by Jason Kendall
To become a proficient web designer with relevant qualifications for today’s employment market, your must-have certification is Adobe Dreamweaver. For applications in the commercial world it’s important to have a full understanding of the full Adobe Web Creative Suite. This means also (but is by no means restricted to) Flash and Action Script. Should you desire to become an Adobe Certified Professional or an Adobe Certified Expert you’ll find these skills are vital.
Creating websites is only the beginning of the necessary skill-set for today’s web technicians. It’s a good idea to look for a course that includes important features like HTML, PHP, MySQL, Search Engine Optimisation and E-Commerce in order to know how to maintain content, create traffic and work with database driven sites.
At times individuals don’t really get what information technology is about. It’s electrifying, revolutionary, and puts you at the fore-front of developments in technology that will change our world over the next few decades. Society largely thinks that the increase in technology we have experienced is slowing down. This couldn’t be more wrong. There are huge changes to come, and the internet particularly will be the most effective tool in our lives.
Should receiving a good salary be around the top on your wish list, you will be pleasantly surprised to hear that the income on average for IT employees in general is considerably higher than salaries in much of the rest of industry. Excitingly, there is a lot more room for IT sector development throughout this country. The industry continues to develop hugely, and we don’t have anywhere near enough qualified skilled IT professionals to fill current job vacancies, so it’s highly unlikely that things will be any different for decades to come.
Picking up on all this discussion about computer technology nowadays, how is it possible to understand what exactly to look for?
You should remember: the training course or the accreditation is not the ultimate goal; the career that you want is. Too many training companies over-emphasise the certificate itself. Students often train for a single year but end up doing a job for a lifetime. Ensure you avoid the fatal error of finding what seems like a very ‘interesting’ program and then spend decades in a job you don’t like!
Stay focused on where you want to get to, and formulate your training based on that - don’t do it the other way round. Stay on target - making sure you’re training for a job that will keep you happy for many years. Seek guidance and advice from a skilled professional, even if you have to pay - it’s considerably cheaper and safer to investigate at the start whether something is going to suit and interest you, rather than realise following two years of study that the job you’ve chosen is not for you and have wasted years of effort.
People attracted to this sort of work often have a very practical outlook on work, and aren’t really suited to the classroom environment, and slogging through piles of books. If this could be you, try the newer style of interactive study, where you can learn everything on-screen. Long-term memory is enhanced with an involvement of all our senses - educational experts have expounded on this for decades now.
Fully interactive motion videos with demonstrations and practice sessions will turn you off book-based study for ever more. And you’ll actually enjoy doing them. It’s imperative to see examples of the study materials provided by your chosen company. Be sure that they contain video, demonstrations and various interactive elements.
Purely on-line training should be avoided. Ideally, you should opt for CD and DVD ROM courseware where offered, so that you have access at all times - it’s not wise to be held hostage to a quality and continuous internet connection.
A lot of training companies only provide support available from 9-6 (office hours) and sometimes later on specific days; most won’t answer after 8-9pm at the latest and frequently never at the weekends. some companies only provide email support (slow), and telephone support is usually to a call-centre that will chat nicely with you for 5 minutes to ask what the issue is and then simply send an email to an instructor - who’ll call back sometime over the next 1-3 days, at a time suitable for them. This isn’t a lot of good if you’re sitting there confused over an issue and can only study at specific times.
The very best training providers incorporate three or four individual support centres across multiple time-zones. They use an online interactive interface to join them all seamlessly, irrespective of the time you login, help is just a click away, with no hassle or contact issues. Never make do with a lower level of service. Direct-access 24×7 support is really your only option with IT courses. Maybe late-evening study is not your thing; but for the majority of us however, we’re at work while the support is live.
Commercial qualifications are now, without a doubt, taking over from the traditional routes into IT - but why has this come about? With 3 and 4 year academic degree costs increasing year on year, and the industry’s increasing awareness that key company training often has more relevance in the commercial field, we’ve seen a great increase in CISCO, Adobe, Microsoft and CompTIA authorised training paths that educate students at a fraction of the cost and time involved. Vendor training works by concentrating on the skill-sets required (along with a relevant amount of associated knowledge,) instead of trawling through all the background ‘padding’ that computer Science Degrees can get bogged down in - to pad out the syllabus.
Put yourself in the employer’s position - and you required somebody who had very specific skills. Which is the most straightforward: Trawl through a mass of different academic qualifications from various applicants, asking for course details and which commercial skills have been attained, or select a specialised number of commercial certifications that perfectly fit your needs, and then choose your interviewees based around that. The interview is then more about the person and how they’ll fit in - instead of having to work out if they can do the job.
Charging for examinations with the course fee and offering an ‘Exam Guarantee’ is popular with many training course providers. However, let’s consider what’s really going on:
They’ve allowed costings for it by some means. One thing’s for sure - it isn’t free - it’s simply been shoe-horned into the price as a whole. Students who take exams one at a time, paying as they go are much more likely to pass. They’re mindful of the cost and prepare more appropriately to be ready for the task.
Don’t you think it’s more sensible to hold on to your money and pay for the exam when you’re ready, rather than coughing up months or even a year or two in advance to the college, and to do it in a local testing office - rather than in some remote centre? Why tie up your cash (or borrow more than you need) for exams when there’s absolutely nothing that says you have to? A great deal of money is netted by organisations charging upfront for all their exams - and banking on the fact that many won’t be taken. In addition to this, many exam guarantees are worthless. The majority of organisations won’t be prepared to pay for re-takes until you’re able to demonstrate an excellent mock pass rate.
With average prices for VUE and Pro-metric tests in the United Kingdom costing around 112 pounds, it makes sense to pay as you go. Not to fork out thousands extra in up-front costs. A commitment to studying and the use of authorised exam preparation tools are actually the key to your success.
The perhaps intimidating chore of securing your first role in IT is often eased because some trainers offer a Job Placement Assistance service. The fact of the matter is it isn’t a complex operation to secure your first job - as long as you’ve got the necessary skills and qualifications; because there’s still a great need for IT skills in the UK today.
Having said that, it’s important to have CV and Interview advice and support though; additionally, we would recommend any student to update their CV as soon as they start a course - don’t procrastinate and leave it for when you’re ready to start work. It’s possible that you won’t have even taken your exams when you will be offered your first junior support role; yet this is not possible unless your CV is with employers. If you’d like to get employment in your home town, then you may well find that a specialist independent regional recruitment consultant or service can generally be of more use than the trainer’s recruitment division, because they’re going to have insider knowledge of what’s available near you.
To bottom line it, as long as you put the same commitment into finding a job as into training, you won’t find it too challenging. Some people inexplicably put hundreds of hours into their learning program and do nothing more once they’ve passed their exams and seem to expect employers to find them.