become a lead support engineer. Lead support engineers with a Network 5 Certification certification earn more money. Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 10% and produce 83,100 job opportunities across the U.S.

What general advice would you give to a lead support engineer?

Dr. Ariful Azad Ph.D.

Director of Graduate Studies for the Dept. of Intelligent Systems Engineering, Assistant Professor of Intelligent Systems Engineering, Indiana University Bloomington

Look for a job that you would enjoy doing, even if it takes some time to find such a position. Internships are great to explore various options.

ScoreLead Support EngineerUS Average

Salary

7.9

Avg. Salary $112,919

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

6.7

Growth rate 10%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

6.0

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.41%

Asian 14.81%

Black or African American 9.92%

Hispanic or Latino 14.79%

Unknown 5.28%

White 54.79%

Gender

female 11.78%

male 88.22%

Age - 41

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 41

Stress level

6.7

Stress level is high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

6.5

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

7.4

Work life balance is good

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a lead support engineer

Explore lead support engineer education requirements

Most common lead support engineer degrees

Bachelor's

67.0 %

Associate

13.3 %

Master's

13.0 %

Start to develop specific lead support engineer skills

Skills	Percentages
Technical Support	10.21%
Troubleshoot	9.15%
Java	8.05%
Lead Support	6.57%
Linux	4.63%

Complete relevant lead support engineer training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 3-6 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New lead support engineers learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a lead support engineer based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real lead support engineer resumes.

Research lead support engineer duties and responsibilities

Manage the setup of virtual thin clients on the SIPR network using VMware and script templates.
Manage local and remote resources to facilitate accomplishment of team goals and minimize total SLA violation.
Perform database queries to gather metric information, troubleshoot database issues, review SQL logs and manage database sizes as required.
Lead technical operations for an innovative workforce virtualization movement, including initial design and improvement of technical systems and processes.

Get lead support engineer experience

Generally, it takes 1-2 years to become a lead support engineer. The most common roles before becoming a lead support engineer include systems administrator, technical support specialist team lead and field service technician.

Prepare your lead support engineer resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your lead support engineer resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a lead support engineer resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable lead support engineer resume templates

Build a professional lead support engineer resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your lead support engineer resume.

Apply for lead support engineer jobs

Now it's time to start searching for a lead support engineer job. Consider the tips below for a successful job search:

Browse job boards for relevant postings
Consult your professional network
Reach out to companies you're interested in working for directly
Watch out for job scams

How did you land your first lead support engineer job

John Castaneda

Lead Support Engineer

I began my career in sales at a T-Mobile store, equipped with an Associates Degree in Electronics and a modest grasp of technology. However, when my daughter was born, I made the decision to leave my sales job to care for her.

For the next year and a half, I diligently searched for employment until I stumbled upon a posting from MadCap Software for a Technical Support Analyst role. Through a series of email screenings and interviews, I was grateful to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ that I was able to navigate successfully, ultimately receiving the exciting news of my hire from the CFO herself.

Transitioning from sales to technical support at MadCap proved to be a significant shift in my day-to-day responsibilities. Surrounded by a supportive team, we tackled challenges together, utilizing daily stand-ups to address our most complex cases.

My time at MadCap taught me invaluable lessons in teamwork and support. Recognizing the importance of lifting others while managing my own workload became evident. A year into my tenure, I earned a promotion to Level 2 Technical Support Analyst.

In this new role, I honed my leadership skills, fostering collaboration across departments and mastering the art of troubleshooting in diverse settings. Learning to communicate effectively with users, extracting necessary information without assigning blame, was a pivotal aspect of my growth.

Continuing to evolve professionally, I was honored with another promotion to Lead Support Engineer after eighteen months. Throughout my journey, I credit my successes to the unwavering strength provided by my faith in Jesus Christ, encapsulated in the words of Philippians 4:13: "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me."

How do lead support engineers rate their job?

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Lead support engineer reviews

A zippia user wrote a review on Jun 2020

Pros

I work hard do my job good worker when i work i want the best out of my job starring with each other stand on the work

Cons

Nothing not doing my job