InformationWeek.com

Welcome Guest. | Log In| Register | Membership Benefits

January 11, 1999

Experience Counts, But Don't Forget Certification

Microsoft offers many certifications, and employers often look for them

By Stuart J. Johnston

our company is moving to Windows NT on the server and desktop, and you need to hire a network engineer who can handle installation and support--without a lot of guidance from you. Can you rely on someone with several years of practical experience alone, or should you hold out for a candidate who is also Microsoft certified?

The unanimous answer from IT managers: Do your best to get both.

"If they've got their Microsoft certification and five or six years' experience, it shows me that most of the time they can think through a problem," says Howard Jones, CIO at Snapper Inc., the McDonough, Ga., manufacturer of power mowers and lawn tractors. Snapper uses Microsoft's NT Server, Exchange Server, SNA Server, and SQL Server to build enterprise applications that link to the company's IBM AS/400s.

"Most of the time, if the person's got Microsoft certification, he has a broader depth of knowledge, has dealt with a lot more situations, and has more troubleshooting capabilities," Jones says.

Because the testing is designed to provide a broad knowledge base, Jones adds, a certified candidate will be more likely to be able to deal with a variety of problems. On the other hand, a person with several years of experience might have focused only on a narrow area during that time. The certified and experienced worker is therefore more flexible--and more valuable to an IT organization.

"Microsoft is setting standards of what is necessary to support their technologies, and that helps IT managers get some measure of value in [workers'] capabilities," says Tom Sweeny, principal analyst for software integration and support services at Dataquest.

Skill Seekers
With the growing complexity of IT environments, it becomes more incumbent on managers to make sure their workers have the skills and knowledge necessary to handle everything from routine problems to potentially catastrophic situations. System engineers, developers, technicians, help-desk personnel, and other troubleshooters all need to know the inner workings of users' products in an increasingly Microsoft-dominated world.

Richard Entrup

"Microsoft systems are so complex today that, in order to effectively install and maintain them, it requires a great deal of training as well as experience," says Bob Quick, director of internal IT at Government Computer Sales Inc., a computer reseller and systems integrator in Issaquah, Wash. "The training and testing are so thorough, you're confident that [certified workers] have that span of knowledge. Their abilities magnify tenfold."

And while Microsoft came late to the game with training and certification programs compared with competitors such as Novell, IT managers say that, at least in recent years, its testing has become more rigorous than most.

"I think Microsoft's tests are a little bit tougher," says Richard Entrup, IS director at Wilson, Elser, Moskowitz, Edelman & Dicker, a New York law firm with offices in 12 states and four European countries. The 900-person firm is switching to Windows NT from Novell's NetWare, and Entrup is looking for NT expertise.

Still, Entrup says certification must be coupled with real-world experience. "The formal training tends to fill in the blanks--you can have the experience but not the certification, but you can't have the paper but not the experience," he says.

Microsoft Certifications
Microsoft Certified Professional:
The basics; can be achieved with a single examination on a single product

Microsoft Certified Professional+ Internet:
Must first be an MCP and then pass exam on Internet expertise

Microsoft Certified Professional+ Site Building:
Same as above, but requires exam on creating Web sites

Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer:
The main IT credential; requires several examinations

Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer+Internet:
MCSE with extra tests for Internet expertise

Microsoft Certified Solution Developer:
The main developer credential; requires several exams

Microsoft Certified Database Administrator:
A new IT credential slated to be available in the spring

Microsoft Certified Trainer:
Certification for training vendors

DATA: INFORMATIONWEEK

Microsoft began its certification program in 1992 with a pair of exams for its networking operating system software, LAN Manager. It now offers eight certifications (see chart, left). The company works with certified training centers and vendors of course materials and self-paced teaching tools, and it contracts with testing centers to administer certification tests. To ensure quality, a candidate must get training from one source and testing from another.

Supply Not Strong Enough
There are 360,000 Microsoft Certified Professionals--the standard certification offered--and Microsoft officials expect that number to reach 500,000 by June, according to Nancy Lewis, general manager of certification and training. But the supply doesn't come close to meeting the demand. "Last year, there were 346,000 vacant jobs around Microsoft technology," Lewis says. "This year, there are about 647,000 open jobs, despite a doubling of the number of MCPs."

The basic MCP credential certifies that a person has expertise with a particular Microsoft product. The credential can be earned, in most cases, by taking a single exam. For instance, a help-desk technician might take a certification exam on Microsoft Office in order to better help users troubleshoot problems with the productivity suite.

That's what Ric Liang, a network architect at Westcoast Energy Inc., a natural gas transmission company in Vancouver, British Columbia, recommends his company's hands-on technical support people do. "It would be very valuable," Liang says. "One hundred percent of our company uses Office 97."

An MCP can then opt to follow a developer's track and become a Microsoft Certified Solution Developer using the company's development tools, including Web development products and Microsoft's Component Object Model. Or an MCP can choose an IT professional track oriented toward installation, integration, and maintenance of applications based on Microsoft's BackOffice server suite, and achieve the Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer credential. Next spring, Microsoft will introduce Microsoft Certified Database Administrator, a certification aimed at database administrators supporting its newly shipped SQL Server 7.0.

The Cost Of Certification
The fee for Microsoft certification tests is $100 each and the tests are administered by two national testing firms: Sylvan Prometric Testing Centers and Virtual University Enterprises Testing Centers. Candidates who fail an exam can retake it within two weeks.

Training, however, can range from $50 for self-paced study materials to $2,000 or more for classroom courses. For classroom training, Microsoft licenses 1,900 Certified Technical Education Centers worldwide. In addition, about 1,000 high schools, community colleges, technical schools, and four-year universities offer courses through Microsoft's Authorized Academic Training Programs.

Despite the costs, there's no doubt about the value of certification for IT personnel. According to a survey by MCP Magazine, which is not owned or published by Microsoft, Microsoft Certified Systems Engineers or solution developers earn an average of $7,000 a year more than their noncertified counterparts. Those holding any Microsoft certification earned an average of $6,000 a year, or 9%, more than non-Microsoft-certified respondents.

That can have its drawbacks for employers, Dataquest's Sweeny points out. "Each certification raises the value of that person, so it costs you more to retain them," he says. "The pace of compensation [inside a company] doesn't necessarily keep up with the individual's competency and expertise, so that person [might] go out and get their market value."

But many IT managers don't view the proliferation of certification as a threat. While a certified worker is more expensive, he or she is also more capable of performing more complex and challenging tasks. And IT shops that send their workers to training and certification testing find that it enhances loyalty.

"There's no downside," Entrup says. "We use it as a perk. [Paying for training and certification] is just that much more we can offer. Training tends to build loyalty, so in my experience, it works for the benefit of the employer."

New Times, New Tests
Of course, it's important to keep training quality high and the testing rigorous--both of which IT managers say Microsoft works hard to do. Microsoft is constantly redesigning its courses and tests. "Before we create a new exam, we do a job-function analysis and evaluate how people are really deploying the products," says Donna Senko, Microsoft's director of certification and skills assessment.

And Microsoft plans more changes in the near future. One important area will be the advent of real-world-based testing, Senko says. "We're producing exams that have people perform actual job functions using simulations," she says.

That sounds good to Entrup, who says the only tests more difficult than Microsoft's are those required for certification by networking vendor Cisco Systems. Cisco already uses real-world problem solving in its tests.

Microsoft also recently introduced computer-based "adaptive testing." If a candidate answers the first few questions correctly, the program advances the test, making the next question more difficult. "You can only pass the exam if you've correctly answered enough of the tougher items," Senko says. For more-qualified candidates, the tests can take less time while still assuring that they correctly understand the material. And because not every candidate gets asked the same questions in the same order, the system also helps protect the integrity of the tests.

Demand for both experienced and trained IT staffers will only continue to grow. "There are so many jobs out there for IT that companies are snatching [students] out of colleges without even waiting for them to finish their degrees," says Mark Resh, CIO of Standard Forms Inc., a major office supplies and preprinted forms supplier in New York. Like many of his peers, Resh says certification is a critical weapon in any IT department's arsenal.

Photo by Edward Santalone