Re: Metro East: Certification SIG meetings

[wllmundrwd@netscape.net (William Underwood)]

<shame notice>
I happen to be an MCSE.  I have been studying as late to update my cert to include Win2K.  My employer saw fit to pay for a class for me, 2150 -- Designing a Secure Windows 2000 Network.  I am attending in the evenings this week.

The class has 11 people in it.  Here is how it breaks down:
4 full time IT people (including me).
3 full time IT support people (techs, cable monkeys, solder jockeys).
3 full time otherwise employed people (looking for career change).
1 unemployed IT support person.

<more shame>
I regret to admit that one person left two hours early, as he was mad about someone apparently using 99% of his cpu time, the entire time he was there.  The person who did it tried to point out (with a localmachine to localmachine net send) that he could use netstat to find out where the connection was coming from, but he didn't appear to grasp the concept.  I will apologize to him tonight...
</more shame>

It is not real suprising, to me at least, that a great many people there have little experience, as it was also not suprising that during the second half of the class, when the instructor was on a diatribe about basic security measures (which included recommending grc.com as a viable [and valuable] personal computer security resource), that everyone else in the class was just freaking astounded that there was so much background to computer security.  Dismayed, yes; suprised, no.

But the point is, I'm getting an MCSE Win2K with an MCSE NT4, and with 6 years experience, I _am_ worth more than the guy who is working as a warehouse/freight handler for a tractor manufacturer.  Even if he bolsters his certification with the same electives that I chose (MS-SQL and Exchange), I have three years experience with each, and he has never seen a production installation.

So, cert factory stamped, or not, certs do help, but only if they are backed up with experience.

My take-it-for-what-it's-worth $.02,
William 
(Who did not end his <shame notice>, because he still feels very shameful about being MS certified...)
-- 
William Underwood
wllmundrwd@netscape.net



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