By Janet Pinkerton
Dominick Gray, president of Center City Communications in Southfield, Mich., wanted to “brush up on cloud” to better serve his clients and grow his technology services company. So, last August, he attended a day-long training session for CompTIA’s new Executive Certificate in Cloud (Foundations) at the IT trade association’s Breakaway 2012 channel training event in Las Vegas, where the program debuted.
As of mid-February, Gray had used the training’s vendor-neutral information, along with group discussions and private conversations with fellow participants, to fine-tune his sales and consultation approach, deploy new cloud hosting solutions for his clients and roll out a cloud-based communications solution to improve his own company operations.
“It’s a great training, a thorough process from start to finish, that really helps you to understand what’s possible with cloud for the customer as well as for your own business,” said Gray, who plans to earn CompTIA’s Intermediate Executive Certificate for Cloud to further improve his business. He speculates he could learn the same information on his own – but not as fast or as completely. “It’s a very comprehensive way to get A to Z information.”
“That piece of paper doesn’t hurt either,” Gray said about the CompTIA Executive Certificate in Cloud that he earned at the end of the Foundations training. “It helps customers feel comfortable that they’re getting a certain standard of knowledge when they are dealing with my organization, versus when they are dealing with somebody else.”
Two Tracks for Growth
CompTIA offers two, vendor-neutral executive certificate training programs in Cloud: Foundations for those needing a basic understanding of cloud solutions and business models, and Intermediate for those seeking to improve and expand existing cloud-based businesses. Both trainings end with an assessment by which participants can earn their certificate.
“Certifications focus on technical know-how and an individual’s skills, but CompTIA’s executive certificate programs focus on the business know-how,” said Kelly Ricker, CompTIA’s senior vice president of events and education. “For example, our executive certificate in cloud training covers how to market, sell, develop compensation plans, and structure operation and delivery.”
The training is available free to CompTIA members at CompTIA events, and also through CompTIA’s vendor, distributor and channel training partners. The Intermediate executive training courses in cloud will be available online starting in April. Larger CompTIA members can request that the program be conducted at their locations.
Approximately 100 technology professionals have earned CompTIA executive certificates in cloud and 750 more are in process, having taken one or more of the courses in the program.
The training is ideal for small-to medium-sized technology solution providers, as well as vendors, distributors and IT consultants, but it also attracts executives from very large companies such as CDW and Cisco.
“People participate because they want to make sure they do all their due diligence in understanding how and where cloud needs to impact their business and their clients,” said CompTIA faculty member Gary Bixler, an instructor for the cloud executive certificate training.
Comprehensive Approach
CompTIA’s training provides the vendor-neutral information and guidance executives need to make cloud solutions profitable for their businesses. A technology service provider accustomed to making margin on big-ticket IT hardware sales, plus installation and service, has to adapt to a reoccurring revenue model with cloud. “It really is a completely different business model,” Bixler said. “The bill of sale is much smaller, the margins are similar, but you can do a lot more deals and offer value-added services to make the transition to cloud solutions profitable.”
Training for the Foundations executive certificate in cloud includes five courses:
- Transforming Your Business to the Cloud.
- Marketing.
- Sales Execution.
- Services Delivery.
- Operations Management.
CompTIA’s Intermediate executive certificate in cloud is structured around three courses:
- Building Cloud Solution Success.
- Developing Cloud Playbooks.
- Transforming Your Business.
Within the course structure, the Foundations and Intermediate training content is continually modified to keep current with cloud’s fast-paced evolution. In addition, both programs provide opportunity for participants to learn from each other. Attendees “know that the CompTIA community is made up of people who want to do the best job for their clients,” Bixler said. “They want to learn what’s happening – what’s really working, what’s not working – from their peers.”
Recently, more executives have been interested in the Intermediate certificate, which Ricker takes as “a positive sign that more solution providers have embraced cloud solutions and are looking to CompTIA for training to hone their existing Cloud offering to maximize growth and profitability.”
Participants leave the executive training empowered to strategically capitalize on cloud. “We don’t give them the answers,” Bixler said. “Instead, people walk out of the training with a plan and a lot of homework to do. They know what they need to do to take the best advantage of this opportunity for their company and their customers.”
For more information about CompTIA’s Executive Certificates in Cloud, contact Blythe Girnus, senior manager of CompTIA’s member education programs, at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or (630) 678-8356.
