Wanted: Someone who knows how to build, program, and maintain a server; all other things unspecified

I recently had a conversation with a friend who was discussing a vacancy in her office. She made reference to the fact that everyone and his/her dog has applied to this vacancy, and even highlighted one person who had applied with no relevant degrees, experience, or--most important--any pertinent skills, to do the job. (He'd listed on his application something along the lines of the work he does in his own field is so good that he'd be great in this vacant position, too.)

Later on that same day, my dad and I were talking about what a hard time my unemployed lawyer-sibling is having finding a job out in Dallas. My dad jokingly said to me, "I worry about the day you say you'll have to move back in with us because you've been laid off and couldn't find another job." My comforting response to him was that I'm in a field that is similar to that of the undertaker's field--there's always going to need to be someone available to plug that computer in, at minimum.

It got me thinking about my own office and my own job. I run a group of servers for a living; in addition I design digital projects for presentation on the web. What I find hilarious about these exchanges is, most people only half understand what the IT person does. Even more so than the desktop support IT person, the server IT person receives a lot of mixed emotions--some people think that the server manager is being lazy because s/he is not the one to drop off a new keyboard; they often don't realize that the server person is sitting in his/her office with the door closed because s/he's trying to finish bringing something online from the server, or trying to change something that is currently online.

I think it helps my position that I'm also working on a degree in Technical Communication and Rhetoric; I'm a fairly good communicator anyway, and I regularly try to represent what I'm working on to different skill levels. I am also aware that one of the risks of maintaining a company's servers is always going to be criticism for "being lazy," ie. criticism for not regularly talking to people about what I'm doing.

But I don't think anyone can easily look at what I do in my job and say, "I could easily do that because the work I do in my profession is so good." Because, though it makes me a little sad to say this, not very many people even remotely understand what a person who maintains servers actually does.