CompTIA A+ benefits your career

Get CompTIA A+ certified today. Many programs offer money back guarantees.

Not surprisingly, the mapping out of your IT career is a multi-factorial concept which benchmarks your present credentials and skill set in terms of prerequisite experience, identifies a training and testing "stream" in the context of required time to complete the underlying tests as well as the total number of tests and their associated costs, and projected income levels based on current market supply and demand factors.

Before considering a broad IT designation goal such as CompTIA A+ certification, you need to baseline whether you are entry level, intermediate, advanced or expert.  Take for example an entry-level designation such as Microsoft Office Specialist Proficient or MOSP level candidate.  This entry-level candidate will require at least one year on average to complete the one core exam.  This CompTIA A+ certification level will require training and testing investment of around $1,000 and assumes that the test candidate has approximately two years of operational experience working with Microsoft office 97 and Microsoft 2000 topics.  Simply moving to the expert designation in the same Microsoft Office 97 and 2000 environments requires and experience base of around four years, however again requires but one core exam in order too achieve the designation.

By contrast, a Microsoft Certified System Engineer or MCSE designation extends prior CompTIA A+ certification designation to the advanced level in terms of industry measurements.  Required experience levels jump to six years or more. Meanwhile, seven core exams are necessary in order to qualify for this designation.  Estimated costs to take you through the A+ certification boot camp phase into the final testing phases at each juncture total nearly $9000 over your career to date.  Industry averages suggest that it will require a minimum of fourteen months to complete the preparation necessary for the MCSE certification exam.

At the higher designation levels the CompTIA A+ certification training supporting successful testing at the expert level, such as with Cisco Certified Internet work Expert or CCIE designation demands the highest level of experience and accomplishment.  This CCIE designation will require over two years of CompTIA A+ certification training along with successful results from two tests.  Meanwhile, core experience necessary for the candidate is eight years.  Testing costs will run into the thousands of dollars, specific cost details can be quoted by your testing facility.

In terms of the market of supply and demand for these various CompTIA A+ certification designations, the "value" as expressed in your income gains can be substantial as you travel from the entry levels to the concluding expert levels.   While the Microsoft Office Specialist Proficient designations (entry and expert) provide only modest income potentials (likely to be in the lowest 25% of the market in terms of income level and job retention), intermediate designations such as the MCSE certification level may take the IT candidate into the second or 50% category in terms of income competitiveness.  The expert level CCIE designation essentially lies on top of the IT salary food chain, where the qualifying candidate should reasonably expect to receive a six-figure salary and benefits package.

Overall, the market remains fluid in terms of how the employers pay against the possible CompTIA A+ certification training designations, as well as the amount of time and number of CompTIA A+ certification exams necessary to reach the next level.  The amount of time necessary for CompTIA A+ certification training can range from 1-month to 24-months, and the number of required tests can range from 1 to 7.  Necessary experience can range from two years to over eight years, reflecting the qualitative differences between entry and intermediate designations versus expert designations.

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