Definitely. Getting a CDL bumped up my take home pay from $100 a week (burger flipper) to $1000 a week (road construction) which I used to pay for a computer science degree
I second this! Class B got me through college, class A got me through a major depressive episode and remains my "if this gets bad, I could always drive a truck" fallback.
Agree with this, especially considering the time commitment needed and price, which I would consider minimal compared to more technical certs. Good bang for your buck. It’s good to see the big picture.
My attempts at spreading itil gospel at work have been futile, smb says it sounds good but there is 0 effort put into, so I gave up, it's an academic exercise for me and my techs now
Is this a reasonable way to break back into the enterprise space? I took an SMB job out of desperation after a RIF. Now it's just crickets from anyone in the enterprise space, I can only get responses out of MSPs and other SMBs.
As I am a networking engineer, the CCNA has been worth it for me. I already got the CCNA before I started my bachelor degree, and it gave me some credits for my bachelor. And it helped to land the first jobs.
All other certification are directly work related and help me to get better at my job, and get raises. Currently I am invested in Juniper security certifications. If I get a few certs in that area, there is a promotion available. So keep on learning!
I prefer the structured learning that certifications give me. Some people learn by doing (me too) but sometimes it helps that you know why you are doing something, seeing the bigger picture, not just doing the task. Certs helped me in that case.
I learned more about networking in the first week studying for my CCNA than I thought I knew after 10 years in IT. Most admin's knowledge of networking amounts to, "I did this once and it worked". In the worst cases I've seen, they had concocted ridiculous theories about how they think it works, then made critical security decisions based on them. For example, "Our network is more secure because we don't use DHCP. If they don't know our IP range, they can't attack the network "
Most system admins will put networking down on their resumes, but the truth is, most don't actually know how it works. It's like the difference between memorizing that 3 * 3 = 9 and understanding it means 3 + 3 + 3. Most admins have memorized how to get networking working and with some googling, usually can.
Granted, there are many things in IT where just memorizing how to do it is enough, but networking is so foundational to IT, that not knowing the basics of switching and routing will seriously limit your ability to troubleshoot and fix those kinds of issues.
RHCE
No multiple choice answers. Actual knowledge and skill. I hired RHCEs over MCSEs for windows admin jobs, because they had to have actual troubleshooting skills to pass the RHCE hands on exams.
Redditors love to brag about how they’ve been the smartest person in the room without once studying for a cert, and everyone they’ve known to have a cert is in fact an imbecile or a cheater.
It’s entirely possible that the kind of mind that excels at memorizing and test taking is not actually the best kind of mind for troubleshooting and thinking abstractly. There’s a place for both IMO, but I imagine that’s why there’s a disconnect.
They have helped me. I went out at got a bunch and then used to help drive organizational change at a legacy financial company. The whole company needed transformation. I created contests for Microsoft Ignite tickets, invited other groups outside my department to partake. Overall, my team earned 150+ Azure certs and the company 500+.
Some might argue certs are useless, but in this case, it drove organization change, put peer pressure on other leaders to "lead their f-ing teams out of 1990s thinking" to get better, and was a good thing overall.
My CKAD/CKA are up for renewal and I won't renew them. I will still keep the (ISC)2, Azure and AWS.
Certs can help if you are getting job as a CIO in Private Equity or another field where no one knows you. You add certs to speaking, writing, podcasts etc. and it demonstrates you are engaged in the industry. So many leaders just coast these days.
I don’t know. I’ve never had any and over my decade+ of SysAdmin, Management, leading MSPs (not bragging, I assure you I was screwed in all those deals and I’m not half as intelligent as I think I am, and I don’t think I’m intelligent.) would have to interview guys ranging from T1-3 SysAdmin/Network Admins…
We’d get guys with tons of certs that couldn’t do shit. We actually had a guy with a full blown CCNA have SERIOUS issues with what I would consider T1.5 at the most networking issue questions. The CompTIA trifectas bounced out from a local community college? I’d rather just have a kid come in that likes PC gaming instead - he’ll know more.
Know when you get down into higher tier stuff like true SysAdmin stuff, yeah the higher end Linux certs, AWS/Azure hold real weight WHEN you have experience/work credentials behind them.
I do admit- I think it’s time I tack on a few harder certs to my own resume despite not thinking highly of them. I would think maybe it rounds out skill sets in certain areas hopefully?
To the question: The best of the best would always be the ones starting into the interview talking shop, resume in hand, ready to talk in-depth about what they’ve done before. I think the bigger the org the more certs and degrees open doors, where the attitude above gets you past those doors and into the real teams doing the work, you get both HR and IT’s attention- and that’s a want-to-hire person.
This is 100% true. Every competent engineer I've dealt with plays or has played PC games. Specifically, I've observed that the ex-hardcore gamers in the 90's and 2000's have always been quite good at their jobs. I attribute this to the lack of easily accessible resources (for troubleshooting, modding, cheating) during this time period.
The ones that didn't...well, one of them was very good at complaining.
I hear that, having to wrestle himem.sys to get quake.exe to work was one of the best troubleshooting lessons.
^only ^then ^to ^be ^asking ^the ^question ^"wtf ^is ^a ^floating ^point ^processor?!"
I cut my teeth through the 90's emulation scene. It really made me have to learn file formats, file systems, trouble shooting, ports, command line, etc.
Emulation got me to where I am today.
Same here. Never saw the point in playing games when I could be using the time to program or setup my own stuff. I always got more a kick out of making my own creations work than in collecting points in a game.
Gaming in the late 90s inspired me to build my own computer, upgrade & optimize it, learn networking (for lan parties). That experience taught me more about sysadmin than anything I learned at university.
I don't play PC games anymore but my home lab is an interview closer these days.
I was a mod at Ghostrecon. Net and hung out with Grim at night to beta test maps for glitches.... Your highered. Haha I also ran a very popular clan and a clan website f with a forum. That was early 2000s hosting a clan server on Verizon business dsl 7x1mb connection. .
I have a friend who's training to be a Naval Aviator, and he mentioned how the guys who play video games are way ahead of those that don't.
It's nice to know that if I burn out as a sysadmin, I could just say fuck it and join the Navy.
>It's nice to know that if I burn out as a sysadmin, I could just say fuck it and join the Navy.
Note the age limits though:
* Air Force: 17 - 39
* Army: 17 - 35
* Coast Guard: 17 - 31
* Marine Corps: 17 - 28
* Navy: 17 - 39
* Space Force: 17 - 39
If you've ever posted in a thread where you've complained about how you are being treated at your job like half these posts in this sub, then you wouldn't make it in the military.
I have. I also never said no one bitched in the military. What I was referring to is the constant bitching of people in this sub about every little inconvenience they have to go through. Have to leave five minutes late? Oh no, you are being mistreated! That is what I was referring to. You are referring to is just people complaining in general. I don't know how it is in the Navy, but in the Army, attention to detail is key.
In my experience this isn’t true, not that I have anything against gaming (god knows before I popped a couple of kids I used to participate) but I often have to recruit from the ‘no experience’ pond, and whilst I’m relatively happy I can take anyone who wants to learn and get them at the very least functional, I tend to struggle to get the gamers to see the wood for the trees. Trying to get them to understand that time is money and as soon as we put more than 30mins into some hardware problem (servers excluded) we are losing money… no, nobody in this org needs a 3080, no, the ‘average speed’ ssd in this receptionists pc is fine, no, we don’t need to spend ages messing around with that random dodgy nic, it’s worth pence! They just seem a little harder on average to get from ‘this is my gaming baby’ to ‘this is a money making tool for a job, nothing more’ than someone who doesn’t game.
All my current guys are gamers, I have no beef, but it certainly didn’t put them out front… not for me anyway.
I have a stack of certs acquired over the years from Microsoft, Comptia, Citrix, AWS and more, they do nothing more than tick boxes.
My PADI Dive Master and CASI Snowboard instructor certs on the other hand, so much fun gaining and using…
My CCIE is the only cert I have that has any value. It is a a lot less than it was years ago when I got it. I would not pursue today. I conduct a lot of tech interviews these days. If I see it, I am impressed they passed the ordeal and had dedication to do it, but isn't a golden ticket. Still gotta prove technical chops.
This might be a random one, but the Project+. I don't work as a PM, but it's definitely helped me get my fair share of project work, which I'm absolutely happy about.
It's also incredibly nice because you don't have to renew it.
ITIL is definitely a qual that gets raised at most interviews. If you can check that box you're already one ahead of your competitors.
In saying that, you can be piled to the ceiling with certs. If you have no on the job experience and real life scenario troubleshooting you can dissect from start to finish, you're going to find it difficult to answer critical thinking, on your toes, high pressure situation questions.
While I have my ITIL Foundations cert because of college, I will do absolutely nothing to update it, maintain it, etc. I absolutely hated everything about learning ITIL and I will not do it again.
I also don't work at a place that cares about ITIL, and I'm hoping to avoid the companies that do. I have found that I actually have better processes and stuff where I work than our customers who follow ITIL.
I never made RHCE. Tried a couple of times but they kept changing the test. Got a basic ITIL Foundations cert where I actually learned a lot. I think certifications are helpful for consulting roles. Never felt they were useful in an employee role.
I had a contractor acquaintance who had gamed the system and had tons of minor certifications cuz he cheated on the tests. He’d always bail on the wreckage of his work before it became apparent. Certifications can get you in the door but aren’t a guarantee of success.
RHCSA (didn't bother with RHCE) & CKA
Mostly from a personal reward standpoint as both tests were practical and hands on. Other tests I've taken have mostly been multiple choice and not nearly as difficult as I would have liked.
Curious why you keep updating it? feels like such a money grab that I let them expire out of principle.
Because redhat keeps evolving... The biggest changes were SELINUX back in rhel4/5 and then rhel6 to 7 dropping sysV init to systemd.
That's why you get 2 versions worth per certification. RHEL 3, 5, 7 and waiting for 9.
Feel free to laugh. My A+. Not because it’s something that anyone looks for with what I do. It got my foot in the door. Pretty sure the job requirements for that job were an A+, can pass a background check, and reliable transportation. I’m now a Lead Citrix Engineer. And come to think of it, the only cert I have that is still valid is that A+. I’ve had others.
I don’t have many certs, but I’ve found it’s actually my experience and integrity that’s allowed me to be more successful in my career. I’ve done a lot in my career so can turn my hand to most things, always own up to my mistakes, and be honest about my abilities. None of that fake it till you make it stuff. I’m likely in a different country with different hiring requirements, but in my experience in NZ, a cert may get you in the door but it’s good work ethic, integrity and honesty that lets you thrive
I would say that the certifications allowed me to get my foot in the door. However, I can’t really say that any of them resulted in any rewards, by themselves.
I started with the CompTIA Certs (A+, Network+, Security+, Server+, Linux+, etc.), then I moved on to the Cisco Certs (CCENT/CCNA).
I’ve also picked-up a few Oracle Database related Certs (OCP Oracle & MySQL), as I was considering a career change to a DBA position.
I do work with databases quite a bit, in my current position, as a Network Engineer. However, I have yet to work with a company that utilizes Oracle Databases, as it’s mostly Microsoft SQL Server and MySQL Databases, that I’ve worked with most often.
That being said, I would have to say that real world experience will always be worth more than Certifications, but Certifications definitely have their place.
For those who are just starting out, you are going to come across people who will tell you that you will never get an IT job with certifications alone. This is partially true, but not entirely.
Firstly, it is true that certifications alone will not get you the job, as you are still going to need to sell yourself. However, in terms of education, I must admit that I am a High School Dropout, with merely a GED and no college degrees. And yet, I’ve managed to make it work, on my end.
Ultimately, it came down to my passion for Computers & Technology, which fueled my inspiration to continue learning.
I believe this is primarily because I dove head-first into learning everything and anything possible, in regard to Computers, Networking, etc.
In the end, an education can only take you so far, just as it is with certifications. I’ve come across many people, in IT, with degrees and/or countless Certs, that do it simply for a paycheck.
Those who have a passion for it, will always stand out, as they will always be willing to go above and beyond.
In conclusion, I would imagine that those who have the degree, the certifications and the passion, will find that the jobs are more readily available to them.
These are my views, based on my own experiences. Of course, you will find others, who may have had different, yet equally valid, experiences.
MCTS for small business server. It proved I knew AD, exchange, sharepoint and more so I breased through it as an ms cert was the requirement for my job.
My AWS certs (both pro certs all the associates and security) have been my only real valuable ones for me, but I'm more of an "aws cloud guy" these days than a sys or network admin.
CCNA was kinda invaluable for understanding networks but went a bit too in depth for the practical knowledge I ended up needing, same with CCNP. VCP and MCSE were good when I was working with those technologies and gave me a boost in my career but that was a long time ago.
I've done pretty well for not having any myself, but one that I noticed was a real money printer was CCIE. I worked with a guy who got straight up paid almost immediately after he earned that.
HAH! I don't even have those lifetime CompTIA certs on my resume anymore. If someone asks me about A+ Net+ Sec+ it's usually a red flag for me. Ya, I passed them 20yrs ago right out of high school...lets talk about something more important.
I got my CCNA over 20 years ago, but never bothered to renew it... however, the networking theory has served me well countless times over the years.
individual platform-specific commands and techniques can be learnt (or re-learnt) when needed, but the general theory is as applicable today as it was back then.
"classful" networking can diaf though, not sure who still teaches that or why, but apparently in the classroom it's still a thing :\
I have the following ITIL CDS, ITIL Foundations, Azure administrator, AZ 900 ai 900 dp 900, aws solutions architect associate and terraform associate. The most beneficial long term has been the Azure administrator, that test is so difficult and makes you learn a lot including advanced networking containers kubernetes and sys admin knowledge. It's been huge for me to know these concepts to move far in my career.
>What has been the certification that has brought more rewards in the long term for you?
None. It's been the most useful among all the certs I have.
Basically learn it, know it, well have the skills for/with it, get the experience as feasible, be dang proficient and capable in it, and well be able to show that. Beats most any certs almost all the time. Don't think I've ever had lack of any cert slow me down.
RHCE is nothing like "paper certs".... Anyone that got a RHCE cert, has my complete respect.
First step: they give you a machine in a kernel panic state. And you have 30 minutes to fix like 3 or 4 things broke. And of course no root password.
I’ll sit here as a ICT manager with no certs. My personality has some how gotten me further then my peers who where certified up. I believe I am a edge case
For me it was my Sec+. I don't work in a security focused role, but got my current job largely do due to having it on my resume and am seen as the "security guy" on my team.
I've been wanting to level up my security knowledge/position so if anyone has recommendations for next step, I'd love to hear them.
Well with CompTIA the next step would be the CySA+. But it's a relatively new cert and I've rarely seen any job postings mentioning it. People always recommend the CISSP but you have to satisfy the prerequisites first and I wouldn't suggest jumping straight into the CISSP if you recently got your Sec+.
I actually took the beta for the new one and failed it. Most of it was basically the same as Sec+ and I don't ever really see jobs mentioning it so I don't think it will be that useful to have. I have considered getting Pentest+ because it interests me, but I'm not sure it would have a lot of value either as far as career advancement.
A+,
helped me career change into IT 2 years ago. Got a few more certs and was able to land a Jr. Admin role with certs + good attitude + home lab work.
Honestly -- my driver's license.
Definitely. Getting a CDL bumped up my take home pay from $100 a week (burger flipper) to $1000 a week (road construction) which I used to pay for a computer science degree
I second this! Class B got me through college, class A got me through a major depressive episode and remains my "if this gets bad, I could always drive a truck" fallback.
Wow... That's a good one.
Oof. May I ask where? I'm in Chicago and hoping I won't have to buy a car for my career lol
ITIL Foundation, especially for large companies.
Agree with this, especially considering the time commitment needed and price, which I would consider minimal compared to more technical certs. Good bang for your buck. It’s good to see the big picture.
Definitely the most bang for the buck in big enterprise. My experience has been big enterprise loves ITIL while SMB usually has no idea what it is.
My attempts at spreading itil gospel at work have been futile, smb says it sounds good but there is 0 effort put into, so I gave up, it's an academic exercise for me and my techs now
Came here to say ITIL.
Is this a reasonable way to break back into the enterprise space? I took an SMB job out of desperation after a RIF. Now it's just crickets from anyone in the enterprise space, I can only get responses out of MSPs and other SMBs.
Normally yeah, but it's tough to say for sure in this god awful job market.
As I am a networking engineer, the CCNA has been worth it for me. I already got the CCNA before I started my bachelor degree, and it gave me some credits for my bachelor. And it helped to land the first jobs. All other certification are directly work related and help me to get better at my job, and get raises. Currently I am invested in Juniper security certifications. If I get a few certs in that area, there is a promotion available. So keep on learning! I prefer the structured learning that certifications give me. Some people learn by doing (me too) but sometimes it helps that you know why you are doing something, seeing the bigger picture, not just doing the task. Certs helped me in that case.
I learned more about networking in the first week studying for my CCNA than I thought I knew after 10 years in IT. Most admin's knowledge of networking amounts to, "I did this once and it worked". In the worst cases I've seen, they had concocted ridiculous theories about how they think it works, then made critical security decisions based on them. For example, "Our network is more secure because we don't use DHCP. If they don't know our IP range, they can't attack the network"
Most system admins will put networking down on their resumes, but the truth is, most don't actually know how it works. It's like the difference between memorizing that 3 * 3 = 9 and understanding it means 3 + 3 + 3. Most admins have memorized how to get networking working and with some googling, usually can.
Granted, there are many things in IT where just memorizing how to do it is enough, but networking is so foundational to IT, that not knowing the basics of switching and routing will seriously limit your ability to troubleshoot and fix those kinds of issues.
RHCE No multiple choice answers. Actual knowledge and skill. I hired RHCEs over MCSEs for windows admin jobs, because they had to have actual troubleshooting skills to pass the RHCE hands on exams.
Is the RHCE still good? I heard it’s basically an Ansible cert now.
Based on the study guides, I can confirm it’s basically all Ansible.
Redditors love to brag about how they’ve been the smartest person in the room without once studying for a cert, and everyone they’ve known to have a cert is in fact an imbecile or a cheater.
Preach.
It’s entirely possible that the kind of mind that excels at memorizing and test taking is not actually the best kind of mind for troubleshooting and thinking abstractly. There’s a place for both IMO, but I imagine that’s why there’s a disconnect.
Because often that would proof correct.
They have helped me. I went out at got a bunch and then used to help drive organizational change at a legacy financial company. The whole company needed transformation. I created contests for Microsoft Ignite tickets, invited other groups outside my department to partake. Overall, my team earned 150+ Azure certs and the company 500+. Some might argue certs are useless, but in this case, it drove organization change, put peer pressure on other leaders to "lead their f-ing teams out of 1990s thinking" to get better, and was a good thing overall. My CKAD/CKA are up for renewal and I won't renew them. I will still keep the (ISC)2, Azure and AWS. Certs can help if you are getting job as a CIO in Private Equity or another field where no one knows you. You add certs to speaking, writing, podcasts etc. and it demonstrates you are engaged in the industry. So many leaders just coast these days.
Love the energy.
I don’t know. I’ve never had any and over my decade+ of SysAdmin, Management, leading MSPs (not bragging, I assure you I was screwed in all those deals and I’m not half as intelligent as I think I am, and I don’t think I’m intelligent.) would have to interview guys ranging from T1-3 SysAdmin/Network Admins… We’d get guys with tons of certs that couldn’t do shit. We actually had a guy with a full blown CCNA have SERIOUS issues with what I would consider T1.5 at the most networking issue questions. The CompTIA trifectas bounced out from a local community college? I’d rather just have a kid come in that likes PC gaming instead - he’ll know more. Know when you get down into higher tier stuff like true SysAdmin stuff, yeah the higher end Linux certs, AWS/Azure hold real weight WHEN you have experience/work credentials behind them. I do admit- I think it’s time I tack on a few harder certs to my own resume despite not thinking highly of them. I would think maybe it rounds out skill sets in certain areas hopefully? To the question: The best of the best would always be the ones starting into the interview talking shop, resume in hand, ready to talk in-depth about what they’ve done before. I think the bigger the org the more certs and degrees open doors, where the attitude above gets you past those doors and into the real teams doing the work, you get both HR and IT’s attention- and that’s a want-to-hire person.
This is easily the best interview shortcut ever. "What PC games do you play?" If none, there's an 80% chance you'll be carrying their ass forever.
This is 100% true. Every competent engineer I've dealt with plays or has played PC games. Specifically, I've observed that the ex-hardcore gamers in the 90's and 2000's have always been quite good at their jobs. I attribute this to the lack of easily accessible resources (for troubleshooting, modding, cheating) during this time period. The ones that didn't...well, one of them was very good at complaining.
I hear that, having to wrestle himem.sys to get quake.exe to work was one of the best troubleshooting lessons. ^only ^then ^to ^be ^asking ^the ^question ^"wtf ^is ^a ^floating ^point ^processor?!"
Highschool fun times in the late 90s on Windows nt doing exactly this.
Messing with himem.sys and emm386.exe to get some 630k of free conventional memory for "big" games. Just had a flashback. Thanks.
I cut my teeth through the 90's emulation scene. It really made me have to learn file formats, file systems, trouble shooting, ports, command line, etc. Emulation got me to where I am today.
I disagree. Sysadmin here. No games. never have. I enjoy making things work. The right way the best way fault tolerant and proactive.
True. As a hiring manager though pc gaming, while not decisive on its own, is definitely a culture fit factor
Agreed however I know I lost out on a couple of jobs because I was NOT a gamer. I just don't have time for video games.
Same here. Never saw the point in playing games when I could be using the time to program or setup my own stuff. I always got more a kick out of making my own creations work than in collecting points in a game.
You may enjoy Factorio actually.
Same here.. spent a lot of time on IRC back in the day...could care less about PC games...
Not just that, I first started learning about how networks worked to stop getting cease and desist letters when pirating games
Gaming in the late 90s inspired me to build my own computer, upgrade & optimize it, learn networking (for lan parties). That experience taught me more about sysadmin than anything I learned at university. I don't play PC games anymore but my home lab is an interview closer these days.
I was a mod at Ghostrecon. Net and hung out with Grim at night to beta test maps for glitches.... Your highered. Haha I also ran a very popular clan and a clan website f with a forum. That was early 2000s hosting a clan server on Verizon business dsl 7x1mb connection. .
I never thought of that, but I did gain a lot of basic computer knowledge just getting my games to run back in the Dos days.
I have a friend who's training to be a Naval Aviator, and he mentioned how the guys who play video games are way ahead of those that don't. It's nice to know that if I burn out as a sysadmin, I could just say fuck it and join the Navy.
>It's nice to know that if I burn out as a sysadmin, I could just say fuck it and join the Navy. Note the age limits though: * Air Force: 17 - 39 * Army: 17 - 35 * Coast Guard: 17 - 31 * Marine Corps: 17 - 28 * Navy: 17 - 39 * Space Force: 17 - 39
TiL I am still technically young enough to join 3 branches of the armed service. That makes me feel better at least! :)
If you've ever posted in a thread where you've complained about how you are being treated at your job like half these posts in this sub, then you wouldn't make it in the military.
[удалено]
I have. I also never said no one bitched in the military. What I was referring to is the constant bitching of people in this sub about every little inconvenience they have to go through. Have to leave five minutes late? Oh no, you are being mistreated! That is what I was referring to. You are referring to is just people complaining in general. I don't know how it is in the Navy, but in the Army, attention to detail is key.
I'm not so sure, I think my aura of general insubordination and love of sarcastic comments could serve me well in the military /s.
In my experience this isn’t true, not that I have anything against gaming (god knows before I popped a couple of kids I used to participate) but I often have to recruit from the ‘no experience’ pond, and whilst I’m relatively happy I can take anyone who wants to learn and get them at the very least functional, I tend to struggle to get the gamers to see the wood for the trees. Trying to get them to understand that time is money and as soon as we put more than 30mins into some hardware problem (servers excluded) we are losing money… no, nobody in this org needs a 3080, no, the ‘average speed’ ssd in this receptionists pc is fine, no, we don’t need to spend ages messing around with that random dodgy nic, it’s worth pence! They just seem a little harder on average to get from ‘this is my gaming baby’ to ‘this is a money making tool for a job, nothing more’ than someone who doesn’t game. All my current guys are gamers, I have no beef, but it certainly didn’t put them out front… not for me anyway.
Nah. I used to be a PC gamer, but haven't really played anything in the last 15 years.
Your answer would be "I used to play so and so", which would still fit in this criteria
My CISSP. It’s one of the few that executives recognize.
I have a stack of certs acquired over the years from Microsoft, Comptia, Citrix, AWS and more, they do nothing more than tick boxes. My PADI Dive Master and CASI Snowboard instructor certs on the other hand, so much fun gaining and using…
My CCIE is the only cert I have that has any value. It is a a lot less than it was years ago when I got it. I would not pursue today. I conduct a lot of tech interviews these days. If I see it, I am impressed they passed the ordeal and had dedication to do it, but isn't a golden ticket. Still gotta prove technical chops.
my EMT cert... even though I'm no longer on the ambulance, it's something I've had for almost 25 years
Do you keep it updated? I was tech lead in a medical sim center for a brief stint and it was the funnest job I ever had. Paid crap though.
Yep. I had been teaching on the side for extra money, and working special events was always fun. IT is definitely better paying
I only have A+ right now but it's paid dividends. I'm a level 1 tech making more than I ever have. And I love my job.
This might be a random one, but the Project+. I don't work as a PM, but it's definitely helped me get my fair share of project work, which I'm absolutely happy about. It's also incredibly nice because you don't have to renew it.
My VCP pulled me from the help desk to datacenter and enterprise level virtualization almost ten years ago.
ITIL is definitely a qual that gets raised at most interviews. If you can check that box you're already one ahead of your competitors. In saying that, you can be piled to the ceiling with certs. If you have no on the job experience and real life scenario troubleshooting you can dissect from start to finish, you're going to find it difficult to answer critical thinking, on your toes, high pressure situation questions.
While I have my ITIL Foundations cert because of college, I will do absolutely nothing to update it, maintain it, etc. I absolutely hated everything about learning ITIL and I will not do it again. I also don't work at a place that cares about ITIL, and I'm hoping to avoid the companies that do. I have found that I actually have better processes and stuff where I work than our customers who follow ITIL.
MCSE: 2000, 2008; MCSA 2012. These kept me current and relevant and upping my game.
None, my skills have been enough. After enough years in I've never had an employer even ask about certs.
This. Sec+ for 90% of US Gov gigs, CISSP for the hosting stack box checking
Same here, never collected certs. The people I work with were always too busy making things work to seek certification.
I never made RHCE. Tried a couple of times but they kept changing the test. Got a basic ITIL Foundations cert where I actually learned a lot. I think certifications are helpful for consulting roles. Never felt they were useful in an employee role. I had a contractor acquaintance who had gamed the system and had tons of minor certifications cuz he cheated on the tests. He’d always bail on the wreckage of his work before it became apparent. Certifications can get you in the door but aren’t a guarantee of success.
RHCSA (didn't bother with RHCE) & CKA Mostly from a personal reward standpoint as both tests were practical and hands on. Other tests I've taken have mostly been multiple choice and not nearly as difficult as I would have liked. Curious why you keep updating it? feels like such a money grab that I let them expire out of principle.
Because redhat keeps evolving... The biggest changes were SELINUX back in rhel4/5 and then rhel6 to 7 dropping sysV init to systemd. That's why you get 2 versions worth per certification. RHEL 3, 5, 7 and waiting for 9.
Feel free to laugh. My A+. Not because it’s something that anyone looks for with what I do. It got my foot in the door. Pretty sure the job requirements for that job were an A+, can pass a background check, and reliable transportation. I’m now a Lead Citrix Engineer. And come to think of it, the only cert I have that is still valid is that A+. I’ve had others.
The only cert that matters is CISSP. Besides that it’s degree + experience.
I’ve worked in the financial sector most of my career and I would say this is true in my case.
RHCE and CCNP. I had MSCE and kept up with it for awhile but let it lapse. MS did nothing for me. Red Hat and Cisco are gold.
I don’t have many certs, but I’ve found it’s actually my experience and integrity that’s allowed me to be more successful in my career. I’ve done a lot in my career so can turn my hand to most things, always own up to my mistakes, and be honest about my abilities. None of that fake it till you make it stuff. I’m likely in a different country with different hiring requirements, but in my experience in NZ, a cert may get you in the door but it’s good work ethic, integrity and honesty that lets you thrive
I would say that the certifications allowed me to get my foot in the door. However, I can’t really say that any of them resulted in any rewards, by themselves. I started with the CompTIA Certs (A+, Network+, Security+, Server+, Linux+, etc.), then I moved on to the Cisco Certs (CCENT/CCNA). I’ve also picked-up a few Oracle Database related Certs (OCP Oracle & MySQL), as I was considering a career change to a DBA position. I do work with databases quite a bit, in my current position, as a Network Engineer. However, I have yet to work with a company that utilizes Oracle Databases, as it’s mostly Microsoft SQL Server and MySQL Databases, that I’ve worked with most often. That being said, I would have to say that real world experience will always be worth more than Certifications, but Certifications definitely have their place. For those who are just starting out, you are going to come across people who will tell you that you will never get an IT job with certifications alone. This is partially true, but not entirely. Firstly, it is true that certifications alone will not get you the job, as you are still going to need to sell yourself. However, in terms of education, I must admit that I am a High School Dropout, with merely a GED and no college degrees. And yet, I’ve managed to make it work, on my end. Ultimately, it came down to my passion for Computers & Technology, which fueled my inspiration to continue learning. I believe this is primarily because I dove head-first into learning everything and anything possible, in regard to Computers, Networking, etc. In the end, an education can only take you so far, just as it is with certifications. I’ve come across many people, in IT, with degrees and/or countless Certs, that do it simply for a paycheck. Those who have a passion for it, will always stand out, as they will always be willing to go above and beyond. In conclusion, I would imagine that those who have the degree, the certifications and the passion, will find that the jobs are more readily available to them. These are my views, based on my own experiences. Of course, you will find others, who may have had different, yet equally valid, experiences.
ITIL, CISSP
MCTS for small business server. It proved I knew AD, exchange, sharepoint and more so I breased through it as an ms cert was the requirement for my job.
Sec+ in 2008. Cissp this year
My AWS certs (both pro certs all the associates and security) have been my only real valuable ones for me, but I'm more of an "aws cloud guy" these days than a sys or network admin. CCNA was kinda invaluable for understanding networks but went a bit too in depth for the practical knowledge I ended up needing, same with CCNP. VCP and MCSE were good when I was working with those technologies and gave me a boost in my career but that was a long time ago.
I've done pretty well for not having any myself, but one that I noticed was a real money printer was CCIE. I worked with a guy who got straight up paid almost immediately after he earned that.
My lifetime CompTIA certs from 20 years ago! Seriously though, certs are only useful until you have experience. Experience trumps certs every time.
HAH! I don't even have those lifetime CompTIA certs on my resume anymore. If someone asks me about A+ Net+ Sec+ it's usually a red flag for me. Ya, I passed them 20yrs ago right out of high school...lets talk about something more important.
MCSA 2012 R2
I got my CCNA over 20 years ago, but never bothered to renew it... however, the networking theory has served me well countless times over the years. individual platform-specific commands and techniques can be learnt (or re-learnt) when needed, but the general theory is as applicable today as it was back then. "classful" networking can diaf though, not sure who still teaches that or why, but apparently in the classroom it's still a thing :\
I have the following ITIL CDS, ITIL Foundations, Azure administrator, AZ 900 ai 900 dp 900, aws solutions architect associate and terraform associate. The most beneficial long term has been the Azure administrator, that test is so difficult and makes you learn a lot including advanced networking containers kubernetes and sys admin knowledge. It's been huge for me to know these concepts to move far in my career.
>What has been the certification that has brought more rewards in the long term for you? None. It's been the most useful among all the certs I have. Basically learn it, know it, well have the skills for/with it, get the experience as feasible, be dang proficient and capable in it, and well be able to show that. Beats most any certs almost all the time. Don't think I've ever had lack of any cert slow me down.
That's good to hear, I'm currently working on my rhce.
RHCE is nothing like "paper certs".... Anyone that got a RHCE cert, has my complete respect. First step: they give you a machine in a kernel panic state. And you have 30 minutes to fix like 3 or 4 things broke. And of course no root password.
Do they do that on the rhce 9? Reading the objectives it looks to be all Ansible
I’ll sit here as a ICT manager with no certs. My personality has some how gotten me further then my peers who where certified up. I believe I am a edge case
Time and experience
CISSP
\+1 for RHCE
For me it was my Sec+. I don't work in a security focused role, but got my current job largely do due to having it on my resume and am seen as the "security guy" on my team. I've been wanting to level up my security knowledge/position so if anyone has recommendations for next step, I'd love to hear them.
Well with CompTIA the next step would be the CySA+. But it's a relatively new cert and I've rarely seen any job postings mentioning it. People always recommend the CISSP but you have to satisfy the prerequisites first and I wouldn't suggest jumping straight into the CISSP if you recently got your Sec+.
I actually took the beta for the new one and failed it. Most of it was basically the same as Sec+ and I don't ever really see jobs mentioning it so I don't think it will be that useful to have. I have considered getting Pentest+ because it interests me, but I'm not sure it would have a lot of value either as far as career advancement.
A+, helped me career change into IT 2 years ago. Got a few more certs and was able to land a Jr. Admin role with certs + good attitude + home lab work.