In aid of vendor-neutral training

The channel needs vendor-neutral training and professional development, says Steve Philp

Philp: Product certification has its place but more professionalism and business skills are needed

Boosting professionalism in the channel is vitally important, especially given that on IT deployments the community is now relied on more than ever for advice and support.

When doing more with less, it is easy for training to fall to the bottom of the list of priorities. Some believe that training and certification can wait until business picks up and profits rise. This might sound sensible but could inhibit long-term recovery.

Investing in training and development will help resellers recover more quickly from these tough times. And resellers with the right certifications will be sought after.

Resellers should embrace vendor-neutral programmes that enable executives to develop the softer business skills needed in consultancy.

Organisations need support and advice on all manner of emerging issues – such as whether to go down a public or private cloud route, how to measure RoI and how to address security.

When it comes to cloud computing, vendor-neutral accreditation is particularly relevant because many organisations are keen to avoid vendor lock-in for cloud services.

Certification and accreditation programmes must help resellers understand how IT can best address business challenges. With cloud computing in particular there is so much noise created by vendors that it is hard for end users to know who to trust.

Resellers that can prove they can be trusted as professional consultants – through certification – will be able to capitalise on this uncertainty and build long-term relationships with customers.

While there’s little doubt vendor certification programmes play an important role in proving excellence around certain types of products, a vendor-neutral approach is needed more than ever because organisations have to make increasingly complex decisions about IT.

Steve Philp is director of ITAC and ITSC certification programmes at The Open Group