nav[aria-label="Primary Navigation"] { padding: 0; & ul { list-style: none; width: 100%; display: flex; flex-direction: row; justify-content: start; align-items: start; gap: 30px; padding: 0; & li { margin: 0; } & ul li { list-style: none; } } }

certification

ACK112233

What do you folks think about a deal whereby a company pays the cost of getting you certified by interwoven at a cost of 10K to 20K, but you have to sign a agreement to not leave for 2 years (or return the money if you do leave)? Does this sound like a fair deal?

Find more posts tagged with

Comments

jbonifaci

If they are the ones initiating the certification, then they should pay for it with no strings attached. If you want to be certified and have asked them to pay for it, then they should have the right to offer terms for it. You either accept or decline those terms, once you have negotiated as much as you can of course (if you think this is even possible). It's understandable for them to not want to pay the $$ for you to get certified only to have you turn around and leave a month later. They get no benefit out of the $$ they spent.

~Jeff

nipper

Does it sound like a good deal ? No

Do you have a choice ? probably not.

Would I take that deal ? No, but you are only as good as you can negoitate.

ACK112233

Thanks for the advice. How valuable is a certification in your part of the world?

In my opinion, a certification is just a piece of paper for the clients to see. I've worked with interwoven certified consultants before and I knew more stuff than they did. Therefore, I don't see a certification as beneficial to me. The certification boot camp is just for show isn't it? If you show up and pay the fee, there's a good chance you'll be certified right?

nipper

Depends on how strong your resume is without the certification.

I have not taken the class. It has not made a difference. However from a
customer point of view, it does give a baseline to measure a candidate.

While your statement about paying & gettting the certificate may be factually true,
it is likely misleading. The class will go at a strong pace and while few if any fail,
it will be due to the instructor and student working on catching up.

Finally, if you really believe you have the deep experience to get certified, you can
inquire to Interwoven Training about another option open to people who have done
several complete implementations, called fast track.

IwovHeather

You also need to pass a certification test in order to receive the certification. It is not guaranteed as part of admittance.

Thanks,

Heather

gzevin

I think we were discussing the certification on a number of occassions..

I myself was forced to certify while with IWOV in 2002. Why 'forced' - because I strongly believed that for an experienced consultant with company traning and heaps of accounts implemented it was a waste of time. And it probably was.

As Fish was suggesting, the whole certification program was for the 'partners' of IWOV, to ensure at least some minimal level of competency for the consultants.

In reality I saw all of the participants of the bootcamp being subsequently certified. So, in fact, the certification is merely ruberstamping after a huge fee was paid to attend the courses. I saw a few of IWOV certified consultants. For me that logo did not make any difference as far as their IWOV skills were concerned, i.e. good ones were good, bad ones were bad

Greg Zevin, Ph.D. Comp. Sc.
Independent Interwoven Consultant/Architect
Sydney, AU

nipper

Greg, don't pull any punches, tell us how you really feel.

gzevin

Andy, stop provoking me! ditto!

Well.. Okay.. one more thing....

What I did not really like is that when I inquired about 6.X certification, they told ME that I needed to pay for 5.5.2 certification before I could start doing the 6... So I gave up and would not certify... I decided that I as one of the main beta testers of 6 still could find a job .....

Greg Zevin, Ph.D. Comp. Sc.
Independent Interwoven Consultant/Architect
Sydney, AU

Migrateduser

I, myself, am a certified consultant. I took the course when 5.5.x came out to get trained in the new version of TeamSite. My company paid for it and it was a good deal for me. Took one 2-day course and then an online test. If you paid attention in class, the test wasn't hard.

I also agree with Nipper and Greg that some people that get the certification are good and some are not. I think it helps if you have a strong web development/programming background prior to getting into TeamSite development. The people who were programmers prior to becoming TeamSite developers are always (in my experience) better than people who learned to program because they were put in a TeamSite developer role.

Many employers list that Interwoven Certification is required to apply for positions. I've seen at least 5, but there's no shortage of positions that don't care whether the developer is certified or not.

For me, it's been good to have the certification because I can go into any interview and say, "I'm Interwoven Certified." That puts me ahead (in employer's mind) of anyone who is not certified. The same way that when I say, "I've got a Computer Science degree," puts me ahead of those who don't. It doesn't mean I'm a better developer than all people without degrees or certifications. I'd say that's extremely unlikely, but it tells the employer more than, "I worked for 7 companies and I think I did a good job for them."

As for getting certified as a permanent employee... If you feel like you're able to do your job well without any classes, I'd say, don't take the classes. I think a consultant has more of a need for the certification since they end up interviewing for new jobs more often.

Hope this helps,

Jason

Migrateduser

Hey, wow, so there ARE more similarities between Interwoven and Vignette!!

Current Environments:
(1,2) TS 6.5 on W2K3
(3) Vignette V7 Portal on Solaris 9

Migrateduser

What I did not really like is that when I inquired about 6.X certification, they told ME that I needed to pay for 5.5.2 certification before I could start doing the 6... So I gave up and would not certify... I decided that I as one of the main beta testers of 6 still could find a job .....

For this reason alone, no one should bother getting certified. It's clearly just a way for IW to suck more money out of people.

Dave Smith
Sr. Software Engineer
Nike, Inc.
(503) 671-4238
DavidH.Smith@nike.com

Migrateduser

In reply to:

It's clearly just a way for IW to suck more money out of people.

So is college. There are plenty of people who can do jobs that require degrees, but the degree gives the employer a better sense of security about what you know. Same can be said for any certification or diploma. Yes, college teaches you stuff, but how many of us really remember it unless we use it often? The certification class also teaches stuff, but if you don't use it right away, my guess is that you'll forget most of it, but you'll still be certified.

Does this mean that degrees and certifications are bad? No, they are benchmarks or records of achievement. Mostly they are to help prove to others that we are good enough at something to complete it and obtain recognition. Doesn't mean that we weren't good at it before we obtained the recognition.

So, unless you believe that getting a college degree is bad in all cases (because it costs a lot of money and the only thing tangible you get is a piece of paper in the end), you can't say that getting a certification is bad in all cases,

- Jason

Migrateduser

So is college

That's a terrible analogy for the argument I was making. When you get your college degree, it's good forever. They don't make you come back every year to pay for a new degree when new stuff gets added to the curriculum, or else take away your degree. Forcing people to re-certify, and therefore re-pay a significant amount of money, at every version level is ridiculous. If someone is certified at version 5.0 and then wants to re-certify at version 7.0, but is told they have to re-certify at 6.0 first, then also certify at 7.0 - that's a sham. It's a grossly greedy way to just suck money out of people's pockets for no good reason. If someone can pass the 7.0 test without having been through the 6.0 certification, they deserve the certification.

Dave Smith
Sr. Software Engineer
Nike, Inc.
(503) 671-4238
DavidH.Smith@nike.com

jbonifaci

In reply to:

If someone is certified at version 5.0 and then wants to re-certify at version 7.0, but is told they have to re-certify at 6.0 first, then also certify at 7.0 - that's a sham

Actually, if they stick to their current policy, if you were certified at 5.0 and wanted to get the 7.0 certification, you would need to first completed the 5.5, 6.0 and 6.5 certification before you could do the 7.0 certification. I also think this is somewhat ridiculous, although I think what they are trying to do is ensure the quality of independent consultants they certify. With the current certification program, if an employer sees you have a 6.5 certification, they would know you are familiar with 5.0, 5.5, 6.0 and 6.5. If they were to change it so that someone can just jump in and get certified in 6.5 and have no knowledge of previous version. Then when an employer is looking for a consultant with 5.5 experience, they'll look at someone's resume and see they are 6.5 certified and assume that since they are 6.5 certified, they will be familiar with 5.5 as well, which would then be untrue. I'm not saying I agree with it, but I can see some reason why they would do it this way. It's not a very good reason, but it does ensure the quality of the people they certify. Not that the certification tests are hard to pass by any means, but that's another issue altogether.

~Jeff

Migrateduser

In reply to:

When you get your college degree, it's good forever. They don't make you come back every year to pay for a new degree when new stuff gets added to the curriculum, or else take away your degree.

An Interwoven certification is good forever too. I will always be certified for TeamSite 5.5 & 6. Nothing can change that. You have to agree that a Computer Science degree from 1975 isn't going to be as useful as one from 2005. There's 30 years of computer changes that have taken place. Sure, some of the theory is still the same, but the practical hands on stuff is completely different. So, in order for someone with a 1975 degree to stay current, they would either need to take additional courses to bring them up to speed or be comfortable with their skillset to do their current job.

- Jason

Migrateduser

I am not sure where they got the cost of 10-20 K. The certification class is $4500 in the U.S. That includes the project evaluation and the test. Unless they are calculating your time into the dollar amount, they are way off. We've done everything we can to keep the cost low for certification and certification upgrades. You can get complete information on the cert program and the costs on the Interwoven website. Send me email if you have any questions.

regards
Kathleen Sullivan
Certification Manager
Interwoven Inc.

nipper

Kathleen

How often do you have the class ? I see it on the schedule for Oct, but nothing after. Do you try once a quarter ?

Migrateduser

I'd very readily hire someone with a 1975 CS degree and 30 years' experience versus someone with a 2005 CS degree and 3 months' experience. You're discounting the work (and life) experience gained after the degree was issued.

Environments:
(1,2) TS6.5, TS6.5SP1 on W2K3
(3) Vignette V7 Portal on Solaris 9

nipper

spoken as a person who graduated in the 70's

Migrateduser

Wow, really? With all due respect to older people than I, I hope I don't come across that way. I was born in the late 70's but that's about it.

Environments:
(1,2) TS6.5, TS6.5SP1 on W2K3
(3) Vignette V7 Portal on Solaris 9

Migrateduser

Nope, you're still comparing apples to oranges.

Dave Smith
Sr. Software Engineer
Nike, Inc.
(503) 671-4238
DavidH.Smith@nike.com

Migrateduser

I see your logic, but rather than force people to spend thousands of dollars to what equates to useless testing, they should make the test for each version hard enough so that someone who is taking the test for 7.0, but wasn't certified in 6.5, couldn't possibly pass it unless they really know 6.5. That's a more useful way of certifying people, and would provide much more credibility for those who are certified. But much less cost effective for Interwoven, so I can bet they will never take this approach when monkeys will just keep giving them money for getting certified for each version.

Dave Smith
Sr. Software Engineer
Nike, Inc.
(503) 671-4238
DavidH.Smith@nike.com

Migrateduser

Not only that, but it would cost Interwoven that much more to write the test materials, too. I don't see them going that route!

Dave

Environments:
(1,2) TS6.5, TS6.5SP1 on W2K3
(3) Vignette V7 Portal on Solaris 9

Migrateduser

Ok, Smitty. Let's try apples to apples. Microsoft offers a certification called MCSA (Microsoft Certitified System Administrator). They have offered this since Windows 2000. People who have a Windows 2000 MCSA would not necessarily be qualified to administer WIndows Server 2003. That's why Microsoft has an upgrade path from Windows 2000 MCSA to Windows Server 2003 MCSA. The difference is that MS also offers Windows Server 2003 MCSA stand-alone. This is very common. Software gets upgraded so the certification must be renewed to be certified as qualified to develop/administer the new version. I believe SUN has a very similar model for their certification programs.

It's not a waste of money for those who want to be able to quickly demonstrate to an employer or a potential employer that they have the knowledge/training required to do a particular job. It takes away the need for an employer to setup their own tests to make sure that the person is qualified. This is not to discount experience. Obviously there are people who would be better qualified to perform tasks than their certified counterparts. But the certification is a benchmark which can help employers guage a candidate's skill.

My feeling about certification is that without experience, it really isn't meaningful, but that's not how many employers see it. Personally, I'd rather hire an experienced Perl developer to develop for me than a person who is just learning how to code but has passed the Interwoven certification program.

I agree that the way Interwoven does it is a little bit limitting. Makes it difficult for people who aren't certified to get certified.

- Jason