Web Ascender has worked very hard over the last 365 days to meet the requirements to become a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner. Today our hard work has paid off and we have been recognized and awarded our Microsoft Gold Certification status.
What does it take to become a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner
The standard Microsoft Partnership is relatively easy to obtain. You need a person or two at your organization to take a test and you have to pay your enrollment dues. However, to become the highest level of Microsoft Partner you must do much more than that. Individually the Web Ascender team has worked hard to obtain personal Microsoft certifications which are critical to becoming eligible for a corporate Microsoft Gold Partnership.
Kevin Southworth has taken 5 Microsoft Exams giving him his Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) certification and Microsoft Certified Application Developer (MCAD) certification. Kevin has focused on ASP .NET and Microsoft .NET application development.
Ryan Doom has taken 6 Microsoft tests giving him his Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) certification and Microsoft Certified Application Developer (MCAD) certification. Ryan has also focused on ASP .NET and Microsoft .NET application development as well as SQL Server database design.
Jeff McWherter has taken 10 Microsoft tests giving him his Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) certification, Microsoft Certified Application Developer (MCAD) certification, Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer (MCSD) as well as his Microsoft Database Administration Certification. Jeff is also a Microsoft MVP, which is awarded for expert knowledge and community involvement within the Microsoft development realm.
The textbook for each exam ranges between 400 and 800 pages of material and all exams are taken within a monitored and proctored environment. No outside materials or aids are permitted.
After meeting the individual requirements Web Ascender had to prove our real world experience in delivering solutions using these technologies. We had to create case studies on 9 projects and have over 20 customer references which were then reviewed and approved by Microsoft.
Web Ascender focused on three Microsoft Gold Certified Partner competencies:
- Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) and Business Process Competency
- Data Management Solutions Competency
- Web Development Specialization
What does it mean for you and your company?
It means we have awesome plaques on our wall!
Well, it also means we have a team that has proven through a series of tests that they are capable of delivering enterprise web solutions. Our actual projects were reviewed by Microsoft, who assesed the technologies used, what business problems they solved and how we approached them. Our customers were then surveyed by Microsoft and our customer satisfaction rating had to be high enough for each project to allow it to be counted towards our overall score.
It shows that we have the formal education to create websites and web applications as well as an excellent track record of delivering them!