Every technology vendor today seems to offer a certification program. Why?
Technology vendors wish to enable businesses to be successful with their products. Especially with the consumption model, happy customers will continue to be ‘sticky’ to a platform and should be less likely to change strategy.
Certifications have historically been a way of providing some validation to a business that their data or processes will be safe when someone is using the vendor technology. Not all certifications are equal, though; they can range from the simple open-book online tests to peer-reviewed person defenses. The complexity of understanding a certification roadmap is sometimes harder than the software service tself.
How does a business understand what is needed?
Software has become much more complex over the years and integrated between lots of layers (application, network, compute, etc). Being a network engineer, or a system admin in a specific technology is not really the current business expectation, also these roles have a ceiling that most technical professionals will eventually reach and want to pivot from (I don’t do <product> anymore).
The result, skills are ultimately lost and hard to replace quickly.
Current certifications, especially within the cloud space attempt to simplify technology as much as possible, focusing on services, SKUs and scenarios. Providers have taken responsibility for a lot of the activities and skills that were historically easier to assess (click this button, order of upgrade etc), and they now attempt to validate the job function such as ‘solution architect’ or ‘developer’.
Is the IT trade, profession or function really that easy? Does studying for a few weeks in a specific technology suddenly make it possible for a person to call themselves a Developer or Solution Architect?
A typical certification will have a blueprint which aims to validate areas of consuming a technology. A group of SMEs will work together to create a bank of questions, which in many cases, are psychometrically measured and baselined to provide some level of comfort or defensibility that the function is being examined sufficiently.
Certifications are often mini projects for a technology vendor, it is not their main business function, in many cases these are contracted out to other specialist content providers, they have a release schedule, a KPI to be successful (i.e. number of exams taken, professionals trained, certifications granted), and a deadline (normally within 6-8 months of a technology release). The quality of the certification assessment is not standarised across vendors. The result is a piece of virtual paper with the vendor’s name and an electronic badge.
Expert-level programs such as the MCA and VCDX, which tried to be different with face-to-face assessments and deep-level validation, have been disbanded by the vendor (Reasons normally suggested are costs, uptake, and company strategy). While these programs had their faults, the intention and overall certifications provided some comfort that an architect awarded had gone through a business and technical-focused peer review process, ultimately showing that they have the knowledge to be safe, sensible, and pragmatic within the relevant vendor’s ecosystem.
Maybe due to defensibility, or release schedule, some certifications are limited to ensure exam question items have a reference from documentation, or even a GUI item. Therefore, the certification is only as good as the documentation associated with it? What is being validated, the technology, the documentation or the ability to design a sollution to a busines problem using a vendor service?
What is the difference between proficiency of using a specific product and a specific job function such as solution architect?
For example, I studied and passed my first AWS solution architect exam years ago in approximately a month by watching a few videos, playing with a test platform I made while on my lunchbreak. Does that really mean I understand all the intricacies of planning a migration of a mission critical application to a service I have only used with test data?
I know, that the first 2-3 cloud migration projects I worked on were complete eye openers for me. I gathered so much information and experience with respect to planning, risk identification, mitigation, and business impact analysis.
In my humble opinion, this knowledge is worth more to any business than any certification, however would I have been able to be in a role/project team to see this take place without having an understanding of the technology measured by the lunchtime coffees and test lab? Would I even had started the journey if the certification wasn’t available (Probably not I like studying certifications).
If I didn’t have the certification blueprint to get me started in such a consumable way, could I upskill as a hobby in my lunchtime? Probably not. Therefore, from a vendor perspective they have helped me and the businesses I will work using the specific technology have been more successful with the technology.
Reviewing the job advertisements on a variety of sites, most advertisements seem to be looking for technology skills and certifications, rather than specific functional skills. Is this the most effective way of hiring?
Personally, I have studied, failed, passed and helped others on a wide range of certifications over the years.
What I have seen is an amazing passion for technology from the professionals who help create these certifications, and the desire from professionals who want to achieve them. Every certification is an achievement, the underlying thought for me is what is the goal?
As a technologist, I care about effective enablement for my personal career journey and to help the projects I work on to succeed. When performing the role of a solution architect, a project is only successful if the business derives value from it, not if the solution works but the business has a real way of taking advantage of it.
What is the answer? How do we promote effective enablement with technology, help others aquire the valuble skills and maintain enthusiasm for the field?
Personally, maintaining relevancy or becoming more relevant with technology is a key component of longevity in technology. Being able to provide business value to projects that are using technology to solve a problem is always going to be valuable to someone.
Additionally, learning something new and integrating it with existing technology is personally interesting. This keeps the passion for technology alive while establishing career avenues to explore.
Ok how?
Review what people recommend I should know;
- Certification blueprints / training courses
- Design Frameworks
- Vendor documentation
- Detailed white papers /
- Success stories with integrating with other technology / business sectors
- Online communities / podcasts / blogs based on experience
Once reviewed material I try to look for opportunities to create test scenarios based on previous business project use cases in labs
Consider how would the new technology help a company I know well.
- Create new logical and physical designs using the labs/free tiers.
- Understand design decisions for options in the designs.
- Risk review the use of the technology without any specific technology bias
- Look for real project learning opportunities,
- Presentation walkthroughs from others in the field
- Shadow others
Developing a portfolio of the technology as I go a long to illustrate how to solve business problems with the new technology to discuss with others in the future;
- Mini design walk throughs
- Design use cases
- Design diagrams
- Risk reviews
- Project plans
- Create Penboard talktracks on the major business value areas
- Success and not so successful stories
- Code snippets and go-to design I can use as a starting point in real projects
This is just my personal method of approach; it helps me stay connected with technology and maintain. relevancy for future roles and while learning being relevant experience and tangible artefacts I can use.