If you’ve read the first part of this series, you’ll know that individuals with IT certifications enjoy higher salaries, increased confidence in their abilities and new transferrable knowledge. Did you also know that IT certification holders can help companies with their business transformations?
That may seem like an unexpected conclusion to draw, but it’s true. Consider what business transformation entails: adopting new technologies, changing processes, and finding the right people to guide the transformation. This is all done in the name of enhanced employee and customer experiences that allow for continuous improvement and innovation and getting new products to market faster than competitors.
When a successful business transformation happens, we only see the result. Publicly, stock prices rise and headlines about new digital strategies surface. Behind the scenes are scores, if not thousands of talented individuals who led the charge and remain to help ensure the transformation is sustainable and adaptable to future environment changes.
The IT Certification Council’s (ITCC) Value of IT Certification whitepaper details just how skilled practitioners help businesses navigate through vast changes.
Certifications improve entire partner ecosystem
Organizational transformation can improve a company’s competitive standing. It can also complicate things. During transformations, IT departments face an influx of requests for new tools, C-suites must develop and approve new budgets, managers must ensure employee engagement amid organizational change. No matter how companies approach the transformation process, few can go it alone.
Companies need partners to optimize their chances of success. Analysts found that a strong partner network can improve product offerings and accelerate time to market. For some partners in the transformation ecosystem, success is wholly predicated on selling their services as a transformation partner.
According to research in the ITCC whitepaper, half of business partner firms said that a certified staff provides a competitive advantage. If you’re a certificate holder yourself, you’re familiar with the knowledge-is-power benefits of an IT certification. If you’re a manager, imagine the power of an entire team armed with expert knowledge. It shouldn’t surprise anyone to find that 66% of managers believe certifications improve the levels of service and support teams offer customers.
When certified individuals drive the entire partner ecosystem, the business outcomes for every part of that ecosystem improve. And while the idea of powerful knowledge is a bit abstract, even folks who aren’t impressionist connoisseurs can appreciate the tangible benefits of certifications. Consider that certified staff can increase IT performance by up to 11%, or that a majority estimate the annual economic impact of a certified employee is more than $10,000.
When a business transformation project costs upward of $2m annually to get up and running, every bit of savings and added value counts.
Certified teams boost operational efficiency and revenue
Successful business transformations lead to enhanced customer and employee experiences. Research in the ITCC whitepaper makes it clear certified individuals are ideally equipped to improve revenue-generating avenues by ushering along a successful transformation.
Forty percent of respondents to one study believe certified staff leads to better sales and customer satisfaction, and nearly half said certified individuals help the company gain more market credibility. That makes sense when you consider the inherent value certifications represent. If you’re partnering with an expert to modernize your app portfolio, are you more likely to choose a partner with expertise in microservices? Probably. Are you willing to pay more to work with an organization with certified microservices and Kubernetes experts on hand? Almost undoubtedly.
Market credibility helps organizations in the eyes of customers as well as the partnership ecosystem that is so crucial to transformation efforts. The credibility boost comes from having experts on staff. Sixty percent of study respondents said IT certification holders help them better install and configure solutions, resolve problems and fulfill engagements. If your company is consistently more effective than competitors at encouraging transformational change, it will earn credibility in the eyes of partners and customers.
More certifications = more business
Why find four different partners if one company offers expertise in installation, management and maintenance of a new technology?
The all-in-one offering isn’t possible without a team of certified individuals. But, with enough of these IT experts running a transformation effort, companies will see bottom lines move in the right direction. One study in the ITCC whitepaper shows that companies with 11 to 25 certifications on their staff enjoy at least a 49% revenue production boost.
That certified staff boosts productivity is true of all companies in the business transformation ecosystem. A substantial portion of solutions providers, systems integrators, independent software vendors and service providers agree that having certified staff generates more business.
We now know that IT certifications help individuals expand their skillsets and help companies improve revenue production in part by finding the right partners. Stay tuned for Part 3 of this series, where we’ll explore exactly how certificate holders help companies bring solutions to market faster, increase credibility with customers and provide additional economic benefits to the company.
In the meantime, take a look at our library of certification courses and read the full ITCC whitepaper.
