Hello, everyone, Welcome to this article on Google Cloud Certification. and in the article, we will learn about Google Cloud Certification. And what are the different Certification tracks which one can apply for?
First of all, we will learn about Why Google Cloud Certification and then What is Google Cloud Certification and then I will tell you which Cloud Certification is right for you.
Why Google Cloud Certification
The first question which comes to anyone’s mind is why Google Cloud Certification, so Google Cloud certified users feel more confident working on Cloud computing, after taking this Google Cloud Certification exam.
However, I would always emphasize backing up your Certification with good knowledge so that you stand a good chance in the market where people are looking for Cloud computing professionals who have good experience and knowledge on Cloud platforms.
Professional Cloud architects’ Certification ranks among the highest paid professionals of 2019, few of the Google Cloud certified users took one or more responsibility or leadership roles at work.
Now, when we talk about Certification that certifies that you have gained knowledge on Google Cloud Platform services, and usage of Google Cloud Platform for a different use, and that basically creates your profile as a stronger profile.
Certification is a commitment to a profession and makes you stand out in the corporate world.
What is Google Cloud Certification?
Google Cloud Certification is obtained by passing one or more exams specified by Google Cloud. It is a certificate of Google Cloud expertise.
People want to certified in Google Cloud because it is the most demanding Certification In 2021, if you also want to do this Certification, then you will be in demand.
Each certificate has a different area of concentration. And now let’s learn which Google Cloud Certification is right for you.
Which Google Cloud Certification is right for you
There are various Certifications which are offered by Google Cloud. So Google Cloud Certification fall, under three categories, you have associate or beginner level Certification.
- Beginner level Certification
Now, this Certification focuses on the fundamental skills of Google Cloud, it is a good starting point for someone who is new to the Cloud and can use it as a path to a professional level.
Usually, people who start learning Cloud computing skills would want to first certify themselves using an associate Certification,
Which gives them fundamental knowledge, and also for anyone assessing their profile, and understanding that this professional has gone through an exam that certifies and states the fundamental knowledge and equipment of any candidate.
- Professional-level Certification
This Certification focuses on technical job functions and assesses many other advanced skills. It is usually recommended for someone who has industry level exposure and familiarity with the Google Cloud Platform.
So people who have successfully clear professional Certifications ones who have had knowledge of Google Cloud and its different services, how different services are used for different use cases.
Plus, they have demonstrated their knowledge in clearing this exam, which professionally makes them more capable to work on the Google Cloud Platform.
- User-level Certification
This is intended for an individual with G Suite experience. so Google offers different services that can be used by users worldwide for different use cases.
For example, you have Google Docs, or you have Gmail, or you have Google Drive, and so on. So this Certification determines an individual’s ability to work with and use the core collaboration tools.
Types of Google Cloud Certifications
1. Associate Certifications
We have various types of categories here. So you have an associate level. Now, this is when a professional or a person has recommended experience, such as six-plus months building on Google Cloud, And here the Certification is called Cloud Engineer.
- Google Cloud Engineer
An associate Cloud Engineer deploys applications, monitors, performs operations, and manages enterprise solutions. So usually, this individual can use Google Cloud Console, or the command-line interface to perform common platform-based tasks to maintain one or more deployed solutions that leverage Google-managed or self-managed services on GCP.
That’s Google Cloud Platform. So associate Cloud Engineer exam assesses your ability to set up your Cloud environment, plan and configuring a Cloud solution, deploying and implementing a Cloud solution, ensuring successful operation, and also configuring access and security.
So the exam here is two hours, the registration fee is $125. It is offered in different languages. When you talk about the exam format, it is usually multiple choice and multiple select taken in person or at a center.
Now that’s your associate Certification, you can go to the Google Cloud Certifications page, it shows you the different Certifications which are offered,
2. Professional Certifications
You have professional-level Certifications, where the recommended experience is three-plus years of working with Google Cloud that can specifically be on Google Cloud services.
So here you have different tracks such as
- Google Cloud Architect
A person who enables organizations to leverage Google Cloud technologies with a thorough understanding of Cloud architecture, how Cloud computing works, and Google Cloud Platform.
This particular professional or individual can design develop, manage robust, secure, scalable, highly available, and dynamic solutions on Google Cloud Platform.
So when you talk about Google Cloud Certified Professional Cloud architect, this will test your knowledge in
- Designing and planning a Cloud solution architecture
- Managing and provisioning the Cloud solution infrastructure
- Designing the security and compliance analyzing and optimizing technology and business processes
- Manage implementations of cloud architecture
- Ensuring solution and operations reliability
This exam is also to us the fees here is $200. It’s offered in different languages. Usually, the exam format is multiple choice and multiple select which can be taken in person or at a test center.
The recommended experience here is three-plus years of industry experience. That is IT which might involve IT solutions, your Cloud computing solutions, and at least one plus year of using GCP.
- Google Cloud Developer
A professional Cloud developer builds scalable, and highly available applications using Google’s recommended practices and tools that would use the Manage services.
So this individual usually would have experience with next-generation databases, runtime environments, developer tools, would have proficiency with at least one general-purpose programming language.
Usually, you can talk about Java, Scala, Python, or C, c++, these professionals would be required to have Stackdriver, which is used for producing meaningful metrics.
So when you talk about the Cloud developer exam here, it assesses your ability to basically build and test applications design, your Cloud-native applications, deploy applications, integrate different GCP services, and manage application performance monitoring.
Again, this exam is two hours, registration fees cost $200. Multiple choice and multiple selections are the exam format languages that are offered in English and Japanese.
When you talk about the recommended experience. It is usually for people with three-plus years of industry experience, including at least one year of designing and managing solutions using GCP.
- Google Data Engineer
Now, this is basically for professionals who can make decisions by collecting transforming, and publishing data. So data Engineers should be able to design-build, operationalize secure, and monitor data processing systems with an emphasis on security and compliance with an emphasis on scalability and efficiency, reliability, flexibility, and portability.
So, a data Engineer should be able to leverage deploy and continuously train pre-existing machine learning models.
Here your ability is assessed based on
- Designing data processing systems
- Building and operationalizing data processing systems
- Operationalizing machine learning models
- Ensuring solution quality
Again, this exam is $200. The duration is two hours, it is offered in four different languages. The exam format is multiple choice and multiple select and the recommended experiences the same as your other professional Certifications.
- Cloud DevOps Engineer
DevOps Engineer is responsible for efficient development operations that can balance service reliability and delivery speed, they are usually scaled and DevOps kind of activities, and especially using GCP to build software delivery pipelines, deploying monitoring services, managing and learning from different kinds of issues or incidents.
The Professional Cloud DevOps Engineer exam assesses your ability to:
- Apply site reliability Engineering principles
- Optimizing service performance
- Implement service monitoring strategies
- Build and implement continuous integration
- Continuous development pipelines
- Managed service incidents
So if a professional has had experience in DevOps kind of roles, then this Certification would be for them, provided the professional along with DevOps experience has gained some knowledge on Cloud computing platforms,
and especially on the Google Cloud platform which offers different services when you talk about other Certifications such as data Engineers, this is for professionals who have had admin, infrastructure management, data processing, or Engineering kind of roles.
So this would be suitable for those professionals. When you talk about the developer, this is obviously for people who have had development background programming background working with different programming skills, developing solutions, or API.
And when you talk about Cloud architect, this is usually for people who have worked with probably different infrastructure systems, different Cloud computing platforms, and have had some experience with Google Cloud Platform and the services what it offers.
- Cloud Security Engineer
A professional Cloud Security Engineer will basically enable organizations to design and implement a secure infrastructure on Google Cloud Platform, which is one of the main needs of organizations when they move into Cloud Platform.
Through an understanding of security best practices and industry security requirements. This individual would design develop, manage a secure infrastructure, leveraging Google security technologies.
the Cloud security professional should be proficient in all aspects of Google Cloud Security, including managing identity and access management, defining organizational structure
and policies, using Google technologies to provide data protection, encryption, configuring network security defenses, collecting and analyzing GCP logs, managing incident responses, and understanding of regulatory concerns.
This exam assesses your ability to configure access within a Cloud solution environment. Now that could be for the services within Google Cloud Platform, or from an external client or service connecting to your GCP platform services.
The Profession Cloud Security Engineer exam assesses your ability to:
- Configure network security
- Ensuring data protection
- Managing operations and ensuring compliance
Again, the cost remains the same as other professional Certifications. It is the format, which is multiple choice and multiple select questions.
language in which this exam is offered is only English. The prerequisites are none and recommended experiences same as your other professional Certifications
- Cloud Network Engineer
A professional Cloud network Engineer, implements and manages network architecture in GCP. This individual usually has at least one year of hands-on experience working with GCP and may work on networking or Cloud teams with the architects who design the infrastructure.
So here you would be leveraging the experience of implementing virtual private Clouds, hybrid connectivity, network services, and security for established network architectures.
So this individual ensures successful Cloud implementations using a command-line interface or GCP platform or GCP console.
So the professional Cloud network Engineer exam assesses your ability to design plan and prototype a GCP network implement a GCP VPC, configuring network services, hybrid interconnectivity, and implementing network security.
The cost of the exam the format of the exam remains the same as other professional Certifications, recommended experience is also the same. And the language in which this exam is offered in English.
- Collaboration Engineer
A professional collaboration Engineer transforms business objectives into tangible configurations policies, security practices, as usually, they relate to user content and integration. So these Engineers leverage their understanding of organizations’ mail routing and identity management, secure communication, and data access. \
So when you talk about different tools, which are offered by Google Cloud Platform, this individual would be operating within Engineering and solutions mindset, using different tools, programming languages, and APIs to automate workflows.
This professional would look for opportunities to educate the end-users and increase operational efficiency while advocating the G Suite and Google’s toolset.
So here, this exam assesses your ability to plan and implement GCP authorization and access managing user resource and team type life cycles managing mains, controlling and configuring G Suite services, configuring manage and endpoint access, and other such use cases by using G Suite and embedded services.
The cost of the exam format and recommended experience remain the same as your other professional Certifications.
Tips For Google Cloud Certification
So when you talk about tips before writing a Google Cloud Certification exam, so take a proper learning path for your Certification. Now Learning Path includes courses, labs, and exams for each Certification.
So that basically will equip you with the right knowledge which is required to clear a Certification. Plus, you would have gained knowledge on the particular topic where you are certifying yourself so that when you would want to upgrade your carrier or apply for a new job,
your Certification is backed up with the right appropriate knowledge on that particular topic or domain. It’s very important, as I mentioned, to have hands-on practice, so did not attempt for exam Certifications.
With theoretical knowledge only do a hands-on try out different services, different options. And that basically gives you more knowledge about Google Cloud Platform, its services, its offerings, and the benefits of using GCP.
you can always follow the Google Clouds page, look for Certification that would also guide you through different learning paths, and try to catch up or cover all the knowledge gaps which you have in a particular topic.
Some Certifications include lengthy case studies, and you can find these case studies in the exam guide that will help you to prepare appropriately.
And finally, an essential part before taking an exam is to take practice tests, analyze where you are weak at, and go back and study again.
So these are some of the tips which you need to prepare for Google Cloud Certification. All the best happy learning Take care.
