Are you going to Cisco-Live this year? I am.
by Nivon de Carvalho e Silva Junior
In my opinion this event is as much as an investment in your career as a Certification exam.
Unfortunately I did not have the chance to attend a Cisco-Live event in a long time. There was always something up, something like strategic projects, certification exams or great changes in my personal life. I always knew what I was missing but after last year I decided to make the right planning for the right budget and for the right moment to take a few days off work, so this year I will definitely be there. Specially for the 20th anniversary of Cisco Networkers.
There are many different kinds of professionals doing this for their specializations. See medical doctors, I have some as friends or even from my family, they are always investing time and money travelling to conferences around the globe to see new medical procedures, discuss cases with colleagues, having a look on new technologies. They are just trying to keep updated with what’s going on with their jobs in order to better qualify them to offer new services and procedures.
This is the same with IT. We are not talking about some event, but the major event I can see to keep us netproes updated. We are talking about the company who brought us things such as Intelligent Routing, Label Switching (which ended up being MPLS), integrated Security into the network and developed most standards we have in LAN Switching (among other things). So their event deserves a real attention from the internetwork market. Even if you’re not related to Cisco technology, it’s a nice chance to see what Cisco is bringing.
For us professionals, the Cisco-Live is a world of opportunities. We have the chance to socialize with other professionals from different companies, discuss interesting projects, bugs, how we have implemented different technologies and so on. We can immerse into the technical seminars, a 4 or 8 hour seminar bringing detail stuff about technologies we are using (or will use) or transform them in real projects after that. I am definitely going to take the lab instructor-led session and create some scenarios I had in real projects and ask the Cisco Instructor a thousand of questions. Yeah man, these guys are going to suffer!
And for you CCIE seekers, there are few interesting things you’ll find there. First, an 8 hour technical seminar for each CCIE program. So if you’re planning to take the CCIE Wireless, the youngest one, that’s the chance to take a full 8 hours immersion into this program. Cool! Since I’m a candidate for the CCIE R&S, you will find me at its technical seminar. But I am really tempted to check the Wireless too. Oh my God, I need more time! And if have not taken the writing exam, it’s a great chance to take it for free. Yeah I’ll accept this charity from Cisco.
So get your gears and let’s go to this event. As I said it’s an investment. Don’t blame your company, if she’s not sending you. It’s a hard economic time and companies are really cutting costs this year. Instead of waiting use that extra money you have saved for your career investments and do it. It’s a chance to know the beautiful city of San Francisco, that’s one major reason my wife is coming with me, she’s being a great supporter, so it’s time to enjoy the good times. Let’s catch the technology wave and prepare ourselves for whatever is coming for the next years. I’ll see you guys there.
Cheers.
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