Skills Certification – What’s Next?

Terry Erdle, CompTIA senior vice president, skills certification, and our partners got together for their own Texas hootenanny at Breakaway to touch on some of the new things to expect in the world of CompTIA certification.

With unemployment hovering around 10 percent, there are still more than 300,000 IT jobs to be filled in the U.S. Forecasts for IT job growth through 2018 approach 20 percent, with areas such as security, cloud computing, healthcare IT and green IT seeing even faster growth as organizations expand their reliance on technology solutions in these areas. These jobs require a different, higher skill set, and many require a combination of skills, but CompTIA is ready.

As we look to address emerging technologies and vertical niches, expect more certificate exams. This includes more offerings in the career entry CompTIA Strata series, plus career specialization certificates in areas like cloud computing and healthcare IT. These specializations could be electives to the traditional CompTIA plus series exams and offer the option to customize skills for the specific job requirements. These certificates will be available in 2011.

We’ve been known for foundational IT exams, but now we’re venturing into the world of higher-level skills validation, with mastery certifications.  The first exam, available in 2011, will cover IT security, taking CompTIA Security+ up a notch in technical requirements. This exam will focus on higher-level technical security skills as opposed to skills required for managers like some of the other advanced security certs in the channel.

We also announced a partnership with Certification Partners earlier this week. The new exam, CompTIA CTP+, will measure skills necessary to sell and service convergent technologies.  It will replace CompTIA Convergence+ and add elements of the CTP exam. This is the second partnership announced by CompTIA this year with more to come. (See CompTIA Linux+ Powered by LPI Certification Exam Now Available.)

No update would be complete without addressing the CompTIA certification renewal policy. Current certification holders are certified for life, and this will be true for anyone who passes CompTIA A+, Network+ or Security+ before the end of this year. Effective 2011, new certifications will be valid for three years or until completing the requirements of CompTIA’s upcoming new continuing education program. Remember, this is a necessary to maintain our ISO 17024 accreditation. Follow the series Certified Forever or On the Continuing Education Death March? for more info.

In with the new also means a little out with the old. Stay tuned for updates on some of the exam codes that are being retired and other exams that will follow CEA-CompTIA DHTI+ and retire completely.