A couple of years ago at Networkers, I heard about a proposal to grandfather people who had been long-time CCIEs, so that they didn't have to take the recertification test any more. My first thought was that it would significantly weaken the program. How would you know whether someone was an active CCIE or grandfathered without taking time to gather the relevant information and spend the time to verify it? I felt so strongly about it that I spoke out against the idea.
Upon further thought, I have a suggestion to resolve the dilemma. When a high ranking military officer retires, he or she gets to retain the title, but with the addition of "Retired" (e.g. General Kilroy, Retired). Why not do the same thing for the CCIE program? It shows that the person can think, work hard, excel, and make a difference in their area of expertise. This is exactly what the military moniker conveys and I see no problem with doing the same for the CCIE program. Someday I'll retire and wouldn't mind a business card that says something like:
Terry Slattery, CCIE #1026/Inactive
How does this suggestion help the CCIE program? It would provide an official way for people who achieved the CCIE status to continue to get some benefit as well as let future employers know that the person has useful attributes and experience. It could broaden the program's reach to people who have moved into the management world from the technical world. Imagine a Cisco account team finding that they are working with a CCIE/Inactive manager and being able to immediately get into a level of technical detail. The existing Cisco CCIE validation tool can tell whether someone is in active or inactive status, allowing employers to easily check someone's status.
I've not considered how far back such a program should reach. Should all former CCIEs be allowed to use an "Inactive" designation (or whatever the designation would be)? Off hand, I can't think of a reason to limit it and what measure one would use to set such limits. My intuition is that allowing all former CCIEs to use the "Inactive" designation would generate a lot of good will in the networking community.
What do you think?
-Terry