Rent A Cert - a website newly created on Friday, September 21st, seeks to line the pockets of Cisco certification holders with extra cash.
While simultaneously preying on the desperation of those in the Cisco channel who wish to improve their company partnership levels on the cheap, to either Cisco Silver or Cisco Gold status (and the coveted partner discounts that go along with each status).
The San Francisco CraigsList is running the below Rent A Cert advertisement:
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People w/ Cisco Certs Needed (financial district)
Our clients are companies that want to achieve higher Cisco partner status and need Cisco certified people on their staff to do it. If you have: - CCNA ...my clients will pay you up to $1,200/month just to associate your certification with their company. Visit: ...for details. No games/signup fees/anything like that. |
Here is the Rent A Cert business proposition:
Being a certified partner can save your company unlimited amounts of money. For example, if a Cisco retailer resells $1M of Cisco merchandise annually and then as a result of being a "gold partner" can buy products at 50% off retail instead of the previous 40%, the reseller will make an additional $100,000 on the direct discount alone (not to mention the additional marketing power the reseller will have with their new status!).
Unfortunately, hiring 4 CCIEs full-time might run your company half a million dollars.
Fortunately, you can arrange for a "support agreement" with certified individuals through Rent A Cert for a fraction of a fraction of the cost.
Monthly - Income - Payment - Profit:
| Certification |
Monthly Income to Cert Holder |
Monthly Payment from Cisco Partner |
Monthly Profit to Rent A Cert |
| CCNA | $100 | $139 | $39 |
| CCNP | $250 | $299 | $49 |
| CCDP | $250 | $299 | $49 |
| CCVP | $250 | $299 | $49 |
| CCSP | $250 | $299 | $49 |
| CCIE | $1,000 | $1,149 | $149 |
Rent A Cert caveats worth mentioning:
Disclaimer
Should your use of the Site violate any agreement, you agree that you shall be solely responsible for the consequences that result, including but not limited to termination of partner status and/or certification status. You further agree, on behalf of yourself personally and your company, if registering as a company, to indemnify and hold harmless Rent A Cert and Twelve Inches Around Corp. from any damages that may occur from your use of this site and/or from your violation of any certification or partnership agreements.
Billing & Agreement Duration
Companies that have requested individuals with certifications associate with their company must pay all amounts due "upon receipt" and for the duration of the agreement (generally, 1 year). All participating certified individuals must give 30 days notice if they would no longer like to participate. While the duration of company - certified individual is limited by time and other factors as described on the Site, this agreement shall not terminate simply because certified individual and company are no longer matched with each other.
Official Cisco response to the Rent A Cert idea:
 Lang Tibbils - PR Manager Corporate Communications for Cisco, provided the following response from Cisco:
The main objective of the Rent-a-Cert idea is to help companies (our channel partners) obtain a higher level of certification. |
Given the rules and regulations that govern our Channel Partner Program, we see a couple of issues with the Rent-a-Cert idea.
| 1. |
If a channel partner hires a CCIE away from another Cisco Certified or Specialized Partner, Cisco will not count this individual toward the certification or specialization for the hiring channel partner for 12-months from the date of hire.
This would make it tough for a CCIE to rent themselves to more than one partner over the course of a 12-month period. We can enforce this policy, because CCIEs are identified by an individual # and we have a complete employment history in our database, including moves and changes among companies. |
| 2. |
To obtain a Gold Certification the channel partner must employ 4 CCIEs and to earn Silver the requirement is 2 CCIEs.
According to our Channel Partner Program requirements, partners can employ full-time contractor employees, but that number cannot exceed 50% of the required number of CCIEs, meaning for Gold partners you cannot have more than two contracted CCIEs. As part of our annual partner audit we validate the employment contracts for the required CCIEs. Near as we can tell, the Rent-a-Cert idea is based on the concept that a CCIE could simply loan his/her certification number to a channel partner, but given that Cisco has a complete employment history of all CCIEs we would discover during the audit process that a CCIE was a registered employee for two companies thus making it impossible for them to qualify as a full-time contractor or employee. |
| 3. |
Channel partners have 30-days to notify Cisco if they lose a CCIE and no longer employ the required number of CCIEs for their certification.
Upon receipt of this notice the partner may qualify for a six month extension to replace the CCIE before losing their certification, meaning if they are Gold Certified they would move to Silver Certified and Silver to Premier. This requirement to remain compliant between annual audits makes Rent-a-Cert a short-term fix or expensive long-term proposition. |
What I personally think about the Rent A Cert idea:
| 1. |
Cisco Cert holders have the right to market themselves and create job opportunities in pretty much whatever manner they wish.
However, the Rent A Cert idea is penny wise and dollar foolish for the cert holder, although it may appear at first to be a great way to earn extra monthly cash from your cert. Why? Because it will drive down the salaries of all Cisco cert holders once Cisco partners get into the habit of "cheaply renting" Cisco certs. |
| 2. |
Initially the Rent A Cert idea will appear advantageous for Cisco partners renting CCIEs on the "cheap".
But where is that partner's value proposition? Rent A Cert touts on its home page: Earn money -- up to $1,200/month! Almost no work required! Securing larger discounts without the "value" full-time CCIEs bring to customer accounts, will rapidly lead to a competitive commodity pricing situation where Cisco partner margins erode, resulting in less profitability for all Cisco partners. |
Related stories:
| CCIE Pursuit | Rent Your Cisco Certification For Cash |
| Network World | Rented Certifications: What’s That About? |
What are your thoughts? Is Rent A Cert a good or bad idea for Cisco partners and cert holders?
About Brad Reese on Cisco
Brad Reese is research manager at BradReese.Com, advancing the careers of 1 million certified individuals in the growing Cisco Career Certification Program.
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My 2¢
Thanks for the read Brad.
When I read information like this, I'm always thinking about the legal side of the issue. In this case, questions such as "Is the Cert Holder in violation of any Cisco agreement?", "Are the partners in violation of any Cisco agreements by falsely claiming they employ Certified Professionals?" After all, the partners are renting the certs, not the cert holder.
Here is what I was thinking when I read the story. I may be wrong, but they were just my initial thoughts.
There's nothing illegal about a person associating their ID with a company they aren't physically working for. Two of my board members have associated their MCP IDs with my company to help give us more leverage in the industry. Although that is a little different, because I am employing their services and they are Board Members of the company.
What I am concerned with are the clients of the companies that are claiming they employ Cisco Certified Professionals, namely CCIEs. Not all situations will be this severe, but if I was to hire a company based on the fact that they have in their employment a CCIE (which most people even outside the industry know is a highly reputable and very prestigious certification in the industry), then I expect the quality, service, and knowledge of a CCIE. When that knowledge is not delivered, or I get less than superior quality from an individual that can barely hold onto a CCNA, I'd be pretty upset and possibly even look for legal representation if the problem was bad enough.
--
Robert
Thank you for your comment
Hi Robert,
Thank you for your comment.
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Received a response about Rent A Cert from a CCIE on another Cisco forum who stated:
"I haven't seen less than $2k/mo for CCIE."
"This has been going on for so long it's not even funny."
"Also, Cisco does help other partners do this (obviously not officially)."
"Why?"
"Just think about it for a second."
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Additionally, received a private email about Rent A Cert which stated:
"Brad you know that this strategy has been around for a long time."
"You wish you had built the web site first."
"I am starting to worry about you."
"I think Cisco has gotten into your head."
"Take care."
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Am wondering now if Rent A Cert is merely the "public tip" of a very large iceberg.
Sincerely,
Brad Reese
http://www.BradReese.Com
Hating on Rent-A-Cert
Thank you for bringing this site and issue to the forefront, Brad.
I bet that the following groups are hating on RentaCert.com right now:
1) VARs
2) Hired Guns
3) Cisco
It seems that by making this business process public via this website, Rent-a-Cert is exposing the hush-hush business of part-time (and I use the term "part-time" liberally here) certified engineers. VARs will now worry about their existing arrangements crumbling and the part-time contractors fear losing their gigs. Finally, this just makes Cisco look bad that they're potentially allowing VARs to attain cert levels with a virtually non-existent engineering force.
It was great to get input back on this from Cisco by the way. I'm glad they're finally responding to issues posted here at Network World and around the web.
Corey Donovan
Vibrant Technologies
Thank you Corey
Thank you Corey for your comment.
Made the following personal remark on comp.dcom.sys.cisco:
Rent A Cert states:
"We, of course, will not divulge our client list to either company."
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To which I personally replied:
"Unless of course you get into a payment dispute with Rent A Cert!"
"Talk about holding a knife to the throats of its customers."
"Pay us what we think you owe us or we will report you to Cisco and Microsoft."
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The official response from Rent A Cert to my remark above:
"Second, our site states that we will not disclose our clients to Microsoft or Cisco."
"I'd like to clarify that under any circumstances that we can control (with the foreseeable exceptions of court order or Cisco hacking our PIX firewall using a secret backdoor that only they know about ;)), this is without exception."
"Using name disclosure as a way to force your hand would be wrong, hurt our credibility, and is plainly something we will not do."
Thanks,
~ Rent A Cert Support ~
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Once more Corey, thank you for your comment.
Sincerely and gratefully yours,
Brad Reese
http://www.BradReese.Com
Official response from Rent A Cert
Hi Brad,
We got a look at your story on us in Network World.
We definitely appreciate the honest review and feedback.
As you mentioned, Rent A Cert is a new venture, and we're looking for ways we can better serve the Cisco & Microsoft certified community, rather than take value from it.
Our goal isn't to lower the value of certifications or the salaries of those holding them.
We're IT guys too, and being recognized for the credentials we've worked for is important to us.
That said, we hope that the effect will be that the certifications are even more valuable as a result.
In today's market, I've found from personal experience that certifications generally just act as a means of getting in the door to an interview.
Unless you're working for some specific IT consulting companies (and a vast majority of IT staff isn't -- most of us work directly for an IT department in a non-IT company), your company isn't going to get any benefit to your certifications.
Therefore, by allowing your certification to be rented out, we hope certified individuals will get the current value (a nod into job interviews) and the additional value (direct compensation for specific certifications).
If I can answer any questions for you, please let me know.
Thanks,
Jon C.
Executive Director, Rent A Cert
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2nd official response from Rent A Cert
Jon,
Perhaps you would care to respond to the following negatives about Rent A Cert:
Interested in your thoughts on some of the checks and balance measures that Cisco has put into their channel partner program, which obviously creates a difficult scenario for your business model.
It appears that the Cisco certification holders you want to help, stand to lose because your idea just won't work, especially given Cisco's checks and balances in their channel partner program.
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Thanks, Brad.
Cisco's response to our program was insightful and we will continue to work within their framework.
Our program was never designed to take a company with no talented technical staff and turn them into a Gold Partner, and it's not objectional to us that Cisco requires half of partners' CCIEs to be W-2.
Realistically, if your company sells enough Cisco equipment to make Gold Partner status beneficial based on the % discount rate on equipment purchases, you'll probably need a couple of f/t CCIEs anyway.
Our program provides comfort, for example, to companies that want to ensure that if all the sudden their fourth CCIE decides they want to move on, they're not in a 30-day rush to fill the spot with whatever CCIE they can find.
In other words, we're better thought of as a supplement to hiring talented staff rather than a replacement for doing so.
Jon C.
Executive Director, Rent A Cert
Cisco CCIE routing and switching responds
Received the following personal email message regarding Rent A Cert from a Cisco CCIE routing and switching:
"Brad, excellent job, I noticed your article is one of the top 10 most popular articles on Network World website."
"Good CCIE's make over $1200.00 a day, I completely agree with Emmanuel of Alliant, Cisco Gold Partner, we need not sell ourselves for cheap to companies like Rent A Cert."
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Keep those emails coming in!
Thankfully and gratefully yours,
Brad Reese
http://www.BradReese.Com
my thoughts on this as CCIE
while making extra money never sounds bad I would urge Cisco to strip away the CCIE status of anyone taking part in something as unethical as this. it is clearly going against the original intent of 'gold partner' which is to make sure their clients actually get the benefit of CCIE talent on staff. renting a cert does not provide such benefit to your clients.
Rent a cert
There is one company that openly hired a CCIE and a CCVP using a CCIE forum (groupstudy) and now is a proud Gold Certified Partner. So I think Cisco is not promoting it but it is not discouraging it either.