Top 10 problems with certification

Turgon

Interesting article by Wyrostek who has been around the block. Point 3 stands out for me and it's been one of the biggest shortcoming of all vendor certifications in my opinion. Too many books preaching the single vendor utopia when the integrated environment rules.

InformIT: The Top 10 Problems with IT Certification in 2008 > Reasons 1–5

Some comments on it here including '9 things wrong with Warren's article'

http://www.informit.com/discussion/index.aspx?postid=27b78061-a7b8-429a-ba3a-fc8fa9f4e0f6#27b78061-a7b8-429a-ba3a-fc8fa9f4e0f6

dynamik

http://www.techexams.net/forums/jobs-degrees/30163-cert-articles.html#post204162

http://www.techexams.net/forums/general-certification/38192-current-state-certifications.html

rfult001

Just in case anyone is too lazy to dig through the comments, here is a counterpoint article which makes a couple good points: Addressing the Top 10 Myths About IT Certification: A Counterpoint Position to Misinterpretation | IT Training | Training Industry

AlexMR

1. Certifications are Vendor-centric :

Rather than being a problem I think this is why certifications will be around for quite a long time and also i think it is why certifications are relevant: The IT field changes so quickly that only vendors or solution providers are the ones who have the correct information as to what is relevant and what not.

I have only taken two Cisco exams and that thing about the "vendor-specific answer" is a little overrated.


2. Certification’s Life Cycle Is Short!: Another reason why the certifications will be valuable for a long time: There is no other way to prove CURRENT proficiency than certifications.


3. Certifications Are Not Real-World Oriented : That is correct. I think this is a major problem and the reason why so many of us are kinda nuts about what to study.

4. Certifications Have Been Devalued: I think the biggest reason for this devaluation is because they have become more common and easier to obtain, because of the braindumps but also because of there is way more quality information available.

I met the Pre-sales Manager for the biggest Cisco Partner in my country who happens to be also the biggest telco of the country, and he was telling me that when he was hired, 8 years ago, having the CCNA training, not the CERTIFICATION!, was enough to get you an excellent job with the partners, because you might had an idea of what to do and was ready to start new training focused on getting you certified. Now he is recommending me going after the CCNP as the CCNAs are not in such a high demand because they are available everywhere.

5. No Oversight Body

"Because certifications are vendor-centric, no one is overseeing the whole process. "

At this point I really think he wants to change the nature of IT somehow. IT professionals will have to train in many technologies, and that path will be endless unless they decide to move to management where that continuos training is not as important.

6.- Degree vs. Certification vs. Experience. The whole fight is pointless. You need all of them. Period. If you are thinking about having a career, you need them all. If you want to make 50k/year and be happy then you might not need the degree, or even too much experience, but it wont hurt you even if you dont have high goals. The whole vs. vs. vs. is very shortsighted for somebody pursuing a career as a professional, not a technician.

7. HR People Are Not In Touch with the Real World. "If I were coming into IT now and looked at some of the unrealistic certification criteria required for entry-level jobs, I would find another way to make a living. It is discouraging. "

Those are the words of somebody who entered the field ina time where being CCNA, maybe not even knowing the CCNA material, guaranteed something decent because of the benefits the partnerships with Cisco and the amount of certified professionals those partnerships required. The same applies to other vendors.

I am trying to get in IT. I am now CCNA and have been studying/labbing for the CCNA Voice for about 130 hours. I even spent about 60hours studying for BSCI. The amount of work that i've put into this is close to nothing compared to the amount of work i had to put to get my bachelor's in Civil Engineering (even the amount of work required to get the CCNP cant be compared), a degree my little sister also has, and she is making exactly 80% of how much the worst paid CCNA makes here in Dominican Republic. I cant say she is even underpaid according to this market.

I am sure that getting into this field is way easier than many others.

8. Budget cuts: I was laidoff from my last employment a few months after being named "a fundamental person for the company" by the vicepresident and owner of the company. I dont know of a sngle field that is not resented by economic downturns.

9. Glut of Certified People

"This one should probably be higher in the list. But it is a major reason for the waning interest in certification. There are just too many certified IT folks—those that know what they are doing and the paper certs who have killed the market.

Simple supply and demand. When the supply goes up, the demand goes down. There has to be a way to weed out those who have killed the market.

If the supply were not as high, the demand and wages would improve. "

That is correct. Want to know the proactive approach? Get better! Plain and simple. CCNA used to be the last coca cola in the desert and now it is not? Become CCNP. or CCIE or whatever it takes. A CCNP from 1999 talks about how incredibly hard it was for him to get the CCNP. He had to make lines in order to rpactice with the labs supplied bby his employer. Now we have Dynamips and the need for super expensive equipment is not as much as it used to be.

Again, it is the same in every field. Both my grandfathers were professionals individuals who did quite well. Both of them used to tell me how speaking english in those times was more valuable than those 5-6 years of university. That only thing opened them lots of doors. I mean, hell, I have pictures of one of them with senator Rober Kennedy and J. Edgar Hoover! He always told me how he went to MSU and was able to do loots of things exclusively because he was able to speak english fluently. These days, out of 110 in my high school graduation, i am sure about 90 were procifient in english. Do you think that skill is the door opener it used to be?


10. No One Knows Which Certs Matter: i think it stopped being as easy as "Get a CCNA, and you are golden".

I think he is right when he says you need to look what is used and in demand in your area and trry to align that with your passion (i used my word here).

On the other hand, I think everybody knows what is valuable and certifications matter. How many unemployed CCVPs, CCIE, RHCE or even CCNPs can we count? I bet they are all doing way better than the average of the rest of the certifications.

The industry is reaching maturity. The crazy boom is over. We need to get over it. The times where having A+ and server+ were hot stuff are over. Now real work is necessary to stand out. Welcome to the life of the rest of the other professions, IT Pros.

Turgon

dynamik wrote: »

http://www.techexams.net/forums/jobs-degrees/30163-cert-articles.html#post204162

http://www.techexams.net/forums/general-certification/38192-current-state-certifications.html

Ah..I see it went around the block about a year ago now. I only stumbled on it today. Sorry about that!

Turgon

AlexMR wrote: »

1. Certifications are Vendor-centric :

Rather than being a problem I think this is why certifications will be around for quite a long time and also i think it is why certifications are relevant: The IT field changes so quickly that only vendors or solution providers are the ones who have the correct information as to what is relevant and what not.

I have only taken two Cisco exams and that thing about the "vendor-specific answer" is a little overrated.


2. Certification’s Life Cycle Is Short!: Another reason why the certifications will be valuable for a long time: There is no other way to prove CURRENT proficiency than certifications.


3. Certifications Are Not Real-World Oriented : That is correct. I think this is a major problem and the reason why so many of us are kinda nuts about what to study.

4. Certifications Have Been Devalued: I think the biggest reason for this devaluation is because they have become more common and easier to obtain, because of the braindumps but also because of there is way more quality information available.

I met the Pre-sales Manager for the biggest Cisco Partner in my country who happens to be also the biggest telco of the country, and he was telling me that when he was hired, 8 years ago, having the CCNA training, not the CERTIFICATION!, was enough to get you an excellent job with the partners, because you might had an idea of what to do and was ready to start new training focused on getting you certified. Now he is recommending me going after the CCNP as the CCNAs are not in such a high demand because they are available everywhere.

5. No Oversight Body

"Because certifications are vendor-centric, no one is overseeing the whole process. "

At this point I really think he wants to change the nature of IT somehow. IT professionals will have to train in many technologies, and that path will be endless unless they decide to move to management where that continuos training is not as important.

6.- Degree vs. Certification vs. Experience. The whole fight is pointless. You need all of them. Period. If you are thinking about having a career, you need them all. If you want to make 50k/year and be happy then you might not need the degree, or even too much experience, but it wont hurt you even if you dont have high goals. The whole vs. vs. vs. is very shortsighted for somebody pursuing a career as a professional, not a technician.

7. HR People Are Not In Touch with the Real World. "If I were coming into IT now and looked at some of the unrealistic certification criteria required for entry-level jobs, I would find another way to make a living. It is discouraging. "

Those are the words of somebody who entered the field ina time where being CCNA, maybe not even knowing the CCNA material, guaranteed something decent because of the benefits the partnerships with Cisco and the amount of certified professionals those partnerships required. The same applies to other vendors.

I am trying to get in IT. I am now CCNA and have been studying/labbing for the CCNA Voice for about 130 hours. I even spent about 60hours studying for BSCI. The amount of work that i've put into this is close to nothing compared to the amount of work i had to put to get my bachelor's in Civil Engineering (even the amount of work required to get the CCNP cant be compared), a degree my little sister also has, and she is making exactly 80% of how much the worst paid CCNA makes here in Dominican Republic. I cant say she is even underpaid according to this market.

I am sure that getting into this field is way easier than many others.

8. Budget cuts: I was laidoff from my last employment a few months after being named "a fundamental person for the company" by the vicepresident and owner of the company. I dont know of a sngle field that is not resented by economic downturns.

9. Glut of Certified People

"This one should probably be higher in the list. But it is a major reason for the waning interest in certification. There are just too many certified IT folks—those that know what they are doing and the paper certs who have killed the market.

Simple supply and demand. When the supply goes up, the demand goes down. There has to be a way to weed out those who have killed the market.

If the supply were not as high, the demand and wages would improve. "

That is correct. Want to know the proactive approach? Get better! Plain and simple. CCNA used to be the last coca cola in the desert and now it is not? Become CCNP. or CCIE or whatever it takes. A CCNP from 1999 talks about how incredibly hard it was for him to get the CCNP. He had to make lines in order to rpactice with the labs supplied bby his employer. Now we have Dynamips and the need for super expensive equipment is not as much as it used to be.

Again, it is the same in every field. Both my grandfathers were professionals individuals who did quite well. Both of them used to tell me how speaking english in those times was more valuable than those 5-6 years of university. That only thing opened them lots of doors. I mean, hell, I have pictures of one of them with senator Rober Kennedy and J. Edgar Hoover! He always told me how he went to MSU and was able to do loots of things exclusively because he was able to speak english fluently. These days, out of 110 in my high school graduation, i am sure about 90 were procifient in english. Do you think that skill is the door opener it used to be?


10. No One Knows Which Certs Matter: i think it stopped being as easy as "Get a CCNA, and you are golden".

I think he is right when he says you need to look what is used and in demand in your area and trry to align that with your passion (i used my word here).

On the other hand, I think everybody knows what is valuable and certifications matter. How many unemployed CCVPs, CCIE, RHCE or even CCNPs can we count? I bet they are all doing way better than the average of the rest of the certifications.

The industry is reaching maturity. The crazy boom is over. We need to get over it. The times where having A+ and server+ were hot stuff are over. Now real work is necessary to stand out. Welcome to the life of the rest of the other professions, IT Pros.

Lots of fair points there Alex.

mikedisd2

AlexMR wrote: »

A CCNP from 1999 talks about how incredibly hard it was for him to get the CCNP. He had to make lines in order to rpactice with the labs supplied bby his employer. Now we have Dynamips and the need for super expensive equipment is not as much as it used to be.

So this guy is b*tching about the bad ol' days when he had to walk 20 miles to school in the snow? Or was it when he was superior to all others who couldn't afford to build a lab and learn a subject?

Someone with a CCNP 10 years ago ought to be much higher up the foodchain now than one who just attained the cert today. Unless he/she chose not to continue learning.

Technology is now much more attainable and it's easier to get certed, but the industry has grown and become a lot more complex; think VMs, SANs, ongoing security, etc.

msteinhilber

I'll add my own to the list.

They can be relationship destroyers apparently. If you work too hard towards certification and school at the same time, and you have the right (or should that be wrong) personality type - you can hyper-focus on your studies. Then with the mixed feedback from your significant other (spend more time with me one moment and jeez I'm not sure what we're going to do about money the next moment) and poor communication in your relationship will lead to disaster. That's what I did, now my wife is on her way out the door in 2 weeks time and taking my son with her.

It's a viscous cycle really, as now I'm going to need to advance my career as much as possible with the help of certifications so I can afford to rebuild my life after our house is either foreclosed on or hopefully able to be sold on a short-sale, and after the expense of the attorney fee's to try to fight for equal placement of the little guy with the mean right hook in my avatar.

Certifications = the devil.

Turgon

msteinhilber wrote: »

I'll add my own to the list.

They can be relationship destroyers apparently. If you work too hard towards certification and school at the same time, and you have the right (or should that be wrong) personality type - you can hyper-focus on your studies. Then with the mixed feedback from your significant other (spend more time with me one moment and jeez I'm not sure what we're going to do about money the next moment) and poor communication in your relationship will lead to disaster. That's what I did, now my wife is on her way out the door in 2 weeks time and taking my son with her.

It's a viscous cycle really, as now I'm going to need to advance my career as much as possible with the help of certifications so I can afford to rebuild my life after our house is either foreclosed on or hopefully able to be sold on a short-sale, and after the expense of the attorney fee's to try to fight for equal placement of the little guy with the mean right hook in my avatar.

Certifications = the devil.

Sorry to hear about this and I hope you can patch things up. This is a big problem in this field with so many people sacrificing personal time outside of work on certifications and what have you it can be a marraige breaker. Sometimes it is a choice between another cert or a happy homelife. Often depends on the dynamics at home. This is one of the reasons why I have been taking so long over the IE with regular breaks. If I had tried to blitz it inside one year with all nighters maybe I would have cleared it, I don't know, but there was a high probability I would be celebrating alone by the time I did.

UnixGuy

I'm really sorry to hear about that ! I really understand what happened with you. I'm unable to get into any serious relationship because of studying and long working hrs.

I hope you things workout with you and your family at the end. Family is more important than any certification or career.

msteinhilber wrote: »

I'll add my own to the list.

They can be relationship destroyers apparently. If you work too hard towards certification and school at the same time, and you have the right (or should that be wrong) personality type - you can hyper-focus on your studies. Then with the mixed feedback from your significant other (spend more time with me one moment and jeez I'm not sure what we're going to do about money the next moment) and poor communication in your relationship will lead to disaster. That's what I did, now my wife is on her way out the door in 2 weeks time and taking my son with her.

It's a viscous cycle really, as now I'm going to need to advance my career as much as possible with the help of certifications so I can afford to rebuild my life after our house is either foreclosed on or hopefully able to be sold on a short-sale, and after the expense of the attorney fee's to try to fight for equal placement of the little guy with the mean right hook in my avatar.

Certifications = the devil.

Hyper-Me

msteinhilber wrote: »

I'll add my own to the list.

They can be relationship destroyers apparently. If you work too hard towards certification and school at the same time, and you have the right (or should that be wrong) personality type - you can hyper-focus on your studies. Then with the mixed feedback from your significant other (spend more time with me one moment and jeez I'm not sure what we're going to do about money the next moment) and poor communication in your relationship will lead to disaster. That's what I did, now my wife is on her way out the door in 2 weeks time and taking my son with her.

It's a viscous cycle really, as now I'm going to need to advance my career as much as possible with the help of certifications so I can afford to rebuild my life after our house is either foreclosed on or hopefully able to be sold on a short-sale, and after the expense of the attorney fee's to try to fight for equal placement of the little guy with the mean right hook in my avatar.

Certifications = the devil.

I'm extremely sorry to hear about your situation, I really am. Im a single guy and would love nothing more than a family.

Although I dont see the correlation of you blaming it on certs. You only have 2 listed and 1 of which i assume you took in beta which means mostly on a whim. The other is a pretty easy test not requiring much time.

Just an observation, though its entirely possible given the amount of time one devotes to the field even in non-cert related studies,events,after-hours work etc.

I hope you land on your feet, man. Again I'm sorry to hear it.

UnixGuy

Hyper-Me wrote: »

I'm extremely sorry to hear about your situation, I really am. Im a single guy and would love nothing more than a family.

Although I dont see the correlation of you blaming it on certs. You only have 2 listed and 1 of which i assume you took in beta which means mostly on a whim. The other is a pretty easy test not requiring much time.

Just an observation, though its entirely possible given the amount of time one devotes to the field even in non-cert related studies,events,after-hours work etc.

I hope you land on your feet, man. Again I'm sorry to hear it.

He told us in other thread that he was doing a college degree and attending classes along with a job AND a family, which is extremely difficult.

dynamik

I basically went through the same thing, and it really boils down to a lack of communication. If it wasn't certs, it would have just been something else. The thing that sucks is by the time it gets to be a seriously problem, there's an enormous gap that's almost impossible to bridge again. There's a fine line between being assertive enough to stop things like that from spiraling out of control and just being a nag. It's definitely more of an art than a science.

msteinhilber

dynamik wrote: »

I basically went through the same thing, and it really boils down to a lack of communication. If it wasn't certs, it would have just been something else. The thing that sucks is by the time it gets to be a seriously problem, there's an enormous gap that's almost impossible to bridge again. There's a fine line between being assertive enough to stop things like that from spiraling out of control and just being a nag. It's definitely more of an art than a science.

This is the truth, communication is key. Without communication, other problems which start as little problems are left unchecked and spiral out of control. My relationship troubles aren't entirely to blame on any one thing, there's a lot that went towards where it is at now - but I think the lack of communication played a significant role. As dynamik said, the same applies to me - if I wasn't busy studying often I probably would have been putting in a lot of extra work at the office implementing projects that interest me - it's just the type of person I am and even though looking back my wife made little hints and sometimes blatant remarks about that upsetting her and I didn't acknowledge them in time. Going forward, hopefully I can use the experience I am in now to help prevent this from occurring in future relationships.

Learning everything that I did was great, but nothing can make the hurt one feels when what they thought they were building over the past 7.5 years from dating till now goes to shambles seem worthwhile. It's a compound deal too, once you begin to get over the initial shock then some other things set in to stir your emotions like what's going to happen to the house, where you will get attorney fees, etc.

Bl8ckr0uter

msteinhilber wrote: »

This is the truth, communication is key. Without communication, other problems which start as little problems are left unchecked and spiral out of control. My relationship troubles aren't entirely to blame on any one thing, there's a lot that went towards where it is at now - but I think the lack of communication played a significant role. As dynamik said, the same applies to me - if I wasn't busy studying often I probably would have been putting in a lot of extra work at the office implementing projects that interest me - it's just the type of person I am and even though looking back my wife made little hints and sometimes blatant remarks about that upsetting her and I didn't acknowledge them in time. Going forward, hopefully I can use the experience I am in now to help prevent this from occurring in future relationships.

Learning everything that I did was great, but nothing can make the hurt one feels when what they thought they were building over the past 7.5 years from dating till now goes to shambles seem worthwhile. It's a compound deal too, once you begin to get over the initial shock then some other things set in to stir your emotions like what's going to happen to the house, where you will get attorney fees, etc.

That sucks man. Is it possible to get her back at all? I mean maybe you would need to make some adjustments but is there a slight possibility for a reconcile to happen?

JDMurray

msteinhilber wrote: »

Certifications = the devil.

Certifications and "working on your career" are excellent reasons to avoid taking care of other aspects of your life that you know need attending, but just don't want to face. Been there/done that.

Hyper-Me

To the idiot that neg repped me, I wasnt "kicking him when he was down", I was simply stating that his statement couldnt be 100% true, although it was very possible that other work related things were the cause. I even stated that.

mikedisd2

Hyper-Me wrote: »

To the idiot that neg repped me, I wasnt "kicking him when he was down", I was simply stating that his statement couldnt be 100% true, although it was very possible that other work related things were the cause. I even stated that.

Yeah, I'm getting dis-repped for all sorts of stupid reasons. There's a few sensitive people out there...

Hyper-Me

Other forums display the username with any rep, it should be that way here.

JDMurray

Hyper-Me wrote: »

Other forums display the username with any rep, it should be that way here.

And what would you do if you could see the members who have given you either positive or negative reputation points?

blargoe

JDMurray wrote: »

Certifications and "working on your career" are excellent reasons to avoid taking care of other aspects of your life that you know need attending, but just don't want to face. Been there/done that.

Ditto..

Hyper-Me

JDMurray wrote: »

And what would you do if you could see the members who have given you either positive or negative reputation points?

I think it would deter undue negative reps that seem to be handed out at leisure.

When someone can do something under the guise of anonymity, they rarely care if its wrong.

mikedisd2

JDMurray wrote: »

And what would you do if you could see the members who have given you either positive or negative reputation points?

We would weed them out and punish them! No you're right, it's just annoying sometimes.
Ulitmately it doesn't matter I guess.

msteinhilber

Hyper-Me wrote: »

To the idiot that neg repped me, I wasnt "kicking him when he was down", I was simply stating that his statement couldnt be 100% true, although it was very possible that other work related things were the cause. I even stated that.

I didn't take offense from your post if it makes you feel better . It was true though, although I only have earned two certifications - it is primarily because I started out down the Cisco path when gearing up for a potential job where I would be pushing through the CCNA/NP/VP path quickly. The job never came to fruition, and I felt the best course was to apply my studies towards certifications that would benefit my current job (MCITP:EA path). Started down that path, and low and behold our focus at work had shifted (vSphere 4 and Linux now) so I started to jump into other studies.

A lot of the work though really was devoted to school through the first 3/4 of the year before I completed the degree. You are correct - the 70-620 is an absolute joke of an exam and the other was a beta exam which I did study for but admittedly not as hard. I do admit to putting in a LOT of study time on the 620 though. As it was my first certification exam even though I have been in the industry a while, I did not want to have the embarrassment of going into my first exam and walking out with a fail on an exam known to be tremendously easy.

I wish I could have learned how to properly balance things before it was too late. Like I said, these were not the only causes but they contributed a lot. It's sad that it is going to take me a divorce and destroyed credit rating and perhaps bankruptcy depending how the house goes to learn this though. I always thought I was doing the right thing once money became a big issue but now I know what is most important for the next time. Hopefully others that stumble across this can give some thought to how much time they devote to their studies vs. their significant other.

Sepiraph

IMO from that link #6 is the big one:

6. Degree vs. Certification vs. Experience

Experience in doing things is arguably the most important. And I don't mean experience in doing the same thing over and over at work. I mean experience in either doing something in your own time, engaging in small projects and really taking the time to learn how to put different aspect of technology together in IT.

mikedisd2

Sepiraph wrote: »

Experience in doing things is arguably the most important. And I don't mean experience in doing the same thing over and over at work. I mean experience in either doing something in your own time, engaging in small projects and really taking the time to learn how to put different aspect of technology together in IT.

I totally agree. I read a long time ago that 5x years experience may actually be just 1x year experience, repeated 4x times. Even though I knew it, I let it happen to me.

One of the head engineers here knows way to much about everything, but has no certs. He just keeps on experimenting at home and trying out new technologies.

mikedisd2

Thanks for the hugs, Dynamik. It's a cruel world out there.

I even got dissed just for saying I got dissed.

Hyper-Me

I hope it all pans out for you msteinhillber, I really do man.