December, 2008

Gearing Up for Annual Reviews

While not all companies' review cycles follow the calendar closely, there's something about saying goodbye to an old year, while getting ready for a new one that leads people to think about where they've been and what they've done on the job, as well as where they're going (or would like to go) and...

And now, a word from/for my sponsors…

It's too easy to get caught up in the working side of life, and to let it overpower other equally important parts. Perhaps because I have tendencies in that direction, I often find myself thinking about how all the different parts of life fit together, particularly work and family life, as the...

More on Entry-Level Certs from the Trenches

I play pool two nights a week on leagues that belong to the American Poolplayers Association (APA). My Thursday night 9-ball team is composed primarily of people who work in IT. Of the seven people on the team, one is a paralegal, another a hairdresser, and the other five work for Dell (1),...

Check Out GoCertify.com

My colleague and long-time certification industry expert, Anne Martinez, runs a very nice Web site called GoCertify.com. There's lots of interesting content there, not least of which is the information available through its

Certification as a “Tie-Breaker”

Site Member Cruicer had this to say about my recent blog "Can Virtualization Certs Get Real?"

Certs are good, but until the Microsoft’s and the VMware’s testing centers put...

More on Virtualization

Interestingly, my latest blog entitled "Can Virtualization Certs Get Real?" has prompted a flurry of e-mail into my inbox. I'm seeing IT professionals weigh in more or less evenly on both pro (8) and...

Can Virtualization Certs Get Real?

As the former series editor for Exam Cram, I still get new titles from that series in the mail from its publisher, Que/Pearson Education. On Friday, the VCP/VMWare Certified Professsional Exam Cram by Eliaz N. Khnaser (Que, 2008, ISBN-13: 978-0789738059) showed up at my doorstep....

By the Numbers: MS Posts Latest Cert Tallies

No less often than once a quarter, and sometimes as often as once a month, Microsoft updates its "Number of Microsoft Certified Professionals Worldwide" page. The last update occurred at the beginning of December (12/1/2008), the...

Add Experience By Volunteering

In an article entitled "Beef up your resume by doing volunteer IT work" that dates back to January of 2000, Jeff Davis makes the very interesting point that on-the-job experience is an important leavening agent for...

How about Networking Certs? Try this survey…

The very nice folks at SearchNetworking.com get my partner, Kim Lindros, and I to update a list of network certification for them on an an annual basis. The latest incarnation is called the "Networking...