The Dell approach to certification

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(Posted in Training & Development as more appropriate than News)

The Dell approach to certification

As Dell Computers steps up its product range to supply bigger and more complex IT systems, it finds that training its partners is becoming vital to this process. Gary Flood looks at how Dell underpins its success story with its new education and certification programme.

Dell Computers - surely that's the company that 'only' sells through its website direct to customers? Well, yes and no. The Dell of 2009 will still happily make you the specific home PC you want.

But increasingly, it also wants to sell bigger, more complex IT systems into the commercial and company space through partners who can deploy and support those systems; and with education and certification becoming more and more important, it's finding training vital to making that vision a reality.

Read the full story : here

 

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We have recently become a Dell partner, so would be interested to here if anyone already has any Dell training under their belt. I seem to recall reading something by Comptia saying "all" their helpdesk staff were funded to complete the latest A+ module.

Thanks for the link!

 

I think their training *can* be good - it's their business tactics I don't like - putting the smaller shops out of business

 

Point taken, although it's everywhere these days.
Shop not far by me has been the "open all hours" for almost 25 years. Unit 3 doors away became available and Mr T came along selling everything cheaper.

 

Not Dell's fault that they can offer their computers at a lower cost. Nobody forces you to buy from Dell.

 

No, what I meant was that they were deliberately selling below cost to drive out smaller businesses. I couldn't even buy the components from trade at less than Dell were selling to the public. There was a suit being brought against them but I don't expect it ever got anywhere.

 

Working within Dell, I couldnt agree more with that article, and have seen the company shift in the way it is talking about over the past year or so anyway. there is only so much money that can be made on a basic computer & standard warranty, but we can see you a world of other support services, that do impact our bottom line, and when you need it youll be glad you took such an option up, wheather it be speaking to someone in the UK within 3 minutes, or being able to keep that failed harddrive without worrying about what actually happens to it once we take it back.

Also dont forget Dells sales volumes are trully massive and operating costs are ruthlessly low, as the majority of operations are outsourced, and based in lower cost locations, with only premium support, some specialist sales and admin functions based locally within EMEA anyway. Truth be told back in march 70 people were given notice at my center, to cut down because of the reduced call volumes etc.

FYI there are two main minimum certs. The standard a+ for entry, or if your an onsite engineer the DCSE which is a Dellified A+. the DCSE needs to be done after each revision or 12-18 months, but we work to a different schedule internally. other MS & comptia certs are paid for us, so long as their relavent, with no limit, other than we actually pass them!. There are some smart guys here, and some right unmotivated ones too, with regards to advancement.

 

I've worked with Dell in the past and certification is close to their hearts. They understand that certifications and training really does improve customer service levels. Dell did not fund the A+ fully, but did purchase CompTIA memberships for each and every 'certified partner' so that they could purchase comptia certifications at a discounted price.

There isn't really too much money in hardware anyways these days. Moving forward you've got to embrace the products sold by Dell and not even make profit from the hardware. The real money is in wrapping services around them. Making money from the service wrapper migration, administration, configuration, customisation etc etc but to be honest, just trying to maintain their position as the incumbant trusted advisor and support provider.

 

that's proposterous
smaller shops do not get put out of business by the likes of Dell and Tescos
smaller shops get put out of business because they don't provide enough value to their customers to warrent the extra cost/hassle of shopping with them

I have plenty of clients that don't touch dell with a barge poll, because they don't like dells support, even though I have heard from others that it is fine

others don't want the cheap and cheerful dell server, so they buy the robust and well designed HP, but pay the premium

the value proposition of the small business is what needs to adjust, it needs to counter the large behemoth by doing what it is best able to do, be agile! and be personal! a small business can adapt to changing circumstances much much quicker than a large multi national can, they also have a much better chance of maintaining a personal relationship with their clients

unfortunately there will always be some customers who shop solely on price
I fire those customers pretty quick, I am not interested, I had a client go somewhere else because an order came in 18 bucks cheaper, the hours of design and planning I put in meant nothing to them, so we told em to bugger off!

 

I don't say it's the only factor but certainly a contributing one and there were many trade press articles to back it up.

Guess we'll just have to agree to differ.

 

The problem is the smaller shops who don't have the 'right' attitude will always find someone to blame, and always manage to get an article written about it
I think the very number of shops still in play, especially in times like this shows that customers are still willing to pay a premium when they receive adequate service, and maintaining strong customer relationships is key to surviving the current economy

Dell will drop the ball on that front, most big business will, they are not personal enough
but if you still want to buy just on price, knock yourself out, I don't try to compete with that