Cisco's plan to triple global pool of network engineers

Stuart Corner
Wednesday, 25 June 2008 05:12

IT Industry - Strategy

However, that number might not be enough to meet India's demand. According to a recent IDC report on global skills, cited by Cisco, India's surging economic development will create a demand for 137,000 more networking professionals by 2009.

A recent study commissioned by Cisco and conducted by Forrester Consulting found that there is a pervasive need for specialised networking skills. Thirty six percent of the global companies surveyed reported that they have dedicated wireless specialists in their IT organisations, a number that will almost double in the next five years.

Dedicated network security specialists were found in 46 percent of the companies surveyed and that number is expected to increase to 80 percent in five years. Additionally, 69 percent of the companies surveyed expect to have a dedicated voice specialist in their organisations within five years up from 40 percent currently. The survey respondents also cited the importance of certifications in their professional development.

In their own career history, the IT decision-makers surveyed indicated that professional and technical certifications were second only to a four-year college degree in the qualifications needed for their position.

Driving the exploding demand for network engineers is the explosive growth in applications, particularly video, that place huge demands on networks, and the number of networked devices. In late 2007 Kevin Bloch, Cisco's Australia's director advanced technologies and engineering briefed journalists on the looming skills shortage, and pointed out that there are now some 300 million PCs, some three billion cellphones and upwards of a trillion RFID devices and sensors in operation. "Everything has got some intelligence on it connecting it through a network of some sort to something else and the network is becoming exponentially more important as we move forward," he said.

The Cisco Learning Network enables individuals to "discuss top-of-mind issues and interact with thought leaders in network design, implementation and operations." The community will also directly contribute to the continued development and co-creation of Cisco's education strategies by providing real-world community feedback that can be used for training development and assessment.

"With the built-in document-sharing tool, there is now a single source for the certified community to seek out product documentation, configuration and troubleshooting advice as well as expert opinions on networking challenges," Cisco says. "As the community develops, it will become an important resource that can be taken advantage of by IT professionals to increase productivity and address critical issues in the networks they administer."