Vendor independent certifications?

[M D L]

On Thu, 8 Mar 2012 17:17:05 -0500
Tom Buskey <tom at buskey.name> wrote:

> On Thu, Mar 8, 2012 at 10:01 AM, Brian St. Pierre <brian at bstpierre.org>wrote:
> 
> > On Thu, Mar 8, 2012 at 3:32 AM, Mike <mikebw at colossus.bilow.com> wrote:
> > > A friend of mine is looking for a career change and asks what sort of
> > > vendor independent certifications (that is, not another college degree)
> > > would help them get in the door in programming, web design, or system
> > > administration? She is not mainly asking about actual education, but
> > > rather how to prove knowledge in such a way that would convince
> >            ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> >
> > > prospective employers.
> >
> >
> > As far as programming or web design goes, I don't put much stock in
> > any kind of certification. I'd be far less likely to want to hire
> > someone based on a certificate than I would be based on demonstrable
> > experience. Also, "knowledge" is fleeting: stuff that I knew 5, 10, or
> > 15 years ago is useless today. Better to be able to prove that you're
> > smart and capable of learning things quickly.
> >
> >
> I'm a sysadmin and have hired some in the past.  In the dot com era, we
> would sort resumes by "lots of certs" and experience.  Then we looked at
> the resumes with experience.  The certs got looked at if we couldn't find
> experience, but we never did.
> 
> I always ask what people do at home with computers.  Most people nowadays
> have them and an internet connection.  There is no excuse (other then time)
> for not learning about free software.  Most of the Microsoft stuff is
> available for evaluation (learn about AD, etc).  You can run VirtualBox or
> VMware ESXi to run systems in VM if your computer is more recent.
> 
> Being curious and service oriented is important.  One of the best service
> desk techs I saw didn't know computers when he started.  He was a
> troubleshooter for the gas company.  Within 2 years he was figuring out how
> to upgrade an ATM network w/o downtime when the engineers said it would
> take shutting down everything & having it back up 18 months later.

I am also starting out in IT.  I'm not sure how much certifications will help in getting a job.  I know many people who go on the internet and get brain dumps of the certifications and memorize the questions & answers on the test.  This does get them the certification without any real knowledge.  That being said, some certifications are probably better than others.  I know the Red Hat certs are a list of tasks to be completed on a system, not a bunch of multiple-guess questions.  

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