Cisco partners consolidate, Cisco quietly drops $40M per CCIE rule - does this depress the CCIE job market?

By Brad Reese on Sat, 01/26/08 - 6:35am.

This week powerhouse Cisco gold partner - Calence, announced its intention to be acquired by mega-powerhouse Cisco gold partner Insight, for at least $125 million cash.

Are Cisco gold partner rollups being sparked by the CCIE revenue rule change?

In March 2007, Cisco officially dropped their requirement that every Cisco Gold Partner must add one additional CCIE for each $40 million in annual Cisco revenue.

Previously, the last change to Cisco's CCIE revenue rule was at the April 2001 Cisco Partner Summit in Las Vegas, Cisco eased the revenue-scaling requirement for partners from one CCIE on staff for every $10 million in Cisco revenue to one CCIE for every $40 million.

Cisco's official response to cessation of its gold partner CCIE revenue requirement:

"We continuously solicit feedback from our partners and based on that feedback make evolutionary changes to our programs."

"We started socializing the elimination of the Gold Certification requirement that stated, one additional CCIE had to be added per $40M in annual revenue with our partners roughly 4 years ago as part of the creation of our current Offer-Based Channel Partner Program."

"At that time we felt this requirement was dated and that we had other ways (specialization, support/services and customer satisfaction requirements to name a few) to validate a growing Gold Partner's technical capabilities."

"However, this change didn't officially go into effect until roughly a year ago due to the two year long program creation and two year long program transition periods."

In response to the above rule change, received the following email message from a concerned CCIE Voice candidate:

Given the changes involved with Cisco's Channel Partner Program, is the demand for CCIEs likely to go up, down or remain the same?

The main purpose of my email out of the way, I'll give you a little background.

I'm in the process of studying for my voice CCIE.

I made my first attempt earlier this month and am looking to make my second attempt in early to mid-March.

Yesterday, I happened across the changes that Cisco has made to their partner program.

What I found conspicuously absent from their new set of requirements was any mention of the one additional CCIE for every $40 million in annual Cisco revenue.

If that is no longer the case, there's a possibility that the demand for CCIEs could drop assuming that the $40 million/CCIE requirement is gone.

Now, in the Channel Partner Q&A revised 4/3, Cisco notes in several places how the CCIE requirements have remained the same.

However, they may be simply referring to the 4 CCIEs required for Gold Certification and the 2 CCIEs required for Silver Certification.

There is no clear tie between revenues and CCIEs listed under the new Gold/Silver requirements whereas it is very easy to find that tie under the Retired Gold/Silver Requirements tab.

Is that an unintentional omission or a purposeful and little noticed change?

I don't claim to fully understand how the Channel program worked before and I certainly don't understand fully how it works moving forward.

I do know that the CCIE community will likely react unfavorably and with surreal speed to anything that would reduce their value in the job market.

If I'm misreading the requirements, overestimating how much the CCIE/$40 million of Cisco revenue contributes to CCIE demand or am otherwise uninformed, I'd be very happy to be corrected so I can get back to studying knowing that I'm working towards something that will have enduring value moving forward.

If I'm not misreading the requirements and it is an actual change with some potential for affecting CCIE demand, I figure it will make good material for an article or two.

I thought who better to answer the concerns of the above CCIE Voice candidate than the first CCIE in history - Terry Slattery

Terry's reply:

Brad,

Regarding the email, good networking people are always in demand.

A CCIE certification means that you took the time to go the extra step and are likely (though not always) to be a higher quality candidate than someone else with similar experience, but no CCIE.

Good candidates know how they are good and confidentially present themselves without being brash.

Brash is a clue that the candidate is not likely to be a good team player.

Another aspect of the demand is to look at the number of jobs that might be affected.

We would have to look at the dollar volume per channel partner and determine how many jobs that translates into.

Then figure the total potential job market, which includes all the Cisco customer base.

I don't have the data necessary to do that calculation, but my gut feel is that it won't have that much of an effect on the demand for CCIEs.

Also note that good Cisco Channel Partners know that they can sell the services of their CCIEs, so even though Cisco may no longer mandate that they have CCIEs on staff, the partner is likely to continue to use them as a way to differentiate their services over partners that don't have CCIEs.

So, is the demand going to go down?

I seriously doubt it.

A CCIE candidate won't be able to demand a fat compensation package from a Cisco partner, but that kind of negotiation builds a relationship that's doomed from the start.

If you're strictly in it for the money, get a job in sales.

Take care,

-tcs

The opinions of yours truly:

	Cisco dropped the CCIE revenue rule because there is a shortage of CCIEs, which has had a severe impact on the growth of both Cisco and its gold partners.
	Cisco and its gold partners are locked into a never-ending competition with each other to hire basically the same CCIE talent.
	The *rules of that competition* as mandated by Cisco have severely limited the salaries of CCIEs by depressing their *true market value*.
	*Cisco and its gold partners are being absolutely penny wise and dollar foolish!*
	Because Cisco and its gold partners are *stooping for pennies* by restricting the *true market value* of CCIEs, both Cisco and its gold partners are growing at only a *quarter of the rate* that they could grow should CCIEs be able to earn their *true market value*.
	Until Cisco *unplugs* its foolish rules that depress the *true market value* of CCIEs, Cisco will *forever* be searching for *pie in the sky* growth platforms.
	Unbelievable growth for both Cisco and its gold partners is in their very own backyard - CCIEs, whom if allowed to earn what they are *truly worth*, would fuel spectacular growth beyond even John Chambers' wildest dreams!