VMware Cloud Community
chillyhead
Contributor
Contributor

Advice needed on ESX3 Certification......

Hello all, I am starting to dive into the world of ESX3 and learning on a home server I purchased. DL385 Dual Core Opteron. Picked it up cheap on eBay. My work does not have ESX yet.

Anyways here is my question. I have been in the IT business for 14 years now. I have my MCSE and Citrix CCA along with a few other certs.

I am starting to notice that the job market for sysadmins for Citrix related jobs are heavily leaning on Citrix/ESX experience. I see these jobs all the time on Dice and Monster. Companies really looking for this type of experience combination. Especially with Citrix setups.

Just from the few weeks I have spent setting up and learning ESX in my own time is really starting to interest me. I love the technology and what the future may hold for it.

I plan on spending much more time reading and doing hands on this year. If I plan to target these types of jobs later this year, should I drop the $3K on these certification classes to get the cert? I realize that will not guarantee anything in the real world, but is it worth the $$ to invest? Or should I try and simply get the job based only on my experience without the cert? How do companies view this?

I see the jobs are getting stronger in this market and the future looks promising.

Any feedback on this? Anyone else in my type of situation?

Thanks!

Reply
0 Kudos
25 Replies
virtual_univers
Contributor
Contributor

I have emailed to VMware and havn't got reply from them.

I plan to go "VMware Infrastructure 3: Deploy, Secure and Analyze" training this year, and want to become a VCP as well!

Reply
0 Kudos
Trigsy
Contributor
Contributor

Totally agree with chuss on this one. Six months ago i knew squat about vmware now i'm studying to take the exam on Monday having installed,created vm's, templates, NFS, looked closely at iscsi from where i never understood the point of it until now!, trashed it built it again and again and again.

Taking ESX apart peice by peice makes you realise a paper VCP would die if exposed to it in the real World.

Courses keep the amateurs away.

Reply
0 Kudos
Dancautella
Contributor
Contributor

This is a important point if we need on our market a certification to differ from all other people that get/do support for ESX. In this middle, we need ever have a full expertize on the ESX using day-by-day. Like almost told, the course is just a open-door to the newbie knows what is.

My best regards

Reply
0 Kudos
AndyK-1
Contributor
Contributor

I was also very disappointed to find out the only way to get certified is by paying the $3000.

We are just underway with a VI3 internal lab and there is plenty of learning to do. All this learning and I was hoping to get certified as well but I'm not sure I would like to fork over that much of my own cash.

I wrote and passed my CISSP last year, there are no brain-dumps that will help. In fact many forums have plenty of people disappointed they failed after "studying" the brain dumps.

With a little effort any company can beat the brain dumps if they really want to.

Right now I'm looking at months of lab work, studying and reading only to be told I need to spend 3k and take a course ?

I hope this approach is reconsidered.

Reply
0 Kudos
vmNewb35
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

First -- happy 3 year VMTN Anniversary to Chris Huss!!! Big ups for KY!!!

Second, all the knowledge on these boards will, in fact, serve you well. I have been doing the IT "thing" for 23 years and have progressed to that lofty middle management tier we all love so well...ahem...but I can honestly say that any potential employer or contractor issuer worth a penny will not only care about how pedigreed you are either on paper, from university, etc. but will want to see if you have the hands-on "know how" to do the job. During the interview process I will always have functional experts sit on the panel to assess a candidates ability to really know a technology because there are a LOT of paper tigers out there. The ones who really make the grade come from the school of hard knocks and also have some current training to keep them marketable. I see VMWare's position on this as two-fold: it's risk management and it's a potential profit center.

I guess the bottom line is that certifications may prop the door open for you a bit but you really have to know what you are doing or that door will immediately slam shut with you on the outside looking in.

Wherever this all leads you, best of luck...it's a great big world out there and there are a lot of niches to fill.

Chad

Reply
0 Kudos
admin
Immortal
Immortal

Thanks Chad.

There's a few others that I've worked with here in Kentucky that have a year or 2 more experience with VMware than I do...and I was fortunate to have worked with them....or continue to work with them as fellow trainers or consultants.

The Kentucky area seems to always be about 2 years behind the rest of the country when it comes to IT trends...and we've all been preparing and waiting for this area to catch on with virtualization...so we don't have to travel so far away from home all of the time to make a living. Smiley Happy

One thing that will help virtualization adoption rates is pricing and competition. Both will help with mainstream awareness and acceptance. Competition will help drive prices down to where companies in our area can start to afford the technologies that surrounding areas have adopted years before.

Also another big contributor to VMware's success is this very forum. It's second to none...and it provides a great community service to not only virtualization adopters...but serves as a wealth of information outside virtualization as well. I would dare to say that if it wasn't for this forum...and the contributions from everyone on here, virtualization would not be where it's at today.

My hat's off to everyone who reads and contributes to these forums!

Thanks again,

Chris

Reply
0 Kudos