12/18/2002 -- When the Hewlett Packard/Compaq merger was announced in 2001, the first thing on many HP and Compaq certified professionals' minds was, "What's going to happen to my title?"

Although the merger is now complete and "the New HP" has emerged, that question still hasn't been answered fully, although much progress has been made. In November, HP unveiled a new name for the program -- the Worldwide HP Certified Professional Program -- as well as a new Web site (http://www.hp.com/go/certification/) and basic structure incorporating many of both previous program's titles (see graphic, below). But details are still being worked out, from benefits to where certain exams fall to who exactly will qualify to be grandfathered in.

While complete details of the new program won't be released until February 2003, earlier this month we talked with Tony Croes, director of the Worldwide HP Certified Professional Program, and Barbara Sandro, Marketing Program Manager, about the progress made so far and what we might expect to see in February. Here's what they told us:

You officially announced the new program structure on November 15th but you're still deciding many of the details. Can you give us a quick overview of what's completed and what you're still working on?

Tony Croes: Absolutely. On November 15th we announced an umbrella program to unify all the certification programs that were publicly available in pre-merger HP and Compaq, including some that were not publicly available, some internal certification programs. This was the announcement of the program name and the branding and the focus areas for that program, and also the integrated tracks that resulted from the pre-merger product lines that we had available at that time. On November 15th we also announced some storage tracks.

Beyond that, what we have are a few dates&I can walk you through a quick set of milestones that we're headed for.

On December 15th there will be a set of business-critical tracks that we're preparing for launch, and those are primarily in the HP-UX, Itanium and Alpha spaces.

A philosophical thing we've done is tried not to modify things where we had good deliverables on the shelf already -- exams, courseware materials. Where we're making changes is because either there was a significant product line change or a product line end, in the case of NetServer, and those are the areas that we primarily made changes in. So the first was November 1, then December 15.

Beginning in mid-December through February of 2003, we're&reviewing&more than 160 exams that were in the combined programs, and rationalizing those into integrated sets of tracks where it's appropriate. We want to make sure there's a common set of design philosophy behind the exams that we use in the program and course material and exam prep guides to support them. What we'll be announcing internally&are the migration plans for those tracks.

We have three approaches here. [The first is that] we'll grandfather [people into the new program] where possible, where 90 percent of the content is common or the goals are common. If it gets larger than 25 percent, there will probably be some form of continuing education requirement. It could be in the form of training; it might be in the form of an exam. Where it's greater than that, it's likely there will be a migration path from an existing track to one of the tracks that goes forward in the program. That's the work that we're doing right now.

Aside from&integrated operations capabilities, the work to create the program is really to take those tracks and integrate the exams, course materials and prep guides. We will begin communicating those publicly to the individuals and on the Web sites in February of 2003. Because they have different legal business requirements for business closure and different capabilities, each region will launch those in a staggered fashion. Worldwide we'll have a set of common tracks. The regions will begin implementing those over time.

On the storage and business-critical tracks you just mentioned, where do they fall in this new program architecture?

Croes: They actually fall across several areas. For storage and BCS, there are new tracks in the sales space, the pre-sales technical space, and the integration space [Editor's Note: See graphic, below]. In particular, from the pre-merger Compaq side, most of our focus was in the systems integration space and the operating system space. The pre-sales technical and the sales certifications we dealt with in what we call a low-stakes manner, meaning that the tests were not proctored. Typically it was training with some form of test&

In the pre-merger HP, in those sales and technical areas, they had higher qualification and certification exams, and we're leveraging that as the best practice going forward. So we will be announcing tracks in all three of those areas.

Graphical representation of new HP certification program structure, as of November 2002. Image courtesy of HP.

How did you go about blending the two previous programs? How did you go figure out the structure you were going to use, what you would pull from the Compaq program and what you would pull from HP? How long have you been working at all this?

Croes: We've been at it for some time. We started with&the core philosophies behind the programs. The pre-merger programs were created -- in some cases -- for different purposes. The HP STAR Systems Training and Recognition was for partners, and that was the target audience. They would allow others in, but it was kind of an on-exception basis. The HP Certified IT Professional and Advanced IT Professional were targeted at customers and systems administrators of HP-UX systems. And they had internal programs that they used for workforce development for our field engineers, our call centers and so on. They were very targeted to supporting some of the programs that used the certifications.

On the pre-merger Compaq side, we had a little different philosophy. We were after the creation of a sales and technical community. Benchmarking them was only the initial step. We wanted something that was much further than just putting the certificate on the wall. To us, looking at the program, we wanted to create that community, we wanted to measure their skill, and then we wanted to start providing them access to tools and information on an ongoing basis to support what we call "readiness of the community" for new product introductions or for significant changes in technology or products.

It's a go-to-market strategy. We can say, "[We] now have a community [we] can identify, and now [we] can target them to provide them with information and tools that help them do their job." The hope in doing that is that they will prefer to do business with HP. Then we've been spending time tailoring the messaging, the operations support, the capabilities of the pre-merger programs to support all audiences: customer, partner and employee.

One last thought here is that we made a decision to say it's one program, internally and externally. The primary reasons for that are partners didn't like the idea of us requiring a different set of requirements for employees than we required of them; and second, people move around a lot or they change job roles. It was very difficult to tell a partner, "Here's one set of hurdles for you to jump in order to sell our product; here's a separate set of hurdles for you to jump to service our product." What we now have is one set of benchmarks that are leveraged by those different programs so that we recognize somebody's achievements and skills, regardless of who their employer is and regardless of what job they're doing.

When looking at the structure, it seems like you've kept a quite a bit from the Compaq structure: the ASE and Master ASE titles, for example. There's a little bit of difference of how you go into it as far as tiers, but it's still very similar.

Croes: There were industry-leading programs in both companies. Some of the things that were best practices, particularly in the Power On training and the pre-sales area and the sales area in the HP STAR program, we adopted the model and continued with it. So with STAR, those two focused areas that we call sales and pre-sales primarily were made up of existing materials from STAR and complemented with pre-merger Compaq information and tracks. We've made the decision to go ahead and build and support where we didn't have complete information in that area, and that's basically a pre-merger STAR concept. There is some overlap between the pre-sales technical and the integration tracks.

Basically, it's the "how do I scope-capacity-plan-design?" system. We would stop there in the pre-sales track, where in the integration track the information would continue to install, deploy, tune, and support.

But you're right -- [regarding] the pre-merger Compaq accredited professional tracks in the integration space, we kept the model there because that was a good model; and in the operating space we have a mix. We have pre-merger Compaq operating systems and pre-merger HP operating systems. We are doing an "adopt and go "on the HP Certified IT Professional and Advanced IT Professional because they had a best practice of performance-based lab exams that we want to take across the line.

The title you just mentioned, the HP Certified Advanced IT Professional, isn't on the chart I'm looking at [Editor's note: See graphic, above]. Where does that fall into the structure?

Croes: It actually falls in the operating system side. You'll find three levels there: a Systems Administrator, a Systems Engineer and a Systems Developer is actually a placeholder. The only one that's using it today is our NSK space, the non-stop kernel.

System Developer is not on this chart.

Croes: It may be because I'm speaking out of school there. The Systems Developer is intended to be a higher level for people who are primarily focused on application development or systems development.

And you said that will have a lab exam?

Croes: Well, the Systems Engineer and Systems Administrator levels today under HP-UX have lab practicals. That's one of the best practices that we want to adopt as an option.

Is that something that's new or was that implemented under the old HP?

Croes: It was pre-merger. The HP Certified IT Professional and Advanced IT Professional delivered lab-based exams through HP Education Services pre-merger.

So there will be a three-tier structure in the Operating Systems section, not two. And those three, you will have a lab exam?

Croes: Correct. If you're familiar with the Red Hat Systems Engineer test, the HP lab testing that we do with the Engineer and Advanced IT Professional is very similar.

When the ASE was a Compaq title, people could go straight in and become an ASE just by passing certain exams. With the new structure it looks like you're going to require previous titles before you become the ASE level. Just to make sure I'm interpreting this chart right, the ASE/Master ASE program is now a four-tiered program where the third tier would be ASE if you're going for the integration certification.

Croes: Actually, what you're seeing is correct -- that the structure of the program has changed. But I wouldn't necessarily call them prerequisites. This existed in pre-merger Compaq as well. We had an Accredited Systems Integrator level, an ASI -- excuse me -- a Platform Integrator Level, API. That level had some common core exams with the ASD level, and the difference primarily between the two was whether or not you had a full operating system certification from us or from a partner.

&There are two paths into the program, but once you reach the ASE level there are systems integration skills. By that, we typically mean complex configuration, multiple platforms and potentially multiple operating systems. So what we have at the ASE level is a prerequisite requirement that someone have operating system certification and a Systems Engineer level, whether that be an HP operating system or a third party like Red Hat or Microsoft or Novell.

Then of course there's also the arrow from the AIS title.

Croes: Correct. It could also be one from pre-sales, but I don't know if that shows up on [that chart]. So you have the Professional and the Consultant level and the Pre-Sales track as potential entry points.

Basically though, what we're showing there is not a prerequisite or required relationship. What those arrows imply is that there are exams contained in those other focus areas that are also required in the ASE space.

As you progress through those tracks, you will have credit for exams [from other certification vendors] that apply to ASE, Master ASE, AIS levels. &That's why when we say there's a very large job to take 160 exams &[We have to] bring that number down -- that's way too much for us to support.

What number of exams do you think you're going to end up with?

Croes: We haven't done an analysis to try to figure that out, but we think we're going to be somewhere in the 90 to 100 range. It's still pretty large. Also, I'll point out that some of those we would call qualification exams, meaning that they are more knowledge and product focused than they are skills-based, and they're delivered in a low stakes environment vs. a high stakes proctored testing center.

What about the exams themselves: Will you be incorporating any new exam questions or technology? Are you taking one of the previous program's exam structures over the other?

Croes: There's a person on my team, Jamie Mulkey, who is the manager for exam development. She's putting together a strategy so that our exams have some consistency, both from a user experience in terms of the candidate but also in terms of certain quality metrics so that if we have psychometric analysis, beta processes and so on. We also are looking at some innovative testing formats such as adaptive testing, and I mentioned the lab-based and practical exams; so we're investigating those.

In every way, what we're doing is an upgrade to what is found across the entire range of pre-merger programs. We're trying to standardize and use one common set of exams available in multiple languages globally. As we do that, we're trying to use a common set of standards

Now that you're moving on with lab exams, will the Master ASE become lab based?

Croes: We would love to have more lab exams, particularly in some of the higher-end skill spaces.

What you'll see over time is a move from labs with a specific product focus area at the Master ASE level -- for example, Exchange or SAP -- and to more of a skill area, like database in a transaction environment, database in a decision support environment, in that, you would have multiple selections of choices.

In the past, for some titles we've offered candidates access to the HP field or labs, where someone can come in and spend some time with us. We've offered that in the past at the Master ASE level& [but it] has not been a requirement for certification. It's more part of those readiness efforts I mentioned earlier, where we're trying to ensure that people have access to information and tools to help them do their job better. I won't say that I foresee lab access as a requirement, but what I do see is opportunities like that to help make sure that the people stay technically capable.

You must be getting many calls and e-mails from pre-merger certified Compaq and HP professionals about the new program. What are you hearing from them?

Barbara Sandro: Any time you merge several large certification programs such as this, you do expect to hear from your certification community. We see that as a good sign because we would be alarmed if we didn't get phone calls and e-mails. They are mostly just calls of clarification because change is scary for people. They just want reassurance -- not so much that their certification will continue -- they really want reassurance in what the certification level is that they have. For example, they want to verify "I'm still a Master ASE, right?" and "I'm still an APS, correct?" They're very interested in the new branding as to where they can get logos, etc. to put on their business cards.

Croes: From an individual standpoint [we're dealing with] approximately 80,000 [certified professionals from both programs] worldwide. From a certification standpoint, it's more than 110,000. So we were due to get a few questions.

If, like you said earlier, not everyone will be automatically grandfathered into the new program, what do you tell people when they call? Or have you already decided that everyone with certain titles will be grandfathered, for example, all Master ASEs will continue to be Master ASEs?

Croes: Actually, you're pointing out something that we consider one of the strengths of the decisions we made. We said we're not going to leave anyone behind. So it doesn't mean nothing would be required of an individual to continue with us, but we have those three options that I mentioned earlier -- where there's less than 10 percent difference between the purpose of the pre-merger program and the track that goes forward, we grandfather. Where there is less than 25 percent, there would be some form of continuing certification requirement and they would keep their title. Where the track ends, where there's been a significant change or a product line change, what we provide is a migration path.

I'll use NetServer as an example. On the day of the announcement, we had product line transition roadmaps that said that the NetServer product line would end by a certain date. We've already told NetServer folks to pursue the ProLiant tracks, but when we start communicating to them individually, we say, "Your NetServer certification&is going to be valid for a period of time, typically a year."

Beyond February 1, 2003, we say for that certification that you achieved, you have credit for these new exams in the new program. And we tell them the areas where they might look, where those exams apply, that are possible migration paths...

When we first started covering this story, one thing we heard from Compaq ASEs is that they didn't want to lose their benefits. Have you made a decision on what the benefits will be?

Croes: We have decided to plan for and fund for benefits at a worldwide level. [Currently] we're taking a look at the suite of benefits that were offered by the pre-merger programs and planning a suite that's available in every region, along with a suite of the benefits that might be available through [alternate means]&

For example, if somebody has a certain certification track, perhaps they get that benefit for free. If that benefit might be useful to somebody else but they don't hold the certification, they might have an option to purchase it from us at cost. Those are the kind of things that we're looking at.

We haven't formalized what those benefits are -- we're continuing with the pre-merger set of benefits; we haven't dropped anything.

Are some people going to be happier because they'll be gettting more benefits, and some disappointed because they're getting fewer?

Croes: I think you'll find that pretty much across the board people will be getting more. We had a very, very strong suite of benefits in the Americas programs, and we're using that as a basis to try to provide worldwide.

What's your trending like in terms of the number of tests taken? Has it slowed down because of the merger plans and/or the economy?

Croes: In terms of certifications, in North America alone, it's somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 to 160 new people a month. It's stayed pretty consistent there. Typically peaks and valleys in it, and they're associated with changes to partner programs, changes to benefit levels, and also of course the economy. But also, whenever we have a Continuing Certification Requirement or Continuing Education Requirement, we see spikes. It has basically been flat but staying consistent; that's across the pre-merger programs.

What about U.S. prices for exams?

Croes: As a guideline, for the high-stakes Prometric exams that we deliver today, typical price points are going to be about $100 per exam. There is a chance that we would change that as we are renegotiating worldwide contracts with multiple vendors. As we bring global contracts in, we're trying to set the pricing right so that it's not a significant barrier to entry into the program. For example, $100 U.S. dollars in India is equivalent to a week's salary, so what we try to do is set the pricing as appropriate in the region. We're not in the business of trying to earn revenue from the exams.

As I mentioned before, we're trying to develop a community and then use that community as part of our go-to-market strategy. That gives us some flexibility in using a global contract to set pricing in a country as it makes sense.

Is there anything else you want to share with our readers?

Croes: I don't want to overcommit at this point, but something that is very important to us is the concept that we are trying to develop this community of sales and technical professionals. We want to put money behind our words and effort behind our words when we say it's not just about hanging a certificate on the wall. So some of the things that we had in some of the pre-merger programs, like enterprise technical symposium -- technical events where we would bring in 3,500 to 4,500 of these individuals and give them non-disclosure training or access to portals or Web sites -- is a primary goal of the program. It's about supporting that community once they've been identified, once they've met the basic benchmarks.

&I hope that if we ask the audience a year from now [if] have we been successful, people will say, "Yes, you've helped me do my job better and you provide me with information, and I prefer to do business with HP."