As you’ve arrived here it’s probable that either you’re considering a career change into IT and you’ve heard good things about MCSE’s, or you’re currently an IT professional and you know that you can’t get any further without the MCSE accreditation.

We’d recommend you confirm that your provider is actually training you on the latest Microsoft version. A number of trainees are left in a mess when they find that they’ve been studying for an outdated MCSE course which inevitably will have to be up-dated. Don’t get bullied into a training program without the right advice. Take time to discover a training company that will spend time helping and advising you on an appropriate training track for meeting your goals.

We’re regularly asked to explain why academic qualifications are being replaced by more commercial certificates? As we require increasingly more effective technological know-how, industry has of necessity moved to the specialised core-skills learning only available through the vendors themselves – namely companies such as Microsoft, CISCO, Adobe and CompTIA. This often comes in at a fraction of the cost and time. Patently, an appropriate quantity of associated knowledge must be learned, but precise specialisation in the particular job function gives a vendor educated student a real head start.

Imagine if you were an employer – and you wanted someone who could provide a specific set of skills. What should you do: Pore through a mass of different academic qualifications from graduate applicants, asking for course details and which workplace skills they’ve mastered, or select a specialised number of commercial certifications that specifically match what you’re looking for, and make your short-list from that. The interview is then more about the person and how they’ll fit in – rather than on the depth of their technical knowledge.