[Linux-aus] LA Certification

[Adam Nielsen]

> > This matches my own experience too.  I presume a lot of certifications
> > focus on memorising things rather than applying knowledge, because
> > people with a lot of certs often seem to struggle to come up with a
> > solution for a problem.  If you tell them the solution they can usually
> > implement it no problem, but you often have to hold their hand a bit
> > while you're trying to work out what the solution might look like.  
> 
> Speaking as someone who is FLOSS at heart but has a long list of vendor 
> certs, this makes me sad.
> 
> I get vendor certs because my current and previous employer both highly 
> value them, and they make them free for staff to take. Most of the ones 
> I've taken (largely AWS & Azure) are little more than logic tests and as 
> long as you have a general idea about the product's capabilities and are 
> a competent reader and logical thinker, they aren't difficult.

I suppose I should qualify that by saying the roles I have been
involved in filling are more devops style, where you have to be part
solution architect, part sysadmin, and part programmer.  This means you
have to make decisions based on a series of tradeoffs and competing
goals.

If you already had someone fully architect a project and provide
instructions for exactly how it was to be built, or a support role that
can fully diagnose a bug and give you the exact solution to implement,
then most of those difficult decisions are resolved and most
certifications would be fine and looked upon favourably.

But then most of those jobs where you are just following instructions
are the more junior roles, so that begs the question of how useful the
certifications are if they don't provide skills that help you work your
way up the corporate ladder?

Of course if you're already a good problem solver then the certs will
teach you useful skills - no argument there - but the issue is if an
employer is looking at two job applications, both of which list the
same cert, how does one know which person is the good problem solver
who can work with minimal supervision, and which person will need
frequent guidance?  Most people just stick the cert's acronym on their
CV and call it job done, with no explanation of what it is or how they
used those skills to make themselves more productive, leaving the
employer to wonder why they bothered listing it at all.

If you could ensure your cert could only be obtained once a certain
level of problem solving skills has been reached, I believe it would
be much more valuable from an employer's perspective - at least once
word got around that it was difficult to obtain and everyone who had
one was really good at their job.

Cheers,
Adam.