The Parallel Universes are Coalescing: e-certification in Europe

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1 echallenges e-2009 Conference Proceedings Paul Cunningham and Miriam Cunningham (Eds) IIMC International Information Management Corporation, 2009 ISBN: The Parallel Universes are Coalescing: e-certification in Europe Peter WEISS 1, John O SULLIVAN 2, Roberto BELLINI 3, 1 Institute of Applied Informatics, University of Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe, D-76128, Germany Tel: , Fax: , peter.weiss@kit.edu 2 Thames Communication, 119 The Avenue, Sunbury-on-Thames, Middlesex TW16 5EQ, UK Tel: , @compuserve.com 3 AICA, Piazzale R. Morandi 2, Milano, Italy Tel: +countrycode localcode number, r.bellini@aicanet.it Abstract: E-Skills and support of Europe s innovative capacity in ICT remains one of the hot topics being discussed. In its recent issue paper the Working Group 6 Skills and Lifelong Learning established by the European Commission argued that human capacity building must remain a cross-sectoral and critical area of focus for the European Software Strategy as a whole. E-Certification summarises industrybased certification best practices of tested informal delivery of global industry-based e-skills standards and certifications but as well newly emerging schemes as titled as vendor-independent offerings. The paper looks at current developments in the field of e-certification, referring to an open-consensus workshop initiative e-certification in Europe within CEN. The way forward is outlined to achieve a multi-stakeholder approach for e-certifications to be aligned to European quality criteria under discussion. 1. Introduction More than ever, qualified people with the right ICT skills are needed (EC, 2009). Certifications of IT Professionals (short e-certification ) are seen as being part of the lifelong learning process which requires mechanism allowing to acknowledge the acquisition of knowledge, skills and competences (KSC) in ICT (Information and Communication Technology) along an individual s career. E-Certification is not in competition with education. Indeed, education, training, certification and professionalism are linked in a mutually supporting cycle of lifelong learning (see Figure 1). The figure displays not all alternatives and ways to acquire KSC but refers to one typical stereotype of IT Professionals career path. The paper takes clear focus on certification of ICT professional KSC. Figure 1 e-cert and Lifelong Learning (e-cert, 2009) Effective performance of a job requires besides competences (which can be described and documented) as well personal trait and characteristics (which needs to be discovered as its not obvious) which influences significantly continuous improvement and innovation (not only in ICT). Young (2002) discusses broadly occupational competence and presents a Copyright 2009 The Authors Page 1 of 8

2 model of effective job performance. Occupational competence is defined as the ability to perform the activities within an occupational area. He differentiates two major perspectives: (1) the individual (intent and action (personal characteristics, trait, etc)) and (2) the job ( outcome (job activities: functions and tasks)). Performance standards are as well looked into in detail in (CompTIA, 2004). While E-Certification (especially if industry-based) emphasis the job perspective ( outcome ), education puts more emphasis on personal characteristics and traits ( competencies ). New emerging offerings being independent (meaning IT platform or vendor independent ; see as well Section 4 or for further details please consult (e-cert, 2009)) are starting blurring the border of systems (often characterised as informal and formal ) what in previous research has been characterised as parallel universes (Adelman, 2000). To develop professionalism in ICT is currently being broadly discussed by the IT Professionals community (such as within the Task Force IT Professionalism of CEPIS (Council of European Professional Informatics Societies, certification of skills has become essential. 2. Objectives The paper presents results and outcomes yielded from a European survey conducted for the European Commission within the CEN workshop. The results are documented will be published as CWA (CEN Workshop Agreement) and will reach the status of an official normative document (CEN standard document) in November The goal is to overlook the market of ICT skills certification for ICT professionals in Europe and beyond. The objectives are: To organise an initiative developing an approach and concept for ICT certification for ICT practitioners in Europe on basis of applied reference models and systems to be identified and conceptualised by field experts with the aim to gain and to strengthen broader recognition of ICT certification products across Europe and beyond. In the paper we explore the following four main areas: (1) Market metrics, (2) E-Certification landscapes, (3) Methodology for mapping certifications and (4) European model for e-certification schemes. Next paragraph briefly outlines the context and developments in the field of e-skills, e-certification and Lifelong Learning. Then, we will present applied methodology and results per area. 3. E-Skills Certification The Wider Context The European Commission Communication on e-skills of 7 September 2007 endorsed by the EU Council of Ministers on 23 November 2007 (on page 19) explicitly refers to: Encouraging the development of European quality criteria for existing e-skills industry based certifications, taking into account the upcoming European Qualifications Framework and industry self-regulation initiatives. These criteria should be available in 2009 (EC, 2007). Unfortunately, however, there is no general agreement about what is meant by e-certification the term can be interpreted in various ways depending on the context and background (Harmonise, 2007). Recruiters often do not understand the many certificate abbreviations and thus are not aware of the coverage and the value of each scheme (ENISA, 2007). Foremost, we see this related to the fact that only information how this systems operate and function is difficult to retrieve. It requires consulting web sites and related material of certification providers and training institutions. Often IT professionals are required to consult online communities such Copyright 2009 The Authors Page 2 of 8

3 as XING ( with the hope to get guidance necessary advice which certificate to choose or fitting best their individual career plans. The availability of ICT skills could be seen as the key to success given the huge potential of ICT. As well as this, there is a need for industry to enhance productivity and to reinforce human resources within companies, in order to stay competitive and to drive new market opportunities. Another crucial task for industry is to develop respective performance standards (output perspective) to allocate the right people with required ICT skills and to align them to the right projects, jobs and tasks. If certifications are broadly recognized and transparent to employers, they are able offer such performance standards (Harmonise 2007). 4. E-Certification Systems Certifications in ICT have to be seen as part of a broader issue, namely the establishment of recognised standards for the international ICT profession (Harmonise, 2007), (EC, 2009). In the broadest sense, certification involves formally assessing that the candidate s knowledge and/or skills in relation to a subject are in conformance with a predetermined standard. In a narrower sense, it is the end point of a learning process with an accreditation system that formally validates the candidate s ability to perform a set of activities in the workplace to the required standards. One thing is certain, ICT skills training, like ICT technology development, is dynamic and rapidly changing. Any work in this field requires close co-ordination among all relevant players (EC, 2009). In the scope of this paper we refer to the definition of certification from Dixon and Beier (CEN, 2006): Definition of Certification Certification often means the awarding of a certificate, or other testimonial, that formally recognizes and records success in the assessment of Knowledge, Skills and/or Competencies, as the final step in the completion of a Qualification. However, it is also used, in particular in relation to ICT Practitioner occupations, to mean the Qualification as a whole. It is important to be aware of these two ( narrow and broad ) meanings of Certification. Other definitions can be found in (Harmonise 2007), (Upgrade, 2007), (Enisa 2007), (CompTIA 2004), (ISO 2003) and (ISO 2008). E-Certification schemes are an internationally accepted standard of competence (job or output perspective) for employers, employees, and tutors. They provide customers with a pool of recognised practitioners, qualified in the application of specific products; they provide suppliers with an additional source of revenue and profit, they enforce skills within their distribution chain, and they provide protection to their customer base. The actual growth in market take-up confirms the validity of this view (e-cert, 2009). As not all industry-based certifications are build equal (CompTIA 2004, p. 73) transparency and recognition becomes a major issue. Incompatibilities can be resolved through a common standard (as (ISO 2008) shown above) or alternatively a harmonization scheme certification providers may adhere to. This would allow certifications to signal on voluntary basis their conformity to pre-defined standards and quality criteria. The project analysed two different situations: 1. ICT professional certifications platform bound : examples of platform-bound certification programmes include almost all certifications proposed by Cisco, IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, Sun, etc. An exception to this classification is CompTIA A+ certification: in this case certifications can be considered platform independent for competences on hardware, but it seems to regard Microsoft Windows as the only one Copyright 2009 The Authors Page 3 of 8

4 family of operating systems. In any case, only certifications proposed by the ICT industry are considered by CompTIA, thus neglecting all other programmes proposed by independent entities. 2. ICT professional certifications platform independent : examples of independent certification programmes include AITTS (Germany), EUCIP (Europe), EXIN (NL), ISEB (UK), PMI (USA/WW), other international certifications such as ISTQB, IWA, etc. Independence from technology platforms does not necessarily mean that the certified skills are less practical: this issue is often solved by letting the candidate choose a platform on which to prove his/her skills. The results presented in the remainder are documented in (e-cert, 2009) are there presented and explained in further detail. 4.1 Market Metrics The certification market worldwide continues to grow at around 25% per annum, with a worldwide cumulative total of 10 to 11 million. There is a view that the above growth may be driven from Asia (Japan, India and China), and possibly the Middle East, with Europe showing a different pattern. We were not able to break down these worldwide figures to national or even European level (suppliers have been reluctant to share national data as this is seen as commercially sensitive, and in any case is not always available). To overcome this, the ILB Certification Council has agreed in principle to assist in the collection of regional data, so that the position in Europe is better understood (e-cert, 2009). This situation of many overlapping qualifications has been described as a certification jungle, with poor information, lack of clarity, confusing to prospective candidates and employers, all to the detriment of the labour market. It has also been described as a parallel universe disconnected from official national education systems. But these views are now seen as outdated, as there are many examples of successful convergence (e-cert, 2009). Furthermore, discussions with the industry have confirmed that the volume of learning associated with these vendor certifications is likely to be a multiple of the above figures (e-cert, 2009). This arises because of two factors, known collectively as the iceberg effect (e-cert, 2009): Not all learners on industry training courses offer themselves for assessment, either because their employer is not interested, or because of the expense involved. The industry suggests that the test to train ratio is around 20% For every successful candidate, there is one or two who are not. Pass rates are a jealously guarded secret, but perhaps 30 to 50%. Taking these two factors into account, the volume of associated learning could be 10 times the volume of certifications, giving perhaps 100 million learners worldwide. In view of the importance of this market data to industry and to European policy generally, we recommend an annual cycle of collecting these statistics on a regional basis. We invite the European IT Observatory (EITO) and the ILB Certification Council to collaborate on this undertaking (e-cert, 2009). 4.2 E-Certification Landscapes The research team decided to start with a set of small focus groups, nationally based, initially in the three main markets of UK, Italy and Germany. These are small groups of 10 to 20 participants, mainly national experts in e-certification in the particular country. The purpose of these groups was to expose the project, to overcome barriers collecting data about national market and on the organisational infrastructure for Action 2, and to explore participants views on the development of a possible European model (see Figure 2). Copyright 2009 The Authors Page 4 of 8

5 Figure 2 - Organisations Involved in e-certification (e-cert, 2009) We have surveyed and described the various organisations involved in e-certification for the major markets in Europe. The Map of Institutions involved in the ICT Certifications from a formal point of view show how differentiated they are per country: the map helps to understand the importance of localisation for e-certification systems (e-cert, 2009): for evident implications about language and other cultural implications, but much more because institutions play a very important role in the accreditation process (having major influence on recognition and trust), and more specifically: o Multinational vendors, through their globalised approach, can with only one decision influence their third party networks to be updated on innovation competences requested to manage the new components of their technological platforms in any country; they are present; o National institutions defend the existing formal accreditation systems (often directly linked to national qualification systems which are not referenced by e- Certifications), if available. The maps of Institutions explain furthermore (e-cert, 2009): That product certifications are effectively oriented by vendors upon their unique centralized marketing strategy; That professional certifications are instead strictly related to the cultural, social and institutional environment; The different speed of change between the multinational universe of product certification and the differentiated parallel universe of formal education and informal training and related certifications; How important is the perception, in some specific countries like Germany, France, Italy and Spain of the differences among the high level engineering practice, subjected to total or partial regulation, against the more operative level not regulated at all; Why the global labour market shows so many resistance to start up in reality, a part for multinationals of the demand side and supply side; instead of the local labour market could any way take advantage from a unique standard like the European e-competence Framework (e-cf) (CEN, 2008), (e-cert, 2009). 4.3 Methodology for Mapping Certifications An important sister project under the same Workshop has been the above mentioned e-cf ( That project has produced CWA establishing the new e-competence framework for Europe, together with user guidelines (CEN, 2008). A follow-on project e-cf in Action is maintaining, developing and promoting the new Copyright 2009 The Authors Page 5 of 8

6 e-cf. The e-cf is structured overall in four dimensions: e-competence areas (plan, build, run, operate, manage), set of reference competences for each area, proficiency levels and knowledge/skills (which are optional and linked to derive requirements for training measures related to certification). To compare certification offerings requires to analyze schemes at this particular level of granularity. Knowledge and skills are optional to be applied according to the user guidelines of the e-cf. Knowledge and skills are described on higher granularity through skill categories (see Table 1) and skills. Table 1 - Comparison of Dimension 4 (Skills and Knowledge) with Skill Category (IPROF, 2009) European e-competence Framework (e-cf) Skills and knowledge (Dimension 4) Certification (CompTIA TCC) Dim. Category Content Content Skills Knowledge (k) and Skill categories skills (s) examples Knowledge Comparing certification offerings concerning proficiency, job or performance level seems an easy and intuitive way of classifying and comparing schemes. It would build the link to HR career development processes and resource/competence planning. However, in detail this will be a difficult because complex task, as validating schemes concerning levels often lacks required information from certification suppliers. But there are good examples such as (CompTIA 2007) which provide best practice and show readiness and need of career guidance. We conclude that a common view and model as offered by ISO (2008) would allow to agree on discussed common architecture and terminology. This combined with the e-cf levels and competence descriptions would allow to develop a methodology to classify and sort offerings according to common, explicit attributes and criteria (IPROF, 2009). 4.4 European Model for e-certification Schemes The role of multi-stakeholder partnerships is essential (EC, 2009). Part of the challenge with inadequate educational structures comes fundamentally to the speed with which technology changes. Yet, dynamism and new approaches in skills training is essential. To supplement, it is essential there be close co-operation between all stakeholders concerned. That may mean enhanced partnerships between university and private sector institutions as envisaged under the Bologna Process. It may mean more ICT specific training centres. Or, it may mean investment by individual companies to promote the greater welfare of the industry by augmenting its technical capacity (EC, 2009). We have also examined other ongoing activities in the field of ICT certification such as ISO/IEC ( and IFIP IP3 ( Contact has been established with these initiatives and relationships established. A recent report of Enisa (2007) states that the European Institutions should consider ways to reinforce bridges between education (schools and universities) and the certification process (private training and certificate providers) throughout a professional career (ENISA 2007). This imposes certification providers to agree on common principles and procedures. ISO (2008) is an example of such a normative document which defines general requirements and quality criteria to maintain certification schemes. Quality criteria need to be developed and agreed in an open-consensus environment (such as provided by CEN). Support of suppliers can only be reached if being based on mutual benefit combined with required self-governance. To our experience, regulatory measures are not promising to be successful. Copyright 2009 The Authors Page 6 of 8

7 5. Developments and Related Work E-Certifications obviously have answers to some of the problems that the formal education system does not (such as time to market, global occupational standards, impact, outputorientation, etc.). They offer open, flexible entry points to the ICT profession and can serve as global, industry-oriented performance standards. E-certifications [ ] are not only related to proficiency in product usage, but also on the knowledge of diverse aspects related to ICT and associated processes. Indeed, there are a large number of certifications related to ICT business and management aspects in a broader sense (EC 2009). Currently there is a substantial movement towards recognizing value credentials (EC 2009) in particular industry-based certifications becoming an integral part of a body of knowledge in the context of professionalism (CEN, 2009). (EC, 2008) provides a comprehensive list of collaboration in Europe, with a strong linkage to certification. The universes seem indeed coalescing. But this convergence is not fully embedded and far from being the rule in many EU Member States, there remains resistance in some political and academic quarters. Further mechanisms are needed to achieve and reinforce full awareness, recognition, understanding and inter-operability (e-cert, 2009). Material of the following initiatives were analysed to substrate common quality criteria and principles for a European model: European e-competence Framework (CEN 2008) and CompTIA TechCareer Compass (TCC) (CompTIA 2009), (ISO 2008), (ICT-Lane 2008), (Open-Q, 2004). 6. Conclusions and Outlook Industry stakeholders are strongly supporting developments towards frameworks which motivate the availability of a common language to exchange information about offerings (see as well CompTIA s offer of a roadmap to navigate (CompTIA 2007)). The e-cf provides an important step creating the aspired overarching European framework of ICT professional certifications. The framework has to be built on an overarching architecture and common language (allowing to build reference profiles and reference models). Based on presented results and achievements the following conclusions and objectives for future work have been derived (see (e-cert, 2009) for further detail). Presented work is aiming to assist convergence (coalescing of the parallel universes by presenting and describing national structures with supporting tools in which the respective contributions of education, certification and professionalism are recognised and respected for their value to lifelong learning (e-cert, 2009). Crucial aspect is multi-stakeholder partnerships and the willingness of stakeholders to deliver required information for the analysis. Today this turns out to be one of the major obstacles to arrive at concrete solutions. Recent studies already investigated and explored comprehensively possible ways for partnerships. Potential partnerships are discussed in detail in (EC 2008), (EC 2007) and (CompTIA 2004). Our plans are to carry on with this initiative deploying presented achievements and results through a follow-up activity e-cert in Action to start in first half of References [1] Weiß, Peter: Common Language to Achieve Transparency of ICT Certifications; Proceedings of I-PROF: ICT Professionalism: a Global Challenge; IFIP Working WG 3.2 and 3.4 Conference: February 2009, Arnhem, Netherlands; [2] Adelman (2000). A Parallel Postsecondary Universe: The Certification System in Information Technology. Adelman, C. Office of Educational Research and Improvement, U.S. Department of Education, October Retrieved March 29, 2007, from [3] Cedefop (2006). Cedefop (Ed.) ICT Skills Certification in Europe. Cedefop Dossier series, 13. Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. Retrieved March 6, 2009 from Copyright 2009 The Authors Page 7 of 8

8 [4] CEN (2008). European e-competence Framework; CEN Workshop on ICT-Skills. CWA (part 1 and 2) has been published by CEN in November Retrieved March 6, 2009 from ftp://ftp.cenorm.be/public/cwas/e-europe/ict-skill/. [5] CEN (2006). CEN/ISSS CWA 15515: European ICT Skills Meta-Framework - State-of-the-Art Review, Clarification of the Realities, and Recommendations for Next Steps. Retrieved March 6, 2009 from ftp://ftp.cenorm.be/public/cwas/e-europe/ict-skill/cwa feb.pdf. [6] CompTIA (2009). CompTIA TechCareer Compass (TCC). Last visited March 6, [7] CompTIA (2007). CompTIA Certification Roadmap. [8] CompTIA (2004). CompTIA (The Computing Technology Industry Association) (2004). The Situation and the Role of E-Skills Industry Certification in Europe, August Retrieved May 12, 2007 from [9] E-Cert (2009). E-Certification in Europe. CEN/ISSS Workshop Agreement (CWA). To appear in November 2009, March [10] EC (2009) Recognizing Value Credentials. Issue Paper. Towards a European Software Strategy. Working Group 6, Skills and Lifelong Learning, European Commission DG Information Society and Media - Directorate for Converged Networks and Service, February 2009, Brussels. [11] EC (2008). European Commission. eskillspolicy - Benchmarking study on policies on multistakeholder partnerships for e-skills in Europe. By Empirica, January 2008, [12] EC (2007). European Commission. Policy Communication on e-skills proposing a long term e-skills agenda and five action lines at European level. September 2007, ENISA (2007). Carsten Casper and Alain Esterle: Information Security Certifications, A Primer: Products, people, processes. The European Network and Information Security Agency Technical Department, Deliverable 2.1.5/2007, December [13] HARMONISE (2007). Survey of Certification Schemes for ICT Professionals across Europe towards Harmonisation. September 2007, Project of CEPIS Council of European Professional Informatics Societies, final report. [14] ICT-Lane (2008). A European language for ICT qualifications and competencies Last visited March 6, ISO (2003). ISO/IEC 17024:2003, Conformity Assessment General requirements for bodies operating certification of persons; source: [15] ISO (2008). ISO/IEC 24773:2008: Software Engineering Certification of Software Engineering Professionals Comparison Framework. ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 7/WG 20 N046; source: [16] OPEN-Q (2004). Standardised E-Commerce for Education and Further Training. Open-Q (open- Qualification ) Project, Information only in German. Last visited March 6, [17] Petersen et al. (2004). Petersen, A. W., Revill, P., Ward, T., Wehmeyer, C. (2004) Towards a comprehensive European e-skills reference framework: ICT and e-business skills and training in Europe. Final Synthesis Report. Cedefop last visit [18] Upgrade (2007). ICT Certifications for Informatics Professionals. Luis Fernández-Sanz, María-José García-García, and Peter Weiß (Ed.), Upgrade Journal Special Issue, Vol. VIII, issue no. 3, June [19] (Young, 2002) Mike Young: Clarifying Competencies and Competence, In: The world s knowledge (Chapter: Human Resource Management), Working Paper Series - Henley Management, Part 19, Supplied by the British Library, Copyright 2009 The Authors Page 8 of 8