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The Issue

First, I would like to throw out a couple of general thoughts for consideration.

1. The Baby Boomer demographic is now starting to move into the age of retirement.
2. A recent article in one of the national papers made reference to how we are now in a firmly based knowledge economy.
3. The Integration Industry is one of the fastest growing segments in business and technology today, if you add the unrealized integration need, the growth in the next 5 years will be overwhelming.

With our knowledge based work force entering the age of retirement we start to realize the growing dilemma that the integration industry is facing and the pressing requirement for qualified and trained human resources by both end users and vendors.

The Challenge

This human resource challenge is further confirmed during industry presentations. One of the principal end user issues brought up during presentations around the world is that integration resources are currently woefully inadequate to meet the needs of the end users. It is not because current integration practitioners have any shortcomings, just that there are not enough of them to quench the current demand, especially when one searches for specific experience and knowledge resources in the integration space.

Thus it is overly apparent that education needs to be a priority for the integration industry. There are a few vendors and 3rd party organizations that provide either product seminars or online education, which is a wonderful start to addressing the education crises but it does not really answer the need for a robust curriculum and educational platform for the integration industry.

All industry stakeholders should be driving, no, demanding the development of a professional accreditation in integration. End users and vendors alike continue to contact the Integration Consortium daily seeking finely honed and experienced integration specialists to contribute to their solution teams. Therefore the need exists and the shortage of experienced and qualified resources can be termed a crises. Supply and demand economics 101, big demand and a short supply, therefore why are we not filling the need?