We live in very difficult times. The world economy is suffering and jobs are being lost everywhere. In these times, one needs to focus on oneself and improve the chances of getting hired. In other words, self-investment is of paramount importance now.

If you’re in the IT business, you’re in luck. This time, IT jobs are suffering the least, if we can say that. The last two major economic downturns at the beginning of this century hit IT jobs hardest. In fact, the IT industry was one of the causes of one such recession: the famous dot-com bubble that burst in 2001. There are many articles written on the subject of that recession and the collapse of the IT industry, but one thing we need to mention caused the huge increase in IT jobs before the overinflation of that bubble. This one thing is the well-known Y2K problem. The years before 2000 were the Golden Age of programming. We are now approaching the golden age of network engineering!

The year is 2010, almost 10 years after the initial signs of an impending doom for the IT industry became visible, and we are on the verge of another surge in IT spending, especially networking. No point beating around the bush: IP addresses are running out. The entire internet works, works, and works with IP addresses and the number of them available to assign to startups is pretty much gone! In less than two years, many if not all companies will need to start migrating to a new network address: IPv6.

IPv6 has been around for almost a decade, but hardly anyone took it seriously. That is changing now, as more and more businesses begin to realize that they may lose communication with much of the Internet in the very near future. As they strive to prevent that, it will be necessary to employ a more capable workforce. Who is that workforce? Well… network engineers! The Golden Age of networking is about to begin!

Yes, we are in a recession now, the economy is bad and it is difficult to invest in education and certification. However, that’s the only way to ensure you’re part of the next surge in networking jobs! As an early indicator of this, we only have to look at the network giants, like Cisco, Juniper, HP, IBM. Many companies are laying off, while these companies are hiring right and left their most competent and advanced teams! As time goes on, smaller companies and integrators will take notice and take advantage of this growing opportunity by hiring even more competent engineers. Who are those people who are being hired? Those are Cisco CCIE certified experts.

CCIE is one of the most valued certifications in the IT industry. It is a highly coveted Cisco certification that can be earned by an IT professional, who has professional resumes. It is the first strong step to climb the corporate ladder. Obtaining the CCIE certification makes one insured during the time of recession. Although it is one of the most difficult IT certifications to obtain, its benefits are limitless for personal professional growth. There are currently 6 CCIE certification tracks offered by Cisco. They are CCIE Routing & Switching, CCIE Voice, CCIE Security, CCIE Service Provider, CCIE Wireless, CCIE Storage networking, and CCIE Service Provider Operations.

To get a CCIE certification, it takes a lot of hard work and dedication because the CCIE exams are the most grueling IT certification exams in the IT industry. It takes a lot of determination to stay focused on working hard. So how can it be achieved? Selecting a good CCIE training partner with a proven track record is the first step on the path to CCIE certification. IPexpert is the industry leading CCIE training provider with a proven track record combined with content rich CCIE training solutions including workbooks, video-on-demand courses, audio-on-demand courses, bootcamps, rack rentals and learning solutions. combined with a proven structured learning approach.

Having CCIE has never been more important in history than now! Being a CCIE was always almost a guarantee of a high-paying job, but as we approach the aforementioned “IPocalypse”, CCIE can be promised much, much more than ever… When will it become one?