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Tag Archives: consulting

In favour of Tuition Fees?

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Tuition Fees. Like them or loath them they’re now here, but what are the implications for the enterprise and more specifically, what will they mean for Cloud Computing?

Over the next two blog postings we’ll argue both sides of the coin.

To start with it’s the turn of those in favour of tuition fees.

In Favour

“The countries in the world in which universities make the biggest contribution to social mobility are those with the highest fees.” – Nick Boles, Conservative MP for Grantham and Stamford

Cloud Computing is not just on the cusp, but is happily galloping over the cusp of greatness. Apple has just launched their iCloud, media-savvy proof that cloud is now being used (effectively) and loved by the masses, by anyone with an iPhone, iPad or Apple computer. Cloud is now a trusted process for work and home alike.

This mass adoption will need increased infrastructure and further development, in order to sustain growth and securely manage both personal and enterprise accounts. This naturally needs a larger workforce than is currently available and will also need sustained investment in training.

The workforce should come through our colleges and Universities. There is a need for highly skilled minds to be trained in both the theory and application of Cloud Computing, and one such route for this would be through Higher Education.

Back in May, Theresa Durrant, Operations Director at Resource on Demand (ROD), said:

“Higher Education Institutions need to further their commercial partnerships with organisations and platforms in order to give under-graduates the edge in a crowded job market. Through offering modules in contemporary technology, such as cloud computing, graduates will enter the job market better equipped for the task in hand.”

“We are currently seeing graduates enter the job market with no certification at all, which is the bare minimum they would need to work with a platform such as salesforce.com. There is then additional training they need to undertake before they can begin to work, which we hope can be avoided in the future.”

There is need for the educational system to continue investing heavily in their students and this funding needs to come from tuition fees. Education costs money, but the results should be impressive.

In the US, where tuition fees are considered to be high, graduate entrepreneurs still account for thirty per cent of the growth in the economy.

Whilst we’re not after, specifically, entrepreneurial graduates; we are after a high calibre of students to be training in the intricacies of Cloud Computing, and many of these will have an entrepreneurial spirit, which will be needed to continue growing the cloud.

Yes there are other training methods, but the sharpest minds will need University to hone their skills and they will require the latest technology to train with. All of which costs money.

The cloud will reap the benefits in the next ten years, as will the graduates who went to University.

Do you agree of disagree with this?

Next week: Against Tuition Fees.

Please note that this blog post does not necessarily express the views of Resource on Demand or their team.

 


Can we speak the new language of the cloud?

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ROD was recently approached by the good people at Cloud Pro, who wanted our thoughts on how quickly people are adapting to new technologies like Cloud Computing.  Here’s a snippet of the article and the link to the full piece on their website.

Can we speak the new language of the cloud?

Cloud computing has created the need for a new vocabulary – and new languages. How quickly are we adapting to this new way of working?

It is perhaps no surprise that the ‘utopian’ world of cloud computing should throw up new set of programming languages. A new lingua franca was inevitable as software developers came to collude inside the fresh pastures of the cloud computing cloudscape with its untapped possibilities.

While cloud vendors have sought to pacify us with suggestions that software development methodologies and core technology principles translate ‘seamlessly’ to the cloud; the reality is that a whole range of new languages and systems tools has come to be and, as yet, not everybody speaks fluently in these new tongues.

Comparatively new names including Cassandra, Voldemort, Puppet, Chef, Map Reduce and Hadoop are starting to define the skill sets that by which we measure cloud competency at the individual coder level. So has the IT recruitment industry found itself on a blind curve heading downhill faster than it can manage? Furthermore, have programmers themselves recognised the new skills topography they will need to navigate – and what are they doing about it?

Back to school?

At the individual level, software application developers are of course responsible for their own skill sets. As such, they can take it upon themselves to ‘train up’ for the cloud by using online training tools and resources if they wish. However in practice, not every developer will choose to augment his skills, so inequalities in the programmer job market have become more pronounced.

“One thing we have always noticed as cloud recruitment specialists is that there are truly excellent programmers who excel at everything they do; and then there are average programmers who ‘just about get by’ and are sometimes carried along by other members of the team. But, crucially, when it comes to the cloud, this disparity is magnified and there is an even greater wedge between the two tiers,” said Theresa Durrant, operations director of cloud-specialist recruitment consultancy Resource On Demand Limited.

“We typically work for large global IT consultancy brands and our clients are becoming very demanding when it comes to skill sets for the cloud. This issue needs to be highlighted right the way back to the student level, or we risk the uncertainties of a job market suffering from a dearth of core skills. Aberdeen University has apparently started to offer MSc/PgDip in ‘Cloud Computing’, but this is a mere drop in the ocean in terms of what is needed,” added Durrant.

To continue reading this article on the Channel Pro website, please click here.

 


New video: All about Resource on Demand

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In this video ‘Resource on Demand’ Managing Director, Lee Durrant, talks about ROD, which is leading the way in Cloud Recruitment in the UK. Lee explains more about the company, what we do, who we help and how we have adopted a new business model – making recruitment an affordable option for organisations all over the UK & Ireland.


Video: Your first steps to becoming a salesforce.com consultant

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There are many people looking for ways to get into the salesforce.com ecosystem.

In this video Lee Durrant, MD of Resource on Demand (ROD), talks you through your first steps to becoming a salesforce.com consultant.

If we can assist you in becoming a salesforce.com consultant or you would like to talk to us about your options please either email us: rod@resourceondemand.com or phone us on 020 8123 7769


9 Tips to Cracking the Cloud

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We’re always being asked how candidates can ‘get into the cloud’, so here’s our top tips, but don’t just pick one, go through all of them and if you really want to work in the salesforce.com ecosystem – do as many of these as you can.  It will pay off.

1.  Do not underestimate the effect of demonstrating enthusiasm and persistence when attempting to break into the salesforce.com ecosystem. Do online training, get certified, push yourself into the salesforce.com world.

2.  Try and identify areas of salesforce.com technologies and features that you are not aware of and learn about them. See what experienced salesforce.com Consultants and Developers are talking about on forums such as this one.

3.  Be prepared to attend events, and when you do attend don’t just shuffle around on your own – Network, Network, Network!

4.  Continue networking online, through Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin and Viadeo.

5.  Relationships are very important in the salesforce.com ecosystem as it is currently very close knit – so your reputation and history will follow you!

6.  Be prepared to start building from the ground up, remember, 3 months is a long time in this industry and progression can be swift.

7.  There is a wide cultural range of consulting partners for salesforce.com, find the organisations that you would like to work with and tell the recruiter that you are dealing with.

8.  Also, be willing to get involved and possibly keep your expectations on salary flexible – at least until you have proved your worth to your employer.

9. Offer yourself to ROD’s Volunteer programme. If you have the time, ROD can help you in offering your services to a charity organisation that uses salesforce.com. This will give you some real world salesforce.com exposure and provide you with a salesforce.com recognised project to put on your CV.


Salesforce.com consulting, what's more important: Certification or Experience?

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Although salesforce.com is now 10 years old, there is a shortage of experienced consultants. Through 2009 and so far in 2010 salesforce.com is becoming an increasing hot topic, aligned to the mainstream acceptance of cloud computing.

Salesforce.com revenues now exceed $1bn. There are a few schemes available to newcomers to the industry designed to provide hands on experience for consultants new to salesforce.com, however it must be said at the time of writing this (Feb 2010) a consultant is considered to be “experienced” if they have between 6 months and 2 years experience of salesforce.com and anything over 2 years is still relatively rare.

Certainly, those with significant experience are currently in great demand and relative newcomers (ie 3 to 6 months experience) are also being actively head hunted.

There is plenty of free online material that can provide some base education on salesforce.com features and functions. Additionally there are a number of courses on offer from salesforce.com that can provide good product knowledge for administrators, consultants and developers alike.

As for whether certification or experience are the most important factor in valuing a consultant of course the answer is, that depends. Certification is a great way of providing confidence in product knowledge and as an officially recognised mark of expected standards of knowledge and best practice. However due to the powerful and flexible nature of salesforce.com practical experience plays a vital role in providing the depth of skills required to be able to deliver services well to customers, to be able to accurately, efficiently and to best effect, provide consultancy services that make best use of salesforce.com to customers needs.

Certification can provide a very good introduction to the technologies involved and best practice methodologies and certainly demonstrates a commitment to moving in to salesforce.com consultancy and no matter what level of experience, to remain current certification should be a serious consideration. Experience of a wide range of customer profiles and processes and depth of practical experience will always boost confidence and capability.

So to answer the initial questions, it depends! However a bit of both are probably a great place to start!