Category: Agile and Scrum Reviews

As documented by Sudhamanohar Gadwala

I am Sudhamanohar, and I am thrilled to share my professional journey and how upskilling through certifications has propelled my career in Business Analysis. With over a decade of experience, I started my career in 2011 with ICICI Bank. Join me as I delve into my enrollment decision, career goals, experience with Simplilearn, and the remarkable impact these certifications had on my professional growth.

Enrollment Decision and Career Goals

During my tenure at HCL Technologies as a Business Specialist and Senior Business Analyst, I recognized the need for further development to unlock better career opportunities. To achieve this, I pursued the Certified Scrum Product Owner and Certified Scrum Master certifications. My primary objective was to gain a broader perspective in my career and secure financial growth through enhanced skills and expertise.

My Experience with Simplilearn

When selecting a learning platform, Simplilearn stood out as the clear choice. With its renowned faculty and exceptional coaching, Simplilearn offers the ideal environment for continuous learning. The meticulously crafted curriculum appealed to me, providing the necessary depth and breadth of knowledge. I am grateful for the enriching experience and the valuable insights gained throughout the courses.

As documented by Srinath V 

I always strive to improve my skills to remain relevant and valuable to my organization. Upgrading myself according to technological advancements is one aspect of this. I wanted to join the product owner role to accomplish more challenging tasks and increase my worth and get promotions.

My Journey

I started my career with TCS, and later I shifted to Cognizant. Here I was a part of the Business Development Group. After working at Cognizant for four years, I felt the need to change my domain to a Product Owner role. For this, I decided to pursue CSPO certification from Simplilearn to gain knowledge on the Product Owner profile and the Agile concepts. Eventually, I got an offer for the PO’e position at Cognizant, which helped me gain recognition.

The Challenges I was Facing

I loved working as a business analyst at Cognizant. All the projects were interesting, and the pay was also good. However, I always felt something was missing. At the same time, product management kept attracting me. Therefore, I wanted to learn more about working in this domain. The best way to shift to this area was to earn a professional certification so I could demonstrate the skills and earn the trust of my seniors in Cognizant. Therefore, I decided to upskill myself with the CSPO offered by Simplilearn.

Simplilearn Solution

The Simplilearn course helped me realise my dream of working as a product manager at Cognizant. The instructors of this course explained every topic and its principles very clearly, and their guidance helped me understand what are the responsibilities and roles of a product manager. This was possible because they knew what challenges a product manager had to face and accordingly provided tried and tested solutions.

As documented by Balazs Sebok 

The thought of changing domains in my organization led me to pursue the Agile Scrum Master course by Simplilearn, and after completing the program, I got a salary increment!

My Career Journey So Far

I am currently working as a Senior Banking Manager at Intesa Sanpaolo. I am a senior financial professional with 13+ years of experience establishing Strategic Partnerships within International Banking and Financial Services. I have coordinated, supported, and provided leadership and strategic direction in Product, Process & Project Management, Digital Transformation, Corporate & Transaction Banking, Business Development, National & International Negotiations of Banks, and Leasing and Factoring companies in 12 countries.

The Challenge

I wanted to explore and enhance my understanding of the Agile Scrum areas and wanted to go for a domain change in my professional career. I decided to look for an online professional certification in Agile Scrum when I came across Simplilearn. After going through the numerous Simplilearn reviews and the high Simplilearn rating, I decided to continue with the course to upskill myself.    

The Simplilearn Solution

The program provided by Simplilearn was well structured and formulated. The industry experts were knowledgeable and provided me with deep, hands-on experience in every topic. It also helped me learn and understand the concepts with practical implementation. My learning journey with Simplilearn was great. It helped me greatly upskill and get certified.

All About My Professional Background

As documented by Samuel Soper

I’m an Army veteran from Wisconsin, U.S.A. While serving back in 1982, I became interested in Satellite Communications as a Senior Instructor/Curriculum Writer. I moved into the private sector in 1994 and worked as a Communications and Systems manager for a while. In my 40-year career span, I have served many companies as a consultant and a Director of Technology.

Due to so many years of experience and newly learned skills, I could change my domain to Solutions Architect within my company in 2020. Then, in January 2022, I joined a new company as a Technical Solutions Architect. My role here focuses on analysis and solution architecture, assisting development and providing configuration while extending D365 Customer Engagement capabilities throughout the Accounting, Architecture/Engineering/Construction, Legal and Consulting industries. Our teams design and deliver a range of solutions to client problems, process gaps, and inefficiencies by providing the skills and knowledge to create solutions that fit in their business strategies.

My Desire to Stay Current Kicks In

I worked as the Enterprise and Application Architecture Director with a company when the global pandemic hit. Although I am on the verge of retirement, I didn’t want to retire. I wanted to retain a youthful perspective regarding skills and mindset at my job. Today’s young people are technically more literate than me. My desire to maintain relevancy in both my position and in the marketplace became my chief incentive to upskill.

How I Chose Simplilearn as My Go-To Upskill Resource

I began my journey by taking some free Simplilearn courses through Skilllup, focusing on business analysis and project management. I really liked the courses and the structure they provided, so I enrolled in Simplilearn and started taking other courses. So, I began with PMI-ACP and PMI-RMP certifications and then moved on to ITIL 4 and TOGAF 9.2 certifications. I took all four of them in 2020. I took the courses to streamline my work. I was looking for courses that would give me practical knowledge and clarify all theoretical aspects. Finally, I wanted to understand how I could use these technologies as a technical architect and help develop business solutions.

I added to my skill set this year by taking certificate courses in Business Analysis and Digital Transformation.

With already working as a technology leader, I wanted to do something bigger and better. I was looking for ways to expand my knowledge in the software industry and also grow as a person. Upskilling to learn about project management, definitely did the trick for me and even resulted in a new job.

Background 

I’m a software professional with over 15 years of experience in software industry. I was working as a technology leader in my last company, which was a product company in the Telecom and Healthcare domain.

Looking to grow in my career, I started looking for learning new things and came across Agile and Scrum as the most demanded in the project management field. I came across couple of articles on Agile methodology on internet. With Agile methodology in particular scrum methodology is the most effective methodology for developing complex software product in complex environment, I wanted to go into software project management. So I decided to take up a course in Agile Scrum methodology.

As documented by Namrata Mishra

My career mantra is to always keep looking up and keep moving forward. I am constantly looking at how I can improve myself and how I can attain my next career goal. This is exactly how when I was faced with the opportunity of becoming a Scrum Master, I took it and haven’t looked back since. Here’s my journey of how I became a Scrum Master.

I have worked my way up ever since I began my professional career, starting as an SAP trainee with SoftSpin Services in Mumbai nearly 20 years ago. Learning on the job came naturally to me. I always make a conscious effort to learn something of value from everyone I encounter—not just at work, but in daily life. This spirit of lifelong learning is exactly how I came into contact with Simplilearn.

I believe a lot can be learned just by doing it in your regular course of work, but sometimes it’s necessary to take a more structured approach to learn, especially when it involves a standardized methodology such as Agile Scrum. For an agile organization to run like a well-oiled machine, you can’t simply wing it. Everyone needs to be on the same page to reap its many benefits.

That is why Simplilearn was the answer to all my problems. A two-day Certified ScrumMaster® (CSM) Certification training course gave me the confidence to excel in my career and that was just the beginning. 

The Challenge: Taking On the Role of ScrumMaster

With my mantra in mind, I have advanced through the ranks as a professional software engineer to become a program manager since graduating in 2001 with a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering. I worked with SAP software (and the ABAP programming language specifically) at SoftSpin for a couple of years before moving on to a series of senior-level software engineer and management-level jobs. 

I joined Mercedes-Benz R&D India as a Program Manager for the Service Operation team. My work focused on SAP and financial services, which was my forte, but my manager knew I wanted to keep growing and taking on more ambitious roles. She asked me whether I wanted to take on the role of ScrumMaster. 

ScrumMasters have a lot of responsibility. They coordinate the various activities comprising a given project with business objectives (bringing a new software release to market, for example), ensuring the project is done right and delivered on time. They host meetings and maintain multiple lines of communication to make sure everyone has the information and resources they need—when they need it. It’s similar to the role of a movie director, although it’s typically applied to technology projects that involve large, multidisciplinary teams.

I was awed by my manager’s confidence in me but I was a little skeptical about making the transition right away, as I only knew the basics of the Agile methodology. So, I decided that the best option for me was to pursue formal certification as a ScrumMaster. After extensive research and multiple recommendations, I found Simplilearn. They had exactly what I had been looking for to help me become a ScrumMaster.

As documented by Sameer Gupta.

I saw the need for Agile management skills first-hand while working as an IT project manager at TCS. I worked in systems integration and estimated project timelines and costs. Projects kept getting delayed, and we did not have a mechanism to speed things up. That was when I decided to pursue the ASM® certification.

I knew about the Agile methodology, but only theoretically. I lacked practical experience. I began researching project management courses. I had positive experiences taking courses from Simplilearn in the past: Prince2® Foundation and Practitioner Certification Training and ITIL® Intermediate ST Certification Training. Simplilearn provides an option to compare classes, and I looked at ASM and Certified ScrumMaster (CSM®). I compared the benefits and differences and decided on Agile Scrum Master (ASM).

My Learning Journey With Simplilearn

The course was excellent. The instructors understood what students needed to learn, anticipated what questions they might ask, and shared real-life examples. There were plenty of references provided for further study.

To pursue my full-time job and take courses through Simplilearn, I practiced time management. I divided the course into various modules and finished one module per week. At the end of each week, I took online mock tests to test my skills.

When I completed the course, I scheduled a practice exam with Simplilearn so that I could take the actual ASM exam with confidence. Mock tests on Simplilearn’s website helped me evaluate my preparation and track my progress. This feature was a game-changer.

As documented by, Miguel Angel Jimenez Garcia.

I know there are countless success stories about professionals who started out in the mailroom and worked their way up to the executive suite, but these have become increasingly rare. Today, even the brightest, most driven professionals must acquire certain formal skills in order to meet their goals. I always believed I had great insights and ambitions larger than just my job description, but I often felt like my ideas fell on deaf ears.

I realized I needed to learn some new hard skills to leverage my innate abilities and drive in order to grow into my full potential. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the time or flexibility to attend in-person classes while also working full-time and taking care of my children.

After a couple of unsatisfying roles, I was hired as a product owner in ThermoFisher Scientific’s Carlsbad, CA office. That’s where I was exposed to the agile process, which led me to Simplilearn’s Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP®) training program. After becoming certified, I felt I was much better equipped to communicate my ideas and work seamlessly with my colleagues.

Overall it was a really good experience. After taking my PMI certification course, and subsequent certification, I saw a lot of differences in my career.

One of the main differences was that my training and certification resulted in my ideas and input being taken seriously and led to positive impacts throughout my organization. This training helped me take my already sharp mind and determination to the next level.

The Challenge: Launching a Satisfying Career

I began my career working as a call center agent at a young age, pursuing my undergraduate degree in computer science. Empowered by my new degree and ready to take on more responsibility, I took a job as a business analyst with a telecommunications company. My position consisted of generating estimates based on analysis reports, but what I really wanted to do was create a product, enhance customer experience, and develop tangible solutions.

I’ve always been an innovator and an “ideas guy” at heart, but the rank and file reality of the job didn’t match my ambitions or abilities. The boundaries and limitations put in place at my place of employment left my ideas routinely ignored. Once I realized that the job wasn’t the right fit, I looked around for more suitable employment.

That’s when I landed at another telecommunications company but in a different role, managing teams and contributing to the development of the products. It was much closer to what I really wanted to do, but the organization was not particularly innovative, didn’t embrace new processes, and—as a result—failed to provide the space I needed to realize my true potential.

Finally, I was hired as a product owner with ThermoFisher, where the team had been adapting agile methods and other forward-thinking ideas. Here, I attended work-related meetups focused on agile technologies for the purpose of increasing team productivity and enhancing customer satisfaction. From these meetings, I decided I wanted to learn practical techniques for planning and estimating the cost of the project using agile methods. That’s when one of my friends suggested that I pursue a project management certification through Simplilearn.

The Simplilearn Solution: Turning Ambition Into Action with a Project Management Certification

As a working father, I wanted to advance my career and learn the tools that would help me find continued success with an employer, but I needed something that worked with my schedule. I checked out a wide range of online certification programs in my price range, but found the curriculum and format of Simplilearn’s Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP®) course to be the best fit for my needs.

With its unique combination of instructor-led lessons and self-paced videos, in addition to real-life case studies and simulation exams, I believed it would be the ideal solution. I was even able to pass the exam on my first try after completing the course materials. I made sure to spread the word about Simplilearn to my colleagues, encouraging them to continuously develop their skills to remain ahead of the curve.

I had such a positive experience with the program that I followed it up with Simplilearn’s Lean Six Sigma Green Belt Certification training program. The combination of these two certifications has amplified my professional versatility, raised my profile within my organization, and did wonders for my career in countless other ways. In short, adding the right skills to my toolkit enabled me to unleash my true potential.