Training For a Career in CompTIA A Plus Revealed
Training for your CompTIA A+ covers four specialised areas – you’ll need exam certification in just two sectors to reach the level of A+ competent. For this reason, most training providers simply provide 2 of the training options. Our opinion is this is selling you short – of course you can gain accreditation, but knowing about the others will set you apart in the workplace, where you’ll need to know about all of them. So that’s why you require information in all four areas.
CompTIA A+ training programs cover fault-finding and diagnostics – via hands on and remote access, as well as learning to build, repair and fix and having knowledge of antistatic conditions.
Perhaps you see yourself as the kind of individual who is involved with a big team – supporting, fixing and maintaining networks, you’ll need to add CompTIA Network+, or consider an MCSA or MCSE with Microsoft to give you a wider knowledge of how networks work.
You’ll come across courses which guarantee examination passes – this always means exams have to be paid for upfront, at the start of your training. However, prior to embracing this so-called guarantee, look at the following:
You’ll pay for it by some means. You can be assured it’s not a freebie – it’s simply been shoe-horned into the price as a whole.
Should you seriously need to qualify first ‘go’, you must pay for each exam as you go, prioritise it appropriately and be ready for the task.
Does it really add up to pay the training college early for exam fees? Find the best deal you can when you take the exam, rather than pay marked up fees – and sit exams more locally – rather than in some remote place.
Is there a good reason to pay interest on a bigger loan than is necessary because you’ve paid early for examinations when you didn’t need to? A great deal of money is made by companies charging upfront for all their exams – and then cashing in when they’re not all taken.
Most companies will require you to do mock exams and not allow you to re-take an exam until you’ve demonstrated an excellent ability to pass – which makes an ‘Exam Guarantee’ frankly useless.
Spending hundreds or even thousands extra on an ‘Exam Guarantee’ is foolish – when consistent and systematic learning, coupled with quality exam simulation software is what will really see you through.
Commercially accredited qualifications are now, very visibly, already replacing the traditional routes into IT – but why has this come about?
Industry now recognises that to cover the necessary commercial skill-sets, official accreditation from the likes of Microsoft, CompTIA, CISCO and Adobe is far more effective and specialised – for much less time and money.
Patently, a necessary degree of associated knowledge needs to be learned, but essential specialised knowledge in the exact job role gives a commercially trained student a distinct advantage.
Just as the old advertisement said: ‘It does what it says on the tin’. All an employer has to do is know what areas need to be serviced, and then match up the appropriate exam numbers as a requirement. That way they can be sure they’re interviewing applicants who can do the job.
One feature that several companies offer is a Job Placement Assistance program. It’s intention is to help you find your first job in the industry. At the end of the day it’s not as hard as some people make out to land a job – assuming you’re well trained and qualified; the shortage of IT personnel in Britain looks after that.
However, don’t leave it until you’ve completed your exams before polishing up your CV. As soon as your training commences, enter details of your study programme and place it on jobsites!
A good number of junior support jobs have been bagged by people who’re still on their course and haven’t even passed a single exam yet. This will at least get your CV into the ‘possible’ pile and not the ‘no’ pile.
If you’d like to get employment in your home town, then it’s quite likely that a specialist independent regional recruitment consultant or service could serve you better than a national service, for they are much more inclined to be familiar with what’s available near you.
Not inconsiderable numbers of people, it would appear, are prepared to study their hearts out (sometimes for years), only to give up at the first hurdle when attempting to secure their first job. Sell yourself… Work hard to get yourself known. Don’t think a job’s just going to jump out in front of you.
Massive developments are coming via technology over the next generation – and the industry becomes more ground-breaking every year.
Computing technology and dialogue through the internet will noticeably change our lives in the future; remarkably so.
Let’s not ignore salaries moreover – the typical remuneration throughout Britain for a typical IT employee is noticeably greater than in the rest of the economy. It’s a good bet you’ll bring in quite a bit more than you’d expect to earn doing other work.
The requirement for appropriately qualified IT professionals is a fact of life for many years to come, due to the continuous development in IT dependency in commerce and the massive skills gap that remains.
Copyright 2009 S. Edwards. Go to www.learninglolly.com/A_Training_Courses.html or This Site.