FUTURE TECHNOLOGY
S
kills shortage is one of the major
challenges when it comes to the
latest trends such as the Internet
of Things (IoT) and software-defined
networking. In order to capitalise on these
technologies, enterprises will need well-
trained and skilled staff. Cisco predicts that
approximately 220,000 new engineers will
be needed globally every year for the next
10 years to keep up with the technological
surge of the Internet of Everything (IoE).
Professionals with skills in the areas
of IT security, IoT, mobility, cloud,
virtualisation, software-defined networking
and software-defined datacentres are
currently in great demand. This is a gap
that must be filled if the potential of IoE is
to be realised.
For partners to be successful in this
area, they need to play key roles in
defining, selling, deploying and optimising
these megatrends that will deliver
business outcomes and meet customer
needs. Vendor certifications reflect the
breadth of the channel partners’ skills
across certain technologies.
Explains Shadi Salama, Channel
Leader, Cisco Middle East, “Cisco
fully believes that its channel partners
should be trained and certified to gain
a competitive advantage. Training staff
is not as challenging as retaining them
once they have attained the vendor’s
certifications. The constraints tend to
be financial as training in the latest
technologies can be costly. Additionally,
training facilities are limited due to the
lack of skilled ICT consultants in the
region,” continues Salama.
A total of 65 per cent of global IT
leaders report a skills shortage holding
them back, up from 59 per cent last year.
The IT skills gap is a major challenge facing
the IT training sector as well. In a recent
study, 92 per cent of students reported
more successful IT projects involving
Red Hat technologies after they took the
training. In other words, Red Hat Training
helps Red Hat end users maximise their
return on technology investments.
“This gap, together with non-
authorised training in the region,
can represent an inhibitor for
24
Training
staff is not as
challenging
as retaining
them once they
have attained
the vendor’s
certifications.
training partners and a big risk for
our customers. Lack of trained and
skilled IT professionals can be a major
disadvantage for today’s IT companies.
Together with our partners, we need to
create awareness around the value and
importance of the authorised Red Hat
Training and Certification, and how it
lets our customers acquire new skills or
sharpen existing ones, perform better
and increase productivity,” says Hesham
Abdel Mohsen, Business Development
Manager, Middle East, Turkey and Africa,
Red Hat Training.
Digital driver
Middle East organisations are increasingly
reliant on advanced technical skills, but
there is a major mismatch between the
current level of talent and the skills needed
by 2020. For example, 64 per cent of
respondents in a global study, carried out
by the Technical University of Munich and
SAP, felt that their company’s personnel
did not possess the skills necessary for
successful digital transformation.
Finding the right channel partners who
have the right skills and certification is one
of the biggest challenges facing the growth
of SAP’s PartnerEdge programme. “We
need the right partners who are specialised
in specific industry verticals or in the
specific SAP cloud-based solutions, such
as the in-memory SAP HANA platform,
SAP S4HANA real-time business suite,
or the SAP Leonardo digital innovation
system,” says Marita Mitschein, Senior
Vice President and Managing Director,
SAP Training and Development Institute,
SAP Middle East and North Africa.
According to Meena Confait, Head of
Skills for Africa at SAP Africa, this year
features participation of partners and
customers from Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda
and Rwanda. “In 2013 and 2014, we
provided training for 130 graduates in
Kenya. In our expanded 2017 programme,
we are able to train 55 candidates of which
40 per cent are female.”
While planning its annual channel
training calendar, Aruba HPE typically
does an assessment of its partner
resources, according to Ahmed Rezk,
Channel Systems Engineer Manager
at Aruba, HPE. With the mobility and
security vendor putting increased focus on
the enterprise digital workplace, channel
partners also need to be competent
on providing additional ecosystem
technologies that will enable the digital
workplace, meeting the full solution
requirements of its end customers.
Aruba HPE provides direct touch
training engagement with its channel
partners focused on the enterprise, as
well as value added distributors, around
compliance and competency. Value added
distributors in turn are responsible for
bridging partnership and certification gaps
in channel partners focused on the small
and medium business sector.
For data availability vendor, Veeam
Software, digital transformation is a driver
for partner training. As enterprises embark
on digital transformation initiatives, the
availability of data becomes essential for
their livelihoods. Not being able to access
critical information puts an organisation at
a distinct disadvantage over competitors.
The always-on enterprise is going to
require data-savvy specialists to empower
businesses to grow to the next level.
“We continuously work with partners to
skill them up and enable them to progress
to the next partner status where they can
leverage more benefits. However, their
progress is dependent on the investment
from their side. We see our partners as an
extension of our own sales team and work
very closely with them to equip them with
Issue 09
INTELLIGENT TECH CHANNELS