Anyone aspiring to be an MCA?

About7Narwhal

Just curious if anyone has a goal of achieving the Microsoft Certified Architect certification. I was looking over the requirements for the laughs. My word does this seem difficult. If I understand correctly, Cisco has a similar layout for their top tier cert. Just curious if people actually go after those or not. Seems like an endeavour that would be difficult to recoup the costs from.

Thoughts?

Essendon

I know Everyone is aspiring to be an MCM: Exchange, and I dont think he's too far off from achieving it. Another member, royal, is already an MCM: Exchange. I dont think there's enough ROI to justify the expenditure for almost any company, any MCA's out there must be working for Microsoft I reckon.

About7Narwhal

I just assume stop at MCSE for most situations. There is a point where having a cert can hurt and as you said, ROI on some of them are simply unrealistic.

blargoe

I would wager a large amount of money that 99% of all MCA's either work directly for Microsoft, or work for a Microsoft partner large enough to justify having a world-class Microsoft <insert specialization here> architect in their stable, and had the entire program paid for by their employer.

ptilsen

The evidence I've seen is that almost the entirety of MCMs/MCSMs work for MS and the larger MS consulting partners (e.g. Dell, HP). I would be shocked if there were any MCAs who didn't work for MS or a consulting partner.

I don't really think it's something you aspire to, specifically. If you get to be in a deep expertise role as an MCM/MCSM and a need for an MCA opens up from there, you would train and take it. I don't think anyone pays for either out of pocket, and even MCM/MCSM is different from CCIE in that regard (although many CCIEs have employer help, I realize).

dave330i

Why not? It's part of continuous education. The more you learn, the more ways you can solve a problem. I would love an opportunity to spend few weeks with other VCDX candidates & VCDX working on case studies.