The Marriage of IT Vendor Training with Postgraduate Attributes: An Unholy Union?

Abstract This paper describes the collaboration between Sheffield Hallam University and an International IT Consulting organisation to develop an innovative postgraduate curriculum that combines intensive, vendor-specific certification training together with a challenging enquiry-focused educational experience. Employers prefer to ‘benchmark’ potential applicants against industry certification standards, yet also desire the qualities of a postgraduate’s enquiring mind. Using research and ‘open enquiry’ as principle values, a curriculum has been created that facilitates exploration of a wide range of practical and theoretical topics in order to support the development of a highly skilled, autonomous ‘Technical Consultant’. A key aspect of this approach is to provide guidance for learners to explore their own development paths, whilst also exposing them to an established vendor specific platform in order to gain sufficient practical experience before seeking employment.