It's a good idea if you are just starting out get going on your career track with a training course in software support. Software support will equip you with some lower level accreditations, to assist you to get your first foot-on-the-ladder, plus give you an understanding of a different valuable side of the business. Take a look at the Microsoft Certified Desktop Support Technician ('MCDST'). A full track of MCDST, MCTS and 'MCITP' could be expected to be concluded in around five-hundred hrs of part time study, so its viable for one year's part-time study. Don't ever get pressurised to make all of the right decisions on the best career track on your own though. You need to be confident that the teaching techniques & the actual selected career are going to be right for you, so talk about them with a professional I.T. training consultant first. If you don't really focus primarily on where you want to get to, you may find that you're way off track and 1000s of pounds worse off!

Be watchful that any exams that you're considering are commercially relevant and are the most recent versions. Training companies own certificates are not normally useful in gaining employment. From a commercial standpoint, only the major heavyweights such as Microsoft, Adobe, Cisco or CompTIA (to give some examples) provide enough commercial weight. Nothing else makes the grade.

'In-Centre' days are often touted as a great feature by many trainers. After talking to the majority of IT hopefuls that have tried them out, you'll begin to see a common thread - they are viewed as a mistake as they hadn't properly considered the following:

- A lot of journeys to the workshop centre - normally hundreds of miles.

- Weekday only accessibility to events is usual, and with 2-3 days to book off work, this can represent quite a problem for the majority of students who work.

- Holiday days lost - the majority of trainees get just four weeks holiday each year. If over half of it is swallowed up by study events, that isn't going to leave much vacation time for students and their families.

- Training workshops usually become quickly full, meaning we have to accept something that we don't really want.

- Tension can be created in many classes as most students want to move at a pace comfortable for them.

- Take into account all of all the travelling, food, parking and accommodation and you could be in for a major shock. Trainees mention extra costs mounting to several hundred and sometimes thousands of pounds. Break it down - and understand where they're coming from.

- The majority of attendees want study privacy and therefore avoiding all management questions at work.

- Posing questions in front of other class-mates can make any one of us feel nervous. Would you admit that you've occasionally avoided posing a question just because you honestly thought you might seem thick?

- Being away from home with your work during the week - a fair few students have to work or live away for certain parts of their training. Events are therefore problematic to attend, but the monies have already been handed over as part of your fees.

Infinitely more flexible is to use videoed classes in the comfort of your own chosen environment - at a time that's convenient to you - not anyone else. You can study at home on your PC or use your laptop to enjoy the sun. If you have any questions, then get onto the live 24x7 support (that should come with any technical program.) Simply do the study modules as many times as you need to revise. And of course, you don't have to make notes as the teaching is yours forever. Even though this won't stop each and every issue, it undeniably vastly reduces stress and simplifies things. Plus you've got less hassle, costs and travel.

If its the Development side of Databases that is of interest to you, the MCITP DB-Developer from Microsoft is for you. This certification covers how to set databases up - design, rationalisation etc., but it won't go into detail on how to write programs for databases. For more info on training in Database programming, you should refer to the Programming section of this site. To tell the truth, there is generally a more significant involvement in the DBA aspect from both students and employers. Nonetheless, if for example the developer track is for you, it could be sensible to add the 'MCITP' DB Developer into a broader Programming training path. Over the next few years, you will also find additional 'MCTS' qualification in 'SQL' Server 2008 more and more relevant.

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