A new certification is in the works with Nutanix Platform Expert (NPX). The objective of the certification is to show that you have the “ability to deliver complete solutions to customers that relate directly back to business requirements,” according to Rene Van Den Bedem, chief architect at RoundTower Technologies, Inc.

Without a skilled enterprise architect, you increase the risk of a solution failing.  It’s a “program designed to cultivate and certify the top-level IT enterprise architects in a hyper-converged, web-skilled infrastructure world,” Chris Skinner, NPX program manager at Nutanix, Inc., added.

Van Den Bedem and Skinner spoke to Stu Miniman (@stu) and Dave Vellante (@dvellante), hosts of theCUBE, from the SiliconANGLE Media team, during the Nutanix .NEXT Conference.

So what does it take to get such a certification? Well, it’s certainly not easy. Going in you have to be Nutanix Platform Professional (NPP) certified and have references from your peers. Then you build and submit a documents set that’s reviewed. If it’s built to a high enough standard, you are invited to defend it in front of a panel of experts, much like during the PH.D. process.

You really have to show expert knowledge, and it’s by invite only. It is the only certification that is hypervisor-vendor agnostic. And for Nutanix, due to its invite-only structure, it currently only costs time and not money. They are looking for the “expert-level, top tier, less than 1% IT architects,” Skinner said.

The top priority

But there is one thing that matters even more than certifications or technology to these experts. People.

Without cooperation, “it’s equivalent of giving a Ferrari to someone in the desert who needs a four-wheel drive,” said Van Den Bedem. People and the process are the most important things, even though technology is often given the priority. But, as they pointed out, the technology follows what the people need.

Watch the full interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE and theCUBE’s coverage of the Nutanix .NEXT Conference 2016.

Photo by SiliconANGLE