I need an advice of Seniors..

Birmingham Guy

hi Seniors,

I'm CCNA certified. Have not found job yet, but I want keep studying. But i'm confused to select my next Cisco course, between, CCDA, CCSA, CCNA(voice) or CCNP. Which one of these would you recommend me, according to UK job market.

I will be thankful for your advices.

thanks

ande0255

Voice is a lot more practical application than R/S in my opinion, so if you're not directly working with Voice, I'd go onto CCNP R/S as it's easier to understand through labbing in my opinion. I work with Voice as my main role at my job, and I still found it difficult to lab independently, though it may possibly help with getting into a VoIP role at some point which seems to command pretty good money.

Birmingham Guy

could you please explain me a bit that how CCNA(voice) is good for money?

ande0255

Well, the money is going to come from being an experienced VoIP tech / engineer, I believe because troubleshooting voice issues in the UC environment simply requires extensive experience troubleshooting a wide variety of issues. It cannot be learned from books or by instructional videos, and it is simply too dry for someone to study on their own time, to the level of being an expert troubleshooter as some people may be able to do with R/S studies (at least I find r/s much easier to study and understand in-depth without constantly working with it at my job).

The only value CCNA Voice may have is to get your resume in front of a hiring manager for a VoIP role in a company, but that is about the extent of it - from there it would be up to you to sell yourself to the manager to take a gamble on training you into the role.

My CCNA R/S cert actually got me my interview for my current role of Voice / Data network engineer (though I don't really consider myself engineer level), and I was able to talk myself into a job offer from the interview, and I honestly had little to no prior experience. The only reason I actually did the CCNA Voice is actually because I had no idea how to do any of the Voice stuff at my new job, and had to learn it extremely rapidly, but it was nice cause my work place was practically an 8 hour lab session every day.

Anyways, that's what I have to say about that

Birmingham Guy

I'm staying in india for 2 months, and I have chance to join some college to do CCNA(voice) with lab. what do you advice me about it? I have chance to do CCNA(voice) with lab facility?

ande0255

You might be able to cram knowledge to pass the exam, but with two months your not going to have time to go in depth into all the different prongs of voice. The CCNA Voice covers CUCM (Call Manager) / CUC (Unity Connection) / CUPS (Presence) / CME (CallMgr router) / CUE (Voicemail on router), and so many other intricacies within those realms.

CUCM study itself could take an entire month, unless you absorb material like a sponge, you are only going to get enough out of the material to pass a test. Without working with voice or labbing a LOT, you will not be able to answer troubleshooting questions at all in an interview, which is why I said the certification will get you the interview but it's up to you to put in the extra leg work to pull through it (or work your charm to persuade your way into the position)