BREAKING DOWN 'Core Competencies'. A business just starting out will try to first identify-and then focus on-its core competencies, allowing it to establish a footprint while gaining a solid reputation and brand recognition.
CCNP Routing and Switching Certification. For network engineers who aspire to plan, implement, verify and troubleshoot local and wide-area enterprise networks, the Cisco CCNP Routing and Switching certification program provides the education and training required to develop hands-on skills and best-practices.
Announced in 1998, this cert acts as the pre-requisite for all the other Cisco certs. So if you want to start your Cisco certification journey so you can get certs on other Cisco technology areas, or to get deeper certs like CCNP and CCIE, then you need to get your CCNA. Cisco provides two paths to get your CCNA certification: a 2-exam path, and a 1-exam path, as shown in the figure.