In this series so far, I’ve talked about three distinct but not mutually exclusive paths to growing up from a tech shop to a next-level digital agency. We all know there’s a dwindling future in the “launch ‘em and leave ‘em” or “big build, meager maintenance” models, but what’s next?

Welcome back to my ongoing blog series on ways to elevate your business model as a digital agency!

Having a website that can quickly adapt and evolve is crucial. The concept of agile websites fundamentally transforms the way we think about web development and management. But how do we make our websites truly agile? 

Before founding Pantheon, I spent over a decade as a web professional, cutting my teeth on Solaris in Silicon Valley in the late 90s, then as an open-source savvy freelancer until I became a digital political operative, and finally as a principal at a Drupal-centric digital agency (Chapter Three, still going strong in San Francisco). Since then, I’ve been privileged to observe the trajectory of thousands of other agencies as they leverage Pantheon’s platform and Partner Program to deliver for their clients and grow.

In my previous post in this blog series about the Pantheon WebOps Certification Program, I provided an overview of the program, its origins and some of its aspirations. In this post, I will highlight how the exam came into being, including the selection process of the exam topics, and the creative minds supporting this process.I will also share some of the ideas we have for additional certifications in the future.

Sometimes I'm in the mood to read deeply. When I edited the study guide for our certification test, I printed out over 200 pages of a PDF. I read closely. I made notes in pen. I translated those notes into Google Docs suggestions, and then I read a bunch more.