CompTIA Blog

Heading into 2013, three key tech policy issues to watch will be immigration, online sales taxes and cybersecurity, said Politico. While Congressional leaders debate the merits of allowing more students with advanced degrees to stay in the U.S., they will also be taking a closer look at online tax laws for companies of all sizes and coming to terms on cybersecurity legislation to protect our nation’s critical infrastructure.While small business advocacy groups have been pleading with Congress to ...

The IT community is rich with career opportunities, despite dismal overall job growth projections and many companies continuing to struggle with economic challenges. There seems to be no shortage of open positions in IT for the properly prepared individual, whether their skills are more technology-oriented or focused on the business side. As the business community relies more and more on IT to run and improve their operations, demand for qualified and trainable professionals will continue to gro ...

This month, CompTIA welcomes 104 U.K.-based solution provider organizations to its membership fold – a direct result of our recent merger with Accredit UK. These highly skilled and qualified information and communications technology (ICT) professionals all have one thing in common; their organizations have undergone a rigorous audit and assessment of their technical and business practices and have achieved the highest standards of operation, marked by their Accredit UK credential.I have had the ...

Takeaway of the week is really a fresh set of takes on some old, established takeaways, such as "certifications are valuable difference makers in the IT job market" or "healthcare IT continues to grow and evolve" and then there's the "IT job market remains strong into 2013." Oldies, but goodies. Certifiable Difference Makers Everything is taken into consideration in a competitive IT job market and some certifications more so than others, according to a well-known industry recruitment firm. As ...

President Barack Obama and his administration are attempting to protect billions of dollars in R&D aid from sweeping budget cuts, said Politico Pro. In addition to meeting with recipients of R&D aid in the science and technology sectors, Obama said in a Twitter live chat last week that the administration is looking to defend its aid budget while offering cuts from alternative areas.The Obama administration’s proposal to tax high income earners would hit about 940,000 people who report bu ...

Writing well is a critical skill for IT professionals who have to convey technical information to technical and non-technical people. "The better you can communicate your message in ways that other people understand, the more likely you are to succeed in whatever you are trying to do," says James Chartrand, founder of Damn Fine Words, an online writing course for business people. Do you find yourself repeatedly frustrated because people misunderstand your emails, or fail to take the right act ...

A long-awaited provision that will benefit woman-owned small businesses seeking federal government contract opportunities is included in amendments to the National Defense Authorization Act (S. 3254), which passed the Senate on Dec. 4. CompTIA has actively advocated for this fix, which will correct an anomaly in this federal program.The Women-Owned Small Business Federal Contract Program sets aside five percent of federal prime and subcontracts for women-owned small businesses. Under the current ...

The biggest obstacle those building new businesses or practices face is not their creation and launch. No, the most daunting issue new business owners struggle with is how to manage and perfect their back office operations. Upfront costs and planned expenses are much easier to project on paper than when the doors are open and the organization is in full swing.That’s especially true in a managed services business. Few IT professionals have the financial and general management training or experien ...

Takeaway of the week is you never know what to believe when it comes to industry reports, findings, statistics or surveys. One set of industry reports and findings might say the IT salaries are on the rise and the next week a new slew of fact and figures come out to counter those claims. The one constant seems to be that IT jobs remain a steady mover in a still stagnant economy. IT Sector Value Up, Wages Not So Much The increasing value of IT departments in the overall success of businesses has ...

President Barack Obama and Congressional lawmakers haven’t emphasized a variety of educational options – namely technical training – to solve our nation’s workforce shortage, said the National Journal. The hardest jobs to fill in our country, which includes IT positions, don’t require traditional four-year degrees, yet legislation that promotes these opportunities is lacking.The House of Representatives passed a bill last week that would grant more visas to those who graduate with advanced degre ...

In today’s economic environment, IT organizations have to continually reassess the way they do business, making necessary changes to best serve their clients and stay ahead of their rivals. With the rapid advances in technology and delivery systems, the challenges here are escalating more quickly than the opportunities they bring, making staffing service desks and properly training employees a particularly difficult task.Can an IT services company afford to run its operations the same way today ...

Nellie Scott Working in the IT services industry for 17 years, Nellie Scott has relied on her personal philosophy of "Nothing happens in an organization until somebody sells something to somebody." In her role as channel services business manager at Lenovo, Scott is responsible for driving revenue by supporting business partners in the United States and Canada through sales and marketing campaigns. Lenovo is a $21 billion personal technology company and the world's second largest PC vendo ...

Takeaway of the week is just because the holiday shopping season is in full swing, doesn't mean shopping for talented IT professionals has eased up. OK, that may have been an all-too-pat post-Black Friday/Cyber Monday tie-in, but the fact is top companies remain on the hunt to fill key technical roles in all sectors of the IT market. Learn more about the positive spin for IT, the expectations for a CIO and job candidate no-no's for HR. Gartner: IT Means Business Job seekers out in the IT market, ...

CompTIA’s 10th Annual Information Security Trends study reviews how the use of mobile devices and technologies such as cloud computing create opportunities as well as vulnerabilities, reports Federal Computer Week. Fifty-seven percent of respondents indicated their company has made at least moderate IT security changes to combat those threats over the past two years, while 10 percent indicated they’ve made drastic changes.Federal officials have hinted that the cybersecurity budget will be spared ...

The White House has renewed its call for legislation intended to stimulate small business job growth. This proposal would provide a 10 percent tax credit for “new payroll” of up to $500,000 beginning in 2013. Incremental payroll of up to $500,000 would qualify for the tax credit, translating into a maximum credit of $50,000 per employer. A similar provision was included in the president’s budget last year and was also picked up in S. 2237; the Small Business Jobs and Tax Relief Act. That bill fa ...