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Наталя ХандусенкоAI Eng
27 May 2026, 16:06
2026-05-27
Exclusive certification from Anthropic: how a Senior Software Engineer from EPAM conquered the new exam from the creators of Claude
In March 2026, Anthropic launched the official Claude Certified Architect (CCA) certification to test architectural skills for building enterprise AI systems. Vladislav Babenko, Senior Software Engineer at EPAM Systems, was one of the first in the company to pass this complex and exclusive exam. As a practicing developer, he sought not just to get another “distinction”, but to confirm his qualifications as an AI Engineer and master the latest AI practices.
Vladyslav shares in detail in our material how the closed certification from the creators of Claude is organized, why the real exam turned out to be more difficult than the training tests, and how to prepare for production-level testing in three weeks.
In March 2026, Anthropic launched the official Claude Certified Architect (CCA) certification to test architectural skills for building enterprise AI systems. Vladislav Babenko, Senior Software Engineer at EPAM Systems, was one of the first in the company to pass this complex and exclusive exam. As a practicing developer, he sought not just to get another “distinction”, but to confirm his qualifications as an AI Engineer and master the latest AI practices.
Vladyslav shares in detail in our material how the closed certification from the creators of Claude is organized, why the real exam turned out to be more difficult than the training tests, and how to prepare for production-level testing in three weeks.
The main goal was to gain relevant knowledge and confirm my qualifications as an AI Engineer.
Vladyslav Babenko is a Senior Software Engineer at EPAM Systems. His experience with AI began with the Copilot extension for VS Code, and now the developer is actively implementing Claude Code. He uses AI mainly as an intelligent companion: he independently designs complex logic, and uses neural networks to optimize code, write tests, and find hidden edge cases. Vladyslav also configures process automation between Jira, Sentry, and GitHub using MCP servers.
EPAM Systems has partnered with Anthropic, which launched the Claude Certified Architect (CCA) certification in mid-March 2026. The first 5,000 employees of partner companies received early access for free.
“This certification is available only to Anthropic partners. That is, this certification is not available to a developer who works as a freelancer or in a company that is not an Anthropic partner,” explains Vladyslav.
Reference
Claude Certified Architect is an official professional certification from Anthropic. It validates a developer’s expertise in building robust enterprise AI systems (production-grade), writing complex code, deploying AI agents, and integrating AI into workflows. It’s not just a test of “good prompts,” but a serious architectural exam that requires deep technical skills.
The exam assesses knowledge in five key areas:
Agent architecture and orchestration (27%): creating multi-agent systems, working with agent cycles, decomposing complex tasks, and managing sessions.
Claude Code Configuration (20%): Configuring workflows, hooks, and optimizing Claude for team processes.
Prompt engineering and structured output (20%): working with system prompts, using a few-shot approach, and configuring AI to output data in precise formats (e.g., JSON).
Tool design and MCP (18%): Claude integration with external databases and services via Model Context Protocol.
Context Management and Reliability (15%): Context window strategies, error handling, and building secure AI pipelines.
Exam format:
Duration: 2 hours.
Task: 60 questions based on real business cases.
Proctoring: The exam is conducted under strict supervision using a camera and screen recording.
Passing score: You must score at least 720 points out of 1000.
The exam was initially free for Anthropic partners, and the base cost can be around $99.
The entire journey from the start of training to receiving certification took about 3 weeks.
Vladyslav devoted the first week of preparation entirely to theory and practice. First, he took official mini-courses on Anthropic Skilljar , mastered a detailed guide from Claude Code , and carefully studied the 40-page PDF guide that the company recommends for successful exam passing.
"I immediately tried to put all the knowledge I gained into practice: I configured skills, commands, rules, and learned to effectively manage the context window. The topic of CI configuration was especially difficult for me, so I took one of the pet projects and, together with Claude, configured CI in accordance with best practices," the IT specialist adds.
In addition, another useful step was to create a separate project in Claude. Vladislav uploaded the aforementioned PDF file there as a context and gave a prompt: “I am preparing for the Claude Certified Architect — Foundations Certification, the attached file contains all the necessary materials.” Whenever complex questions arose, the IT guy simply sorted them out in this chat, receiving accurate answers based on official documentation.
“I used more than one resource, as different platforms have different approaches to formulating questions and answer options. On some tests, I easily scored 900+ points, but then switched to others and failed the attempt. Therefore, in my opinion, it is important to switch between resources and adapt to different styles of questions and their formulation,” notes the Senior Software Engineer.
During the exam, which lasted 120 minutes and consisted of 60 test questions, the biggest challenge for Vladislav was to accurately understand the essence of the tasks and choose the correct answer from among the four proposed ones. Some questions turned out to be too complicated and required knowledge of specific parameters, and the answer options were extremely similar to each other.
Vladyslav also noted that the average level of difficulty of the real exam is significantly higher than in the available training resources. While some tasks turned out to be easy, others required a lot of thought and had to be revisited several times.
As a result, the Senior Software Engineer scored 822 points out of 1000 possible, where the passing threshold was 720 points. This result brought complete satisfaction, as it confirmed the successful passing of the exam. At the same time, this indicator turned out to be quite expected: during the preparation, the average score remained at the same level, and in some cases, during training, it was possible to score even more than 960 points.
For me, obtaining Claude Certified Architect means, first of all, confirmation of knowledge and skills to apply the latest practices offered by Anthropic.
Since this certification appeared only three months ago and is currently available exclusively to the company's partners, it has not yet become widespread in the labor market.
Colleagues and management reacted to Vladyslav's success with great interest and enthusiasm, immediately asking about his experience taking the exam. Many from the team also started studying, but for various reasons never reached the finals, so the IT professional is ready to share his learning track and help others with their preparation.
It is difficult to assess the general popularity of the CCA status among Ukrainian IT specialists, as there is still skepticism in the community: some do not see the point in certifications and consider them a waste of time and money. However, the trend is changing, and more and more specialists are undergoing certifications to keep their knowledge up to date. An indicator of the rapid development of the industry is the fact that this certificate is valid for only 6 months. Anthropic himself emphasizes: technologies are progressing so quickly that knowledge from a year ago may lose its relevance tomorrow.
The main advice for anyone seeking professional growth is to just start and move confidently in the chosen direction: if you want to get certified, you shouldn't postpone it.
Ukrainian developers interested in the CCA certification should note that it is currently only available to employees of companies that are part of the Claude Partner Network. However, for those whose companies are not part of this network, there are excellent alternatives to similar certifications from AWS or Databricks.
Vladyslav himself does not plan to stop at the achieved level and has ambitious goals for this year, including obtaining at least one more profile certification. His further plans are related to active development as an AI Engineer, where he will be able to fully use the acquired knowledge and implement new technological solutions in real projects.
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Марк і Вікторія Терещенки — IT-подружжя. Він працює на позиції Lead Test Automation Engineer у компанії EPAM, вона — Software QA Engineer у Tesla. У серпні 2021 року пара разом з 1-річним сином здійснила релокейт до США за L візою. Ми зв’язалися з українською родиною та поговорили про труднощі переїзду, зарплату в Америці та специфіку роботи в компанії Ілона Маска.
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