Which IT Certifications for Specific IT Jobs? 380
outlander78 asks: "There have been several questions posted recently (Landing a job, College or Career? to list a few) discussing education and job searching. I have just completed a BSc Computer Science, and have 2 years of co-op experience. This is apparently not enough, as I have yet to get a single interview, despite many carefully written letters and resume submissions to job postings. I read here that a degree with certifications was a good combination, so now I need to know - which certifications are best for job seekers? Whether I work as programmer, sys admin or something else isn't an issue, since I need any job at this point, and enjoy most computer-related jobs - please, suggest whatever certifications you are hiring for or were hired because of."
It's a buyers market right now ... (Score:5, Insightful)
1) We can demand experience. We don't have to take the time to train someone and get them up to speed.
2) We don't have to offer the salaries and benefits we did two years ago.
3) Certifications aren't as valuable as they once were. The last boom in certifications was the Cisco program and that has stagnated as the technology and programs have become entrenched. It's all cyclical with certification programs anyway. You have to be in at the beginning to reap the benefits.
The other fact you need to face is the best way to secure employment is not through classifieds and monster.com, but personal contact with people in the field. Join user groups, go to vendor tech demos and start meeting people.
Good luck.
We dont need no stinking Certs (Score:2, Insightful)
Certs will help you (Score:5, Insightful)
Welcome to a slow job market (Score:5, Insightful)
Keep at it, you'll find something eventually.
Tired Refrain (Score:5, Insightful)
Depending on where you live... (Score:3, Insightful)
What can I say, recessions suck. The only thing worse is recessions that politicians are bending over backwards to deny exist. (E.g., our governor says that we're past the worst of it, the economy is picking up... and a few pages into the paper the person in charge of the unemployment compensation/job matching agency admits that they're still overwhelmed by the unprecedented demand from thousands of people new to the system.)
P.S., I started out in similar (but localized) conditions. A major employer announced massive layoffs, and suddenly I was competing against people with years of experience. I found a job at about 2/3 of what I was discussing weeks earlier, and the entire organization was pathological. But it was a job and where they saw me putting in lots of unpaid overtime, I saw squeezing a year of experience into 6 months. Just keep repeating "this too shall pass."
Ability to solve problems (Score:5, Insightful)
To the extent that certifications act as a marker for a person's curosity, desire to learn, and humbleness in the face of the unknown, I will take them into account. However, I would rather have an English Lit major with zero technical background who can solve an unfamiliar problem from scratch than a 3 month/employer guy with a bag full of paper certifications.
To the extent that I consider certifications at all, I will look in order at Cisco certs (past the CNA), Novell CNE or Master CNE, Pine Mountain Group network analyst certs, a broad background in Unix, and of course any professional engineer certs.
But for what kind of job, you ask? Remember, I don't match up specific certs to my current position needs. I have never seen a person with a deep knowledge of Netware have any problem picking up what he needs to know about NT, but I have certainly seen the person with 38 Microsoft certs be unable to figure out how to configure a 2-router Cisco network.
My 0.02.
sPh
Sound like you want this specific job (Score:3, Insightful)
My boss recently hired someone here, and he was saying that while the candidates seemed eager, very few asked good questions or showed a lot of specific interest in this position. I think, like you, they wanted any job they could get. This attitude didn't really impress him.
The lesson, I think, is that you absolutely have to sound like you want this job, not any job. They're not going to hire you if they think you will immediately leave when you find something you like better, etc.
I'm not saying you necessarily showed this attitude in the actual interviews, but it's something to watch.
The best aren't peices of paper (Score:3, Insightful)
The best certification is validation by your peers. Locally attend small conferences, users groups, etc... get to know people in the field in your area, make your skills and understanding known. You might find a job directly through contact like that. At the least, you might make freinds with people with respectable established careers that you can use as references for employers to call and hear the good word about you.
Don't forget the on-line equivalent of this too - participate in technical newsgroups and mailing lists, help out with opensource projects, etc...
CCIE? (Score:3, Insightful)
What I might suggest to you is simply get a list of a bunch of certifications and do searches on the various job sites to see how many hits you get, etc. That should give you a rough approximation of where the demand is. Also, maybe find a good technical recruiter and see what they recommend as the hot demand right now.
One bit of advice for you though is that I would put some careful thought into which direction you choose, be it programmer, admin, etc. A few years down the line you can change jobs, but if you do so you'll be very little better off than you are now due to the lack of relevant work experience in the new area. Tech jobs seem to seek people with very specific skill sets, and care less about general experience.
A friend of mine got into sysadmining but would much prefer being a developer now. Of course now if he was to try to go back and be a developer he'd have to take a substantial cut in pay. So if you might change your mind later, just be aware of this little trap and plan for it (save up some money, maybe do some side work in some open source projects, etc, just to keep your skills honed).
Re:To many CS know nothings (Score:5, Insightful)
(emphasis added by me)
(and so on)
Perhaps while you're at college, you might consider taking some non-Engineering courses. Learn to spell, use proper grammar. Become a well-rounded individual. Learn to communicate concepts and ideas effectively. From all indications, while you may be one of those "people that do know computers for real," you're not a very appealing employment candidate due to your poor communication skills. Then again, I'm not quite sure what you mean by "know computers for real," since if you're not getting good grades in your CS classes, how much can you really know about CS? (Computer Science != just computers. there's a metric pantload of theory and algorithms to learn. It doesn't matter if you're the fastest linux installer in the West, if you don't learn that theory you'll never be able to call yourself a Computer Scientist, regardless of what your degree eventually says.)
College is about more than just hunkering down and focusing strictly on your one chosen subject. Sure, there's a time and place for that, but as long as you're going to be there for 4+ years (milk another year or two out of the parents while the economy's in the pooper), you may as well take some time and attend some interesting classes that will grow your knowledge in other directions than just computers computers computers.
Re:It's a buyers market right now ... (Score:3, Insightful)
you do the math... (Score:3, Insightful)
One of my interview questions is "What is your greatest technical achievement?" If your answer to that question has anything to do with certifications, I will throw you out into the street.
I don't recall ever being critically intersted in an applicant's certifications, and when I am, I can consult their resume. I want to know if you can do the job.
Re:Welcome to a slow job market (Score:3, Insightful)
I hope you don't yet have family obligations, because the only thing you can do with this is get an IT job... ANY IT job that you are capable of doing and can keep body and soul together. Mind: I don't mean jump on the first one you find, unless it's really good. Hit job websites - especially dice... at least in fall 2000, dice was where the serious IT recruiting was going on. Be willing to relocate - ANYWHERE, and mean it. Try to get several good prospects on the table at one time, and take the best one (criteria - stability, pay, learning).
Stay with the job until things pick up, and if it will help, move to a better one when the rise starts. You won't be the newbie when the big hiring starts again. You'll be a leader, and in a much better situation to exploit the next boom.
What I did... (Score:3, Insightful)
I have worked for the same Defense Contractor in the DC area since 1994. Graduated then with a BS Finance and some low level military experience (well, I did work in a Major Subordinate Command as a Captain for a while as a Reservist).
Anyway, this part will be easier now than it was in 1994:
1. Get classifieds from newspapers (or search web classified of newspapers) in the regions that you think there may be work or where you want to move to. I graduated from utk.edu and there was not much in town, so I got the sunday Washington Post every tues or so and copied the fax and e-mail addresses for every defense related job I could find, then sent resume and cover letter to each. Not many back then, but at least this breaks you away from the monster.com masses today too.
2. Always tell them you will be in the area for a couple of days the following week, i.e., if you send to Chicago today say you will be there Tues - Thurs next week. This gets you past many of the "out of town apps" that get trashed, also, since you are responding to the newspaper ad it gives the illusion that you actually give a crap about that city
3. When you start getting responses, plan your travel to do several interviews at once. If you get one interview in Chicago this week, but 2 in NYC next week and another in Chicago the week after, try to get one of the Chicago ones moved.
May not help, but I hope it does. Sofar what I have seen on this article is "I don't have a cert and you don't either" or "I have a cert and so do you". Seems you have a good enough education, just need to use a different guerilla method to get some interviews.
BTW, you ARE AVAILABLE IMMEDIATELY and leave every possible way to contact you that you know of (your phone, parents, cell, fax (I know but they are still in use), e-mail, snail mail, EVERYTHING!
Programmers don't need certs (Score:2, Insightful)
When I was involved in the hiring process, I never ever cared about programmers' certifications (only a very low percentage of them even had certs). Instead, I looked at what they *did*. Also, I read the want ads quite a bit and I almost never see anyone asking for "certified" programmers.
So, if you want to write code, don't waste your time with programming certifications. They really don't help you, especially if your interviews are conducted by coders.
If you want to be in network administration, unfortunately it seems you need certs to get anywhere. Again, I disagree with the philosophy behind this, but that's the way it goes, I guess.
What about non-profits? (Score:3, Insightful)
With that out of the way, what about non-profits? Most of these need general computer assistance, but don't really know what to ask for. Someone with basic tech knowledge could make a real difference.
In fact, if you like open source software, you could help the revolution along:
- Get a general tech job at a non-profit, hopefully one working with disadvantaged people with low educational skills
- Help convert old computers to Linux systems so that they can still be used to some capacity.
- Start modifying interfaces for the needs of co-workers and the people they help. Make a real-world usability lab that works!
- Become famous as the guy who put Linux on the desktop ("He made it so that even high-school dropouts could use it!")
- Spend the rest of your life sipping champagne and eating caviar with Linus.
Now, isn't that more exciting than working with Cisco routers all day, Mr. CCIE?