Two AWS Solutions Architects discuss advancing their cloud skill set with digital badges

If you are new to AWS and trying to figure out which Storage services to use, how to use them, and best practices, it can be challenging to find guidance that you can trust. The depth of features and options means that even experienced users can identify better solutions with continuous learning. But how do you simplify learning? And once you learn, how do you prove what you know?

At AWS Storage Day 2022 (August 10), AWS announced a new digital learning badge by AWS Training and Certification aligned with the Storage Learning Plan: File Storage on AWS Skill Builder. By earning this File badge with the existing Object and Block digital badges, you will also earn the tiered Storage Core digital badge. We recommend these learning plans and badges to anyone responsible for managing their organization’s data and seeking to better understand AWS Storage services. They can help you identify the appropriate solution for storage workloads. This includes storage administrators, storage engineers, developers, solutions architects, and anyone that wants to plan for their cloud data. You can improve your skills and knowledge of cloud storage by earning the Storage Digital Badges. The AWS Storage Core digital badge gives you a credential to demonstrate a well-rounded background in AWS Cloud Storage.

In this blog, learn how two seasoned storage experts at AWS benefited from these learning plans and by earning the associated badges.

How did earning Storage digital badges help two AWS Storage Specialist Solution Architects?

Carlos: Hey Allyn, I think one of the interesting challenges for IT roles is keeping up with the constant updates for each technology area. I started working in the IT industry in the early ’00s when most of the technologies I interacted with were deployed only in customers’ own data centers, and there were experts nearby when I had questions. Back then, there was a lot to learn. But when more customers started to adopt AWS Cloud technology, none of us could claim to be experts. The need to learn cloud technology, so we could make the right decisions for our own data, became clear. How about you?

Allyn: I have worked in the IT and computer industry for many decades. I installed my first Novell File and Print server in the early ’90s. Before joining AWS, I worked with an independent software vendor (ISV) partner that used Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3) as the authoritative storage for the workflow we enabled. I helped hundreds of customers create their first AWS account, first Amazon S3 bucket, first AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) user, and IAM policy. These customers then uploaded petabytes of data to Amazon S3. It’s interesting how we need to continuously learn new technologies.

Carlos: Yes, completely agree. Everyone picks up new skills as they work, whether through on-the-job learning from coworkers or by proactively developing on their own. Each one of us has different opportunities and preferences for how to keep learning, but formal training has always been a great tool to learn. Online options, such as AWS Skill Builder, provide flexibility to advance at your own pace.

Allyn: Cloud technology is certainly a space that requires constant learning, and knowing how to learn the right things can itself be challenging. I thought I had a good understanding of how Amazon S3 worked, but when I joined AWS, I quickly found out that there was a lot more to S3 and other AWS Storage services than I knew. I jumped in, read online documentation and blogs, and built solutions and workflows in my personal AWS account. I did learn a lot in a short time, but I did not have the new AWS Storage learning plans to help me at that time. Now that we do have them, I recently completed the Object, Block, and File training and assessments to earn all three badges plus the Core Storage Badge. Earning these Badges now—after joining AWS—definitely increased my understanding. If only I had these when I first started, they would have simplified figuring out what I needed to know and how to learn it. Each Storage learning plan includes customer examples and videos to reinforce the information, and that helped me pass the assessments for the digital badges. I know you also came in with a storage background already. What was your experience with the Storage learning plans?

Carlos: As AWS Storage Specialist Solution Architects, we need to continuously learn to help customers solve their business challenges. So, it’s really important that we know what we’re talking about, and that we can demonstrate that to customers. This year, I obtained the Object and Block digital badges to refresh my knowledge on those topics and recently earned the File digital badge, which means I earned the Storage Core digital badge, too. By completing the Learning Plans and taking the assessments for each digital badge, I was able to dive deeper on how AWS Storage services provide options for different customer use cases. This has helped me provide better guidance for customers and recommendations on which AWS Storage service to use on their workloads. What about you, Allyn? How has this impacted your thinking or engagement with customers about AWS Storage solutions?

Allyn: After earning the Block badge, I was able to help a customer understand the benefits of our newer Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS) volume types, like GP3 and IO2. This customer was still running most of their Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) production workload on GP2. I explained to them the technical and cost advantages of moving to GP3. The customer decided to use GP3 for any new EBS volumes and started to plan on converting the current GP2 to the GP3.

After earning the Object badge, I was able to help a customer use Amazon S3 Storage Lens to create actionable recommendations to help improve cost-efficiency and apply data protection best practices to their S3 buckets.

The latest badge I earned was File. This covers all the managed File services that AWS offers. I am very hands-on with a few of them, and completing the File learning plan helped me dive into one that I was less hands-on with: Amazon FSx for OpenZFS. Just after earning the badge, I had a call with a customer looking to move a workload into AWS. This workload used a file system on premises. I asked what type of file system they used, and the customer shared that it is an NFS file system hosted on commodity hardware. After a few more questions, we came to the conclusion that they should test Amazon FSx for OpenZFS to ensure that it does meet their requirements. I was able to have a deeper conversation with all of these customers after completing the learning plans and earning the digital badges. Carlos, you mentioned you’ve been able to provide better guidance to customers. Can you share an example?

Carlos: Recently, I worked with a customer from the financial services industry who needed to change the architecture of an application for their end customers to make it work on multiple AWS Regions to increase availability and improve performance. After reviewing the workload details and storage requirements, the option to move from file storage using Amazon Elastic File System (EFS) to object storage with Amazon S3 made the most sense. The customer was able to re-architect the application to leverage features such as Multi-Region Access Points and bucket replication of Amazon S3 to achieve their goals.

Allyn: Bottom line: even for seasoned experts like us, these Storage learning plans can help refresh what you know or learn something new about AWS object, block, and file storage. Do you have any tips for folks wanting to tackle the Learning Plans and assessments?

Carlos: I found it helpful to schedule some time each day to complete the learning plans and then take the assessments. It is possible to go directly to the assessment if you have enough experience with AWS Storage services. The assessment results will share areas you have strengths and areas where you need to learn more. Good luck to everyone. Remember to share your badges on social media, and tag #AWSTraining when you do.

Now it is your turn to start earning AWS Storage digital badges

Each of the storage foundation badges—Object, Block, and File—has a Learning Plan with courses to help you understand AWS Storage services in depth and how they can be used to solve different challenges. In order to earn the badges, you must score 80 percent or higher on the assessment for each badge. The Storage Learning Plan: Object Storage focuses on Amazon S3, the Storage Learning Plan: Block Storage focuses on Amazon EBS, and the Storage Learning Plan: File Storage focuses on Amazon EFS and Amazon FSx family of fully managed storage services. Start your learning now or take a free assessment by registering for a free account for AWS Skill Builder and choosing a Storage Learning Plan to start.