Are you looking to learn about the AWS Cloud Practitioner Certification?
If so, this video is for you.
Hi. My name is Michael Gibbs, and I'm the founder and CEO of Go Cloud Architects, and we're an
organization dedicated towards building high performance cloud computing careers.
I have been working in tech now for over 25 years, and I've been coaching or mentoring
others to get their first tech job or get promoted in tech for well over two decades.
And today, we're going to talk about the AWS cloud practitioner exam and is it worth it?
The way we're going to present today's information
is we're going to talk about what is the purpose of the certification,
then we'll talk about certifications that not only build your portfolio, that escalate your career,
and then from there, we're going to talk about the cloud practitioner certification. Should you
do it? And then if you should not, we're going to give you recommended steps on what to do instead
to make sure you have the best cloud architect, solution architect or cloud computing career.
Let's talk about certifications and what are they? So at Go Cloud Architects,
we actually love certifications, though people would assume we do not. We love certifications
because a certification can do the following: It can teach you about vendor services such as Cisco,
Microsoft, AWS, and it can make up for gaps on your resume,
which is really great, especially when you have gaps in experience.
And when you have a collection of the right certifications, not the wrong ones,
it can help you being brought in for an interview. So that's great. We love certifications because it
helps you get an interview. And without an interview, you don't get the job.
Now let's talk about what certifications will not do. They will not get you hired.
See, they will get you the interview, but when you get on the interview,
it's going to be left to your technical competency, your attitude, your emotional
intelligence, your communication skills and your experience. So while we love the certifications
to help you get that interview, realize they will not get you hired. They're just not enough.
So helpful in boosting your resume to get the interview but not enough to get hired,
with a few exceptions, and we're going to tell you what those exceptions are.
Now, there are certain certifications that are so impressive on your resume that they will get you
hired just by having them. One such example is the Cisco Certified Internet Expert, something which
was a two-day exam that I took 20-plus years ago, and in order to pass the existing exam,
what you had to do was you had to design a system based upon Cisco's requirements, and they knew
it wouldn't work. So not only did you have to design this system that was impossible to work,
then you had to fix it, given the requirements, and they would break it and you'd have to fix it.
Wow. We all got hired. Why? Because we had to be an expert to even do it.
This is different than these other certifications. A lot of these certifications out there are new,
and the way they work now is basically, they ask you the name of a service and how to configure it.
And there's lots of practice tests and lots of ExamDumps and lots of courses,
which can teach you exactly how to pass these exams without knowing anything.
So now let's talk about certifications for the cloud and how to build that really great cloud
certification portfolio. I'm going to tell you right now. Don't do the AWS cloud practitioner.
And our perspective and our experience, the AWS cloud practitioner is simply a huge waste
of your time. Why? Unless you have a large amount of experience, it's going to be near impossible to
actually get hired with the cloud practitioner certification. And okay, we get it. It's an
entry-level certification, but you know what? So is the AWS certified solution architect associate.
They're almost the same level of difficulty and they're almost equally just as basic. And the
reality is it's pretty hard to get hired with the AWS certified solution architect associate alone,
unless you've got a lot of experience, but you're one step closer to getting to your goals.
See, the average cloud architect earn $600 a day. And if it takes you two months to do the cloud
practitioner, then it's going to take you two months if you do it, honestly, because AWS makes
these exams hard. It's going to cost you $12,000 per month for at least two months to pass this
exam, which is a cost to you of $24,000. Now we're talking in terms of opportunity costs, meaning
what you could be earning while you are working versus what you're doing while you're studying.
So we got to get you through the study process as fast as possible so we can get you hired.
So skip the cloud practitioner. Go straight to the AWS certified solution architect associate,
similar level of difficulty, take you about the same two months,
and that's kind of your intro, intro, intro to the AWS cloud. So that's your first step.
Now we're going to take you to the next phase. So as soon as you finish the AWS certified solution
architect associate, next steps. If you want to be a solution architect or cloud architect,
your next step is the AWS certified solution architect professional, straight from the
associate to the professional. Why? The AWS certified solution architect professional is
pretty much the bare minimum level of knowledge to start working as a cloud architect, so go for it.
Now, associate professional. Now you're getting into the place where you're starting to have some
cloud skills. Now, do not do SysOps and do not do DevOps, unless you want to do the following.
If you want to be the maintenance person of these systems, which is SysOps, study SysOps, but then
don't study architecture because they're different skills. If you want to do DevOps, automating
software release cycles, improving the quality and you have software to go back, wonderful, study
DevOps that has DevOps to engineer. Remember, an architect is a system designer. A cloud
engineer is the person that builds the things the architect designs. The SysOps people maintain the
things that the cloud engineers built, and the DevPps people are working on the software stuff,
all wonderful careers but separate. So we want to make sure you get the right one.
So SysOps, for example, and architecture are about as related to the physician
that's working in the hospital taking care of the patients, and the person who works
in the hospital that's making the meals to serve the physicians in the cafeteria,
both very important but different careers. And they're so different that it's not going to
really help the person working in the cafeteria that says, "I want to be a doctor." Likewise,
if the doctor wants to be a chef in a cafeteria, just being a doctor is not going to help them be a
chef. Both are valid, both are important, but it's a matter of just studying for the career you want.
Now, how do we improve these things? So you've done the AWS
certified solution architect associate and a professional. Now, how are we going to round
out your certification portfolio to really make you shine? Here's going to be our recommendations.
Figure out first which career you want. And if, and we're only talking certifications,
we're not talking about the complete training you need but only certifications here,
if you want to be a cloud architect, here's what's going to make it look good. The
certified solution architect professional may be a TOGAF, which is an architecture certification,
perhaps a little bit of networking, things like a CCNA or a Linux certification.
Big picture. Why this big picture? The cloud is nothing, nothing, nothing more
than a virtualized network in a data center. So if you understand the network in the data center,
you want to understand the cloud. So if you want to be a generic cloud architect, that's generally
a recommendation for certifications. Now we've got a lot of training outside that we recommend.
Certification is maybe 10% of the piece, but that's your certification portfolio.
Now let's say, for example, you want to be a cloud infrastructure architect like me,
someone that focuses on the network and infrastructure. Well,
totally different certification portfolio. We're still talking about the certified
solution architect professional as a base cloud certification. Now we need an internet expert,
something that's going to show networking. So here, the Cisco certified network professional
would be good. The Cisco certified internet expert like me is obviously the best, but because
now you've got a cloud networking perspective. No, I did not say the AWS advanced networking.
I said Cisco certified network professional or the Juniper equivalent of that, the Juniper
network's equivalent of that. And I said the AWS certified solution architect. I don't know why.
The AWS events networking, and it's a good course. It's kind of like an intro to networking. It is
really basic. It's like sub-level of a CCNA. So if you're going to be a cloud architect focusing on
infrastructure, you need to know networking, and you're going to get that at the CCNP level. So
that's typically what we're talking about, like a CCNP level net routing and switching person along
with a certified solution architect professional. Great resume for a cloud infrastructure architect.
Now let's say you're a cloud architect that like security. I had my foray into security for years
and I loved it. Now let's see what an architecture certification package would look like. AWS
certified solution architect professional? Yes, because that should be your bare minimum
and a security certification. Now for the architect types, we like the CISSP.
Why? It's a design certification just like architects do, is sign, designing the policy,
planning it, so the CISSP is a beautiful certification combined with the certified
solution architect professional if you want to be a cloud security person.
But you might want deeper, you might want to be on the hacking side and the prevention of the
hacking side, so the CEH is good, the certified ethical hacker, but only with the practical exam.
See, if it's just a paper certification like some of these other things,
it doesn't hold the value. But when you do that CEH practical exam, it's like a Cisco
certified internet expert. You've had to prove to experts that you know what to do.
And when you do that, it raises your value. So that's typically what we're looking for.
Now, people ask us, I'm from a database background. Is there a place for me on
the cloud? Yes, absolutely. So database people, certified solution architect professional, maybe a
deep Oracle professional over vacation. Now you've got that database environment or whatever it is.
See, what we're trying to do to really make you look good is we're taking these deep, deep, deep,
extremely challenging industry certs, the things that basically you know how it all works, and
then we're marrying that with these cloud certs which teaches services on the cloud. And together,
you're building an expert level portfolio, which is going to help you for the rest of your career.
So we're not just talking about how to get your first step here. We're talking about
career progression and acceleration all at the same time. So this will help you get hired,
but it'll help your career progress as well.
So now that we're talking about certifications and how to get them, let's make sure we do
them the right way. You have to be technically competent. I'm going to say this again. If you
are not technically competent, you can't be hired. So everybody that uses an exam dump or some kind
of way where they've gotten practice questions and answers that are like the real thing.
They're not hireable because they don't have the competency,
so it doesn't matter if you're certified. Certification gets you the interview,
but you got to be able to win on the interview, so skip any kind of exam dumps.
Now I'll tell you what we did. we love high quality textbooks, the kind that
a manufacturer would make like Cisco Press book for Cisco. Sybex makes a beautiful book for the
AWS certified solution architect associate and advanced networking and advanced security. These
books are made by the vendor or authorized by the vendor and they are good and they are solid.
So we strongly recommend you get one of them and use that through your training program.
In fact, we feel so strongly about the book thing that we've completely written an AWS certified
solution architect associate e-book and made a course and it's completely free on the link below.
Why did we do this? We surveyed all the courses we saw out there and we couldn't find one that
would prepare you for the job, so we felt bad about it. So we have free AWS certified solution
architect associate and free AWS certified solution architect professional training,
and AWS advanced networking training. I'll leave the links to all below so you can get this. And
the money that you save by not buying training, dedicate it to a book by one of the major vendors,
a Cisco Press book, a Red Hat book, something from the security people that make the CISSP.
Get one of these deep books and read that book with the money you save from not buying
a training program by using our free. You combine those two. Now you're getting training because we
want you to be trained and we want you to have a great cloud computing career.
I will tell you this. I've been an architect for 25 years,
and I've been working on cloud since before they called it the cloud. The first cloud was
frame relay. The next one was HPM. The third one was VPLS. And then we were building the
data center in clouds and clouds and clouds. We built clouds for decades. We just didn't call
them that at the time. And I will tell you, the cloud is a great space to be.
I will tell you it is a wonderful career, and we want to get you there as fast as possible and
help you have the best career. So we love the book model and the books will really help you.
I come from the medical world. I used to practice internal medicine as a nurse
practitioner before I went into tech, and I read a lot of books. When I did my CCIE program, I read
75,000 pages of materials just for that exam alone. So books are great. And we're giving you
the free training. Marry the free training with books and watch your career progress.
Let's talk about some fun things that we can do to help you get your first cloud architect job.
On Mondays and Thursdays, we have a completely free how to get your first
cloud architect job webinar. We will tell you everything you need to know,
how to interview, the things to do in an interview, what hiring managers want.
That's completely free. We do it on Mondays and Thursdays. The link is in the description below.
Now on Tuesdays, we have a completely fun cloud architect career challenge. We invite people
from all over the world, and just like being an architect, they will interview an executive and an
interview with a technical team, and that's what we do on this free webinar every Tuesday. People
come from around the world. They will interview me, and I will give an environment of a sample
case study for my 25-year architecture career. I will present the material. The students will
ask me questions. I will answer their questions. And then everybody will design that system on two
clouds. By the end of this thing, you will know, are you ready to be hired or do you need training?
And if so, you'll know exactly what you need to do. And we do this completely free every Tuesday.
Now on most Wednesdays, we do a free YouTube live where we basically go on YouTube and
you can ask us any questions about how to build your cloud computing career,
and we answer them real-time completely free. Again, subscribe to our channel
and hit the bell to be notified of when we do these, but we do them most Wednesdays.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today. We love the cloud. We love working with
the cloud architect community, and we're honored and privileged to be able to communicate with you
and share our knowledge and experience several times per week on YouTube. Thank you so much
for watching this video, and we look forward to seeing you in another video very soon.