So I looked it up and Google is offering certifications in various fields through Coursera, and they claim it’ll help one get a good paying IT job.
People have made videos on Youtube talking about them with varying answers and in the comments, people often discuss using them as a springboard to get CompTIA certs.
But are these certifications actually worth the money financially? Do people actually get hired if that’s all an employee has? Don’t employers want people with degrees too?
As a software engineer that is involved in hiring decisions, they are not worth anything with respect to software development jobs.
I look for, in order of importance:
- demonstrated experience - this is your work history
- academic achievement - this is college degree. I do not include certs
- additional skills - this tends to be a skills section - I expect people to not lie and will ask about this section explicitly in interviews
- external factors - previous job - circumstances around leaving
And that’s it. Certs don’t ever even get considered.
Why?
So, you don’t hire entry level then?
Certainly should be considered for entry level roles because everything you describe is for more senior positions. If this is how you hire entry level, that’s a bit of a problem.
Conversely, as a system engineer that is involved in the hiring process for software development in addition to various types of platform and cloud engineering jobs.
I look for, in order of importance:
- demonstrated experience
- additional skills
That’s it. College degree isn’t even considered, but if you got relevant experience in college that can count.
Most of my interview time is spent digging into technical details to see if you can back up your resume claims. The rest is getting an idea of how you approach challenges and think about things.
As far as certifications, they’re often required to get in the door due to qualification regulations. Especially security certs. If you list them, I’ll ask a few questions just to make sure you actually know what’s up.
Good for getting your foot in the door. And their content can often be useful if you intend to work on the topic. For instance, I learned some things by reading the Security+ materials without having any intention of getting the cert.
Don’t employers want people with degrees too?
This all varies for the job and the cert or degree, but degrees are good. Certs might be good enough. Basically an employer wants to know you can do the job. Degrees and certs are ways they can verify that. Between you saying “I know how to replace a CPU” and some other schlub saying “I have an A+”, it’s easier to take CompTIA’s word than yours.
And experience trumps all, usually.
IT instructor at a high school. When I started in the industry I had nothing but knowledge from personal tinkering. I currently teach classes on everything from ITF+ through Security +. Through knowledge gained from industry partners and vendors I can say that it’s not always required but someone with those certs will usually get more attention than you on applications. If money and time are an issue I can recommend TestOut’s library license. For around $900 a year you get unlimited access to a wide range of training materials including the entry level ITF+, A+, Net+, and Security+. I’ve been using this platform with my students, and while it has its shortcomings, it’s one of the better tools I’ve encountered. They are also owned by CompTIA so the content is aligned with their tests. If you have any questions, I’d be happy to have a chat. Career education is my passion.
That’s an awesome suggestion, thank you. I assume TestOut doesn’t include any actual tests?
It does not include the certification exams for CompTIA. it comes with lots of practice exams and labs. It’s all web based.
Testout labsim is where you’ll learn all the stuff you need (if you don’t just go to youtube). You’ll have to order (or redeem) your tests through comptia themselves.
Source: Took the test last year for A+ and Security+
I have a bunch of certifications. I use them as bargaining chips for raises and promotions. Like, showing them I’m continuing to grow. And at the senior level, they will always choose the guy with 10 certs + 15 years compared to others. I see it time and time again.
I can’t say they ever helped me beyond that. Most of the testing felt like trivia rather than real world. I’m dumb AF and just really good at taking tests.
I think it’s worth it only if you’re fully okay that it’s just a talking point, and not a measurement of your expertise, or that it will change your life. Also I hate that you have to renew it every few years.
My Career:
- Crappy retail management job for a long defunct retail electronics store.
- Crappy retail management job for a long defunct toy store.
- Crappy desk job as an inside sales agent for a computer supplier.
- Hired onto the service/support side of computer supplier above and worked crappy Service Desk job for a few years. a. Used my down time at the SD to attain my MCSE, CCNA, Red Hat and CLP (Certified Lotus Professional for Lotus Notes 5 and above and no I don’t expect you to have heard of it) certifications. The company paid for me to take the tests, which was great.
- Hired on the systems engineers department of said computer supplier, which had subsequently stopped being a supplier and strictly a Managed Services Vendor. It was also bought out by an extremely large German company that you’ve probably heard of.
- Got my ITIL 1.0 certifications (Problem, Incident, Change, Service Delivery) and started working in processes rather than systems. I’m currently ITIL 4.0 certified.
- Laid off from above company and worked a variety of contract jobs, mainly Major Incident response and the like, as I have a pretty wide skill set.
The above covers about the last 33 years of my career with 28 of it in IT.
I’d probably make more money if I refreshed some of my certifications, but working on the process side in really large environments means I’m not on call and I don’t deal with emergencies at 3am. I currently work for a very very large defense contractor that you definitely have heard of. My wife is a physician and works an on call schedule that can be brutal at times, so I’m happy to not be on call. I handle the kids, while she’s running off to the hospital saving some poor child.
I think the only certs that matter right are cloud certs. AWS, Azure, or GCP. Just my experience.
If you work on a government contract they could be written into the contract.
The Department of Defense has the 8570 baseline which defines which roles require certifications. Having these certs are helpful because you can’t get these jobs without them. You can see them here: https://public.cyber.mil/wid/cwmp/dod-approved-8570-baseline-certifications/
