Why I Dropped the Certification Game
Certifications are a hot thing in tech…anyone familiar with LinkedIn should have seen people having a few to hundreds of different badges swarming their profiles. At one point in my life… I was riding on that train. Before I started my degree in cybersecurity…I was looking for ways to upskill and, at the same time, earn credibility to land an entry-level security role, which was what led me to certifications.
After much research, I enrolled for my first computer networking certification, the Network+ from CompTiA.After passing the exam with just one month of preparation, I passed the Security+ the following month, and that was before I started my cybersecurity degree. I thought I was a genius.
When I started looking for jobs, the employers who listed these certifications as a requirement did not pay attention to them; they only care about the experience you have gathered either from building something exceptional or your work experience.
Even if the certifications I did during those years were basic entry-level certs. The same rule still applies to advanced certs. Credibility can never be handed over; it is earned over time. I will not write certs off completely, for some people, that’s the level-up game, certs got them the job, the pay raise, the promotion, but it is a game I chose to opt out of. It’s expensive, unreliable and risky.
I don’t force myself to learn loads of stuff upfront to prove myself to an employer. I follow the just-in-time-based learning approach, where I only learn what I need for a specific task and allow my skills to compound naturally through real-world experience and constant iteration.
If you’re considering pursuing certifications, ask yourself the following questions:
- Is it worth it?
- Would you be better off creating a tailored learning path for yourself?
- Do you simply want to display badges on your LinkedIn profile?
- Are there other ways to prove your skills to an employer?
- Do you need to go to such lengths to demonstrate your expertise?
You should find your answers easily.
— Tobiloba Ogundiyan