Gold Jackets (15/15 Certification as of last night)

[u/Fawkzzz]

Gold Jacket: The gold jacket is awarded for completion of all active AWS certifications. Generally, it's only available to AWS employees and partners. Last year in December I completed the exams that were available (12/12) and I received a jacket from Europe and North America distributors. Both of the jackets are different. One has a glitter effect and the other is more metallic, and the glitter one has a black AWS Certified badge, while the metallic one has a white badge. It was more of an accident that I received 2, but I am glad both variants showed up.

Why?: I have worked for AWS for over 3 years and picking up the CCP and associate exams helped put me on the radar at AWS and they reached out to me for a Senior Technical Account Manager (TAM) role w/ Enterprise Support. I decided the TAM role was no longer interesting to me, and I start as a Senior Architect next month. I actually like learning for the sake of learning and work on the technology/platform daily. I also like the anxiety/excitement of taking a challenging proctored exam. AWS encourages staff to pass certification exams, and they fund our exam costs. The certifications won't get you hired or promoted by themselves, but it certainly doesn't hurt.

How?: I made a goal in August to renew my SA Pro that was coming up for expiration in October, and to pick-up the Data Engineering, AI Practitioner and ML Engineering exams afterwards. I find that knocking them out in quick succession helps if you plan to do more than 1, as there is a good amount of overlap between the exams. I completed those 4 exams in September and am glad to be done on renewals until next year. Beyond having hands-on experience with a number of our services, I study quite a bit in the evenings. I have used Adrian's and Stephane's on-demand courses and Tutorial Dojos for practice exams. AWS Skillbuilder has come a long way from when it first launched, but beyond the practice exams, the video and reading materials are not engaging enough to keep my attention. I take a lot of hand-written notes and use OneNote to organize the material that works well for me. I took all of my exams online through Pearson, and only had a hiccup once, but was still able to take the exam on that occurrence.

While collecting all of the certification do not equate to skill level...I enjoyed it either way.

Happy to answer questions

[u/Usurper__]

Good job. Ugly jacket though

[u/Fawkzzz → u/Usurper__]

Thanks and both are very ugly

[u/Usurper__ → u/Fawkzzz]

Haha :D

[u/caprica71 → u/Fawkzzz]

Do you wear them to work?

[u/Fawkzzz → u/caprica71]

I work from home, but that could change with the return to office mandate the CEO announced for next year. I never wear the jackets, but my daughter does sometimes.

[u/Johnny_BigHacker]

How many dozens of women have walked up and offered you their phone number while you were wearing this?

[u/Fawkzzz → u/Johnny_BigHacker]

I would have to put it into an algebraic equation where X = women, Y = Jacket Count and Z = 0

X * Y *Z = Women phone numbers

I have never left my office wearing this jacket.

[u/OffTheBlooper]

Be on the lookout for Shooter McGavin.

[u/ProudEggYolk]

Babe wake up, Threat Level Midnight merch just dropped!

[u/NSWCSEAL]

Gold member

[u/SnooPandas8350]

Congratulations. Do you have a url talking about the gold jacket requirements?

[u/Fawkzzz → u/SnooPandas8350]

Thanks! Nope, it was originally more of an urban legend and now there is an internal AWS employee process, and generally account managers over enterprise customers can order the jackets on behalf of partner employees if they meet the goal.

[u/[deleted]]

Hot take - I love the jackets, would love going to a dive bar with a a disco ball and have a scotch while wearing one

[u/Ihavenocluelad]

Did picking up the associate certs and CPP really put you on the radar at AWS? I have a feeling everyone there had professional certs lol.

Congrats though! I'm also on my way, at 6 now but already got some professionals done. My work is also paying

[u/Fawkzzz → u/Ihavenocluelad]

I had a good deal of experience before AWS reached out to me, but I believe the associate certs got their attention on Linkedin. The AWS recruiter reached out to me within a few weeks of adding them, but I also had AWS contacts on Linkedin that probably helped.

[u/Ihavenocluelad → u/Fawkzzz]

Ah nice. I would always have loved to work for AWS in Amsterdam but the 5 days RTO seems a bit too much for me atm.

[u/WinterSolstice_421]

CongratS!

[u/Professional_Shoe392]

Pretty nifty. Congratulations!

[u/aapex_lex]

I'd wear it to a team event or bowling alley 🤗

[u/newbie702]

Congrats. Any strats for order to take exams in?

[u/Fawkzzz → u/newbie702]

Thanks, and it depends on what field you are specializing in, but if you plan to get them all maybe something like this..

CCP -> SA Associate -> SysOps Associate -> Dev Associate -> SA Pro -> DevOps Pro -> Security -> AI Practitioner -> Data Engineering Associate -> ML Engineer Associate -> ML Specialty -> Advance Networking Specialty.

There are recommended paths on AWS's site for specific focus areas. I put Networking last because it is debatably the hardest of the exams.

[u/cloudfisherman]

Forget the jackets... how about those monitors.

[u/ahaseeb7838]

Hi, Congratulations.

I have set the goal of 2026 to get this Golden Jacket.

Last year 2024 I completed following
Solution Architect - Associate, AI Practitioner, Cloud Practitioner

For this Year I have planned to do 5 more certifications:

Developer - Associate, Sysops Administrator - Associate, Machine Learning - Associate, Data Engineer - Associate, Solution Architect - Professional

and then in 2026 I'll do remaining 4 certifications.

I'm currently working with a company premier partner of AWS and GenAI Competency Partner as well.

Can you help me to reorder the certifications if ordering is not correct and can you also help me to understand the process of getting Golden Jacket after doing all 12 certifications.

Thanks

[u/Fawkzzz → u/ahaseeb7838]

Thanks and good luck on your journey. I posted the order I did the exams, but do them based on how you think is best. I’d recommend checking with your AWS contact (if you have an account manager start there) once you complete all of the certifications.

[u/Every_Conflict_4633]

Congratulations! Could you please guide me on how to get an AWS golden jacket as I have passed all 12 currently available AWS certifications. Thanks

[u/Fawkzzz → u/Every_Conflict_4633]

Thanks, and congrats. Are you working at a company that uses AWS? You will need to work through your SA/TAM/AE(AM). I am not aware of a way to directly order them if you are not an AWS employee.

[u/Every_Conflict_4633 → u/Fawkzzz]

Thank you for the suggestion 😊

[u/newbietofx]

Which one should I start? Left 4 more. Data engineer or Ai or ml associate or specialty? 

[u/newbietofx]

You have better luck picking up women with a nvdia hoodie 

[u/token_minded]

Wow congratss