Back to PostingCandidates: Ask Questions of Your Interviewers

Certifications Aren’t Useful for Filtering Candidates

June 29th, 2004

Some hiring managers use certifications to filter resumes. I specifically caution against that practice in the book. I’m not a fan of certifications. Michael Schrage’s column Hiding Behind Certification is another article about why certifications are not a good predictor of job success. Here are two quotes I particularly liked:

“The truth — as we all so bitterly know — is that the IT world is filled with certified, credentialed and accredited idiots.”“…the real value of credentials and certifications like CMMs and MBAs is not that they indicate greater skill, but they signal to the market that these individuals and organizations will jump through hoops to demonstrate how much they care about being seen as top-notch. … the willingness to procure credentials can reveal more about attitude than aptitude.

Although Schrage is talking about IT, his observations aren’t limited to IT. Unless you’re talking about licenses which require some sort of an apprenticeship, certifications are no way to screen resumes or make a hiring decision.

Entry Filed under: Uncategorized


Leave a Comment

Required

Required, hidden

Some HTML allowed:
<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>

Trackback this post  |  Subscribe to the comments via RSS Feed


Hiring technical people and being hired can be difficult, no matter what the economy is doing. Use the tips here to hire better, or find a new job.


Search