Increase your skill set with IT certification

I was reading an article by Lutz Ziob of MCPmag.com about IT certification, and it got me thinking about the value of these certifications—especially with tech wages steadily rising.

There are some skill sets in the IT world that are especially hard to come by, and those with SAP and Oracle skills are always in demand. Therefore, potential employees who can perform the necessary tasks associated with these skills will have their pick of jobs. And that means employers will be more likely to provide additional perks and raise wages to entice workers.

So what does that mean for consultants? A lot. These certifications do much more than show IT workers are competent in their skill set, and increase their hirability. When certification programs are put in place, they strengthen their business.

A survey by IDC (and sponsored by Microsoft) found that 66 percent of managers thought certifications improve the level of service and support offered to customers, and 75 percent of these managers felt that certifications were important to overall team performance.

Likewise, certifications are also beneficial to the employees. Having a certification can set you apart from similar candidates who might not be certified. In addition, certifications can keep you abreast of changing technologies and the skills to manage them.

But these certifications don’t just have to come from employers. There are also online training programs and programs run by vendors, such as Oracle and SAP, that offer certification in several of the latest tools, including Microsoft Visual Studio .NET, Oracle 9i DBA, and mySAP CRM 3.0. And online courses let you complete certification at your own pace, in your free time.

I’d be interested in hearing thoughts on this. Do your employers have certification programs in place? Do you take advantage of them? Have you taken training programs online or through vendors if your employer does not offer certification programs?

All comments welcome!

Posted by Michele B.

Comments

[Paul]

At least for Microsoft, the official curriculum released by them is a very lousy way to study for their exams. Even if you had a photographic memory and knew everything in their courses for their exams, you could still fail the exam because their courses don't come close to covering everything on their exams.

Their courses are also expensive. High costs, low return, not worth it.

There are a lot of third party exam preps that can be found at Barnes and Nobles or Borders that are a much better way to approach passing these tests.

Perhaps one of the best ways to find good certification exam books is to read the reviews of different exam books on Amazon's site.