Cisco and StepStone Help Networking Academy Students Get on the Job Ladder

October 31, 2007; 06:45 AM

LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--StepStone (OSE:STP) and Cisco® Networking Academy® today launched a revamped careers portal for Networking Academy alumni and students, featuring career advice, resources and a searchable database of thousands of active jobs.

NetAcad Advantage (www.netacadadvantage.com) aims to provide access to jobs, career advice and support to the hundreds of thousands of students and alumni of Cisco’s Networking Academies in Europe, Africa and the Middle East.

Already boasting more than 100,000 subscribers, NetAcad Advantage now features a job search service powered by leading online recruiter, StepStone, specifically designed to help Networking Academy students find and apply online for the right job to match their skills.

Through NetAcad Advantage, Cisco Networking Academy students will be able to search through job vacancies from StepStone’s online job sites in nine European nations and soon be able to expand their search to StepStone’s other sites and network of job site partners which cover 60 countries worldwide. The NetAcad Advantage site also provides career advice, job profiles, industry news, interviews with top industry figures, and profiles of students who have successfully gained employment after graduating.

Celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, Networking Academy has helped more than two million graduates gain skills that have been instrumental in improving their employability. Cisco created the program to provide students in underserved communities with the expertise to work in the information technology (IT) field. It offers 16 courses covering various IT concepts and skills to prepare students for the industry-recognised certification. The programme currently has 465,000 participating students across 9,000 academies worldwide.

“Cisco Networking Academy has helped millions of graduates improve their skills, but we wanted to give our graduates a helping hand in building their careers in IT, which is why we developed the NetAcad Advantage careers portal,” said John Edwards, Networking Academy director. “NetAcad Advantage not only helps graduates look for suitable jobs but is also packed with advice and information to form a comprehensive career resource which we hope graduates will keep returning to over the course of their careers.”

NetAcad Advantage users can carry out a multi-country search for jobs, sign up for job alerts of relevant posts, or access information on core job-seeking skills such as preparing for job interviews and filling out online applications. Recruiters looking for skilled Networking Academy graduates can benefit from low-cost job listings on the website that can also be posted across all relevant StepStone sites and those of its partners.

“The strong demand across the world for skilled technology graduates makes Cisco Networking Academy even more relevant to today’s employers,” StepStone CEO, Colin Tenwick, said. “We believe the NetAcad Advantage careers portal is not only a great resource for graduates but it will become a vital link for employers looking to access a large pool of skilled talent in an increasingly networked world.”

About StepStone

StepStone is one of the world’s largest providers of on-demand, talent management solutions, offering a portfolio of technology, software and online services that enable organisations to attract, recruit, develop, retain and manage the best available talent.

StepStone Online operates some of Europe’s largest and most successful Total Talent Communities, covering 13 countries and attracting 1.9million visitors each week. StepStone’s Total Talent Management Software Solutions are a range of on-demand services which enable organisations to manage the entire employee lifecycle, from initial attraction, through pre-hire online recruitment, on-boarding and post hire performance management including compensation management, skills and competency management and employee training and development. StepStone recently completed the acquisition of ExecuTRACK, a global leader in strategic Talent Management, which extends StepStone's Total Talent Management solutions portfolio.

Thousands of organisations including Aviva, BBC, Amey, Royal Bank of Scotland, AXA, British Airways, Xerox and Fiat use StepStone's products and services to help them recruit qualified staff globally. Founded in Norway in 1996, StepStone was the only European-headquartered vendor to be recognised as a ‘leader’ by Gartner, Inc’s recent "Magic Quadrant for E-Recruitment Software, 2006” report. For more information see: http://www.stepstone.com

About the Cisco Networking Academy

Launched in 1997, Cisco Networking Academy is a partnership between Cisco, education, business, government and community organizations around the world, aimed at nurturing IT professionals. The education program employs an e-learning model, using a combination of Web-based and instructor-led training along with a hands-on lab environment to teach students how to design, build and maintain computer networks. Worldwide, more than 2 million students have graduated from a total of approximately 10,000 academies in more than 165 countries.

The Cisco Networking Academy will be celebrating its 10-year anniversary with a number of events and activities throughout 2007.

About Cisco

Cisco, (NASDAQ:CSCO), is the worldwide leader in networking that transforms how people connect, communicate and collaborate. Information about Cisco can be found at http://www.cisco.com. For ongoing news, please go to http://newsroom.cisco.com. Cisco equipment in Europe is supplied by Cisco Systems International BV, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cisco Systems, Inc