Qualifications from the commercial sector are now, without a doubt, beginning to replace the traditional academic paths into the IT industry - but why is this the case? With a growing demand for specific technological expertise, the IT sector has moved to specific, honed-in training that can only come from the vendors - that is companies such as Microsoft, CompTIA, CISCO and Adobe. Frequently this is at a far reduced cost both money and time wise. Clearly, a certain amount of associated detail has to be learned, but focused specifics in the required areas gives a commercially educated person a real head start.

What if you were an employer - and you needed to take on someone with a very particular skill-set. Which is the most straightforward: Pore through reams of different degrees and college qualifications from hopeful applicants, struggling to grasp what they've learned and which commercial skills have been attained, or choose a specific set of accreditations that exactly fulfil your criteria, and then choose your interviewees based around that. You can then focus on how someone will fit into the team at interview - instead of long discussions on technical suitability.

To get a specifically well rounded network career-path, you might look at including either the MS MCSE or MCSA to your A+, Network+ & CCNA program. Either way, a discussion of your career-path and learning-style, with a knowledgeable IT professional or consultant, really should be at the head of your sheet of priorities, to be sure that you will get off to the best possible start and escape any frustrating mistakes.

Technology and IT is amongst the most stimulating and innovative industries you could be involved with. To be working on the cutting-edge of technology puts you at the fore-front of developments affecting everyone who lives in the 21st century. We're only just starting to get a feel for how technology will affect our lives in the future. Computers and the Internet will massively alter the way we see and interrelate with the world as a whole over the coming years.

Let's not ignore salaries either - the typical remuneration over this country as a whole for the usual IT worker is much better than in the rest of the economy. Chances are you'll make quite a bit more than you'd typically expect to bring in elsewhere. The need for well trained and qualified IT technicians is a fact of life for the significant future, due to the ongoing growth in IT dependency in commerce and the very large deficiency still in existence.

Trainees eager to begin an IT career often haven't a clue which direction is best, let alone what sector to achieve their certification in. As in the absence of any solid background in the IT industry, how can most of us understand what a particular job actually consists of? To attack this, there should be a discussion of many core topics:

- What hobbies you're involved with in your spare-time - as they can highlight what things you'll get the most enjoyment out of.

- Is your focus to get certified due to a particular raison d'etre - i.e. are you looking at working based at home (working for yourself?)?

- Is salary further up on your priority-scale than other requirements.

- Learning what typical job areas and sectors are - and what makes them different.

- How much effort you're prepared to spend on obtaining your certification.

To cut through all the jargon and confusion, and uncover what'll really work for you, have an in-depth discussion with an industry expert and advisor; an individual who appreciates and can explain the commercial realities and of course all the qualifications.

One area that's often over-looked when preparing for 'Cisco' exams is how to reproduce the 'Cisco' environment. If you are working on a Microsoft MCSA or MCSE for example, a handful of old Computers are able to be 'networked' with each other to permit economical 'dummy-runs' at home with genuine equipment. This isn't the case with Cisco - to create any sort of practical environment you'd have to have sophisticated routers and hardware, plus many PC's & further very expensive technology. The only real practical answer is to utilise 'simulated' networks that are approved by Cisco. These provide an on screen software-system, that allows you to effectively construct large scale 'virtual' networks & test them, all the way down to specific router/data-switch types, along with having the ability to 'interrogate' the packages of information whilst they move through the network. These are excellent pieces of software, & no home study or self learning CCNA package should be considered without one. The hugely respected RouterSim's 'CCNA' Network-Visualiser is undoubtedly among the finest we've tried, and we include it in all our CCNA training courses.

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