Why Certifications Are Necessary (Even If Aggravating To Earn)

Nerval's Lobster writes: Whether or not certifications have value is a back-and-forth argument that's been going on since before Novell launched its CNE program in the 1990s. Developer David Bolton recently incited some discussion of his own when he wrote an article for Dice in which he claimed that certifications aren't worth the time and money. But there's a lot of evidence that certifications can add as much as 16 percent to a tech professional's base pay; in addition a lot of tech companies use resume-screening software that weeds out any resumes that don't feature certain acronyms. There's also the argument that the cost, difficulty, and annoyance of earning a certification is actually the best reason to go through it, especially if you're looking for a job; it broadcasts that you're serious enough about the technology to invest a serious chunk of your life in it. But others might not agree with that assessment, arguing that all a certification proves is that you're good at taking tests, not necessarily knowing a technology inside and out.

Comments

They're worthless.

[msauve]

EVERY cert test I've ever taken tests not knowledge of the subject/product, but the ability to do rote memorization of the training materials, even if it's wrong. It's all a moneymaking scam.

Re:They're worthless.

[Anrego]

For that to work you need actual hard rules that everyone can agree on.

Sure, electricians and plumbers disagree around the edges (ask a plumber about sharkbite if you want to lose a few hours of your life) but there's a huge chunk that's accepted practice for good, demonstrable and easily definable reasons.

Software is still the wild west, and we're still figuring out how to do it properly.

Re:Meh

[Darinbob]

However for some tech jobs, if you have certificates listed on your resume then this will lower your chances of getting a job. Listing certificates is a signal that you haven't updated the resume since you were an entry level grunt. Outside of IT you will almost never see certificates except in technician jobs. The point of these certificates most of the time is not even training to be competent in some field, but for their marketing use (ie, all those certificate holders will promote Microsoft solutions to the end of their days).

The *real* reason

[alexhs]

We recently published on this site an opinion piece whose author was dismissing the usefulness of certifications.
We wanted to reassure our advertisers that the author's opinion was strictly his own, and not reflecting Dice's opinion in any way.
We at Dice are convinced that the certifications offered by our advertisers are indeed useful and even necessary.

Certs are for noob's.

[Lumpy]

If you are a newbie or fresh from college, get a cert.

If you have 20+ years experience, Certs don't matter. Unless you have a clueless HR drone, then you dont want to work for the place.

If they discount your "15 years senior network administrator for AT&T" and want to see a entry level cert, then you really really dont want to work there.