CompTIA Points Prospective Professionals Down Path to Prosperity
Do you have a professional interest in IT? Are you wondering what steps you should follow to go from having acquired IT skills, and maybe even gotten your first entry-level job, to building a long-term career? Tech industry association CompTIA is looking out for individuals whose IT aptitude is well-established, but who aren't certain where to go from there. The new Career Path Planning Tool points the way forward for anyone who is just getting into IT from a starting point in any of five popular tech sectors: tech support, networking, cybersecurity, software and web development, and data analytics. The above-linked post to the CompTIA blog uses tech support to illustrate some of the ways that CompTIA can help fledgling tech pros spread their wings. It won't surprise anyone to learn, of course, that CompTIA's popular IT certifications, including A+, Network+, and Security+, are involved in making the most of your IT career. There's lots of other good information available, including data to help guide salary expectations and data describing the general availability of jobs.
(ISC)2 Launches Registration for Annual Security Congress Event
There's a great deal of consternation, at the moment, about the immediate future of large-scale gatherings, conferences, and conventions. With COVID-19 rampaging around the globe, many, if not most such events are either already canceled, or settled into a long-term holding pattern. If you're confident that the immediate crisis will have subsided by November, however, then you may want to consider registering to attend the annual (ISC)2 Security Congress gathering, to be held Nov. 16-18 at the Hyatt Regency Orlando in Orlando, Fla. With thousands of cybersecurity professionals in attendance each year, Security Congress is one of the foremost professional conferences of its kind. An estimated 200 speakers will address attendees at the three-day event, and while it's probably not possible to hear from each of them, that does give potential attendees a sense of the options they'll have available to choose from. After opening up registration last month, (ISC)2 has an early-bird registration discount in effect until April 15 – so you can take some time to think through your options and still get a deal.
IDG Inside Pro Asks Time-Honored Question About Certifications
For nearly as long as IT certifications have been around, proponents and skeptics of certification have (at times contentiously) debated the question of whether getting a certification actually has a net positive impact on your income. Those who challenge this popular perception are, in essence, screaming along with Cuba Gooding Jr. in that one Tom Cruise movie, "Show me the money!" This past week, IDG Insider Pro stepped up to the pulpit to add its two cents, based on data from the recently conducted IDG Insider Pro and Computerworld IT Salary Survey. The survey, conducted online, fielded inputs from 2,269 full- and part-time IT professionals. One interesting factoid to emerge from the survey is that, among the self-selected full- or part-time IT professionals who participated, 59 percent have at least one IT (or IT-adjacent) credential. The article provides a lengthy preview, but the balance of its data and findings are behind a paywall, so be prepare to open your wallet if you want to get the full monty.
Certification Magazine Tips Cap to Female Certified IT Professionals
Speaking of people who conduct IT certification-centric surveys and report their findings, the team at Certification Magazine acknowledged International Women's Day (Sunday, March 8) at the end of last week by using its weekly Deep Focus article to paint a picture of female certified IT professionals. Instead of focusing on a set of individuals from its annual Salary Survey who hold the same IT certification, the article zooms in on the IT-certified women who participated in the survey. The general scarcity of women in IT professions is reflected in that fact that, of the more than 5,000 certified IT professionals who participated in the 2020 Salary Survey, only 16 percent are women. The article includes (and slightly enlarges) salary data released in an earlier Salary Survey report, and goes on to reveal data about IT-certified women's educational background, working hours, job titles, and more.
That's all for this edition of Certification Watch. Please keep your certification news and tips coming to the GoCertify News Editor.
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