Certification or College degrees?

Thu May 23 16:07:06 UTC 2002

On Thu, May 23, 2002 at 02:18:37AM +0300, ariel at fireball.tau.ac.il said:
>   Hi all,
> 
>    I've read this thread with quite a bit of interest, I must admit. I
> must say that after reading it all, I see alot of ... misguided
> perceptions.
> 
>    Certifications, of any kind, be it university degrees, or other
> generic certifications, or even the product specific ones, are just a way
> to ascertain material knowledge. Nothing, nothing more. By no means are
> they any good at ascertaining the persons ability to implement knowledge
> (no matter what Cisco says about its hands on lab test). Like any other
> program, they are built around a specific structure. That doesn't predict
> the ability of a person to implement knowledge in new situations, adapt it
> to his/her needs, and find a solution to a new problem.
[snip]

*nod* I'm by no means qualified to give any kind of authoritative (or even
very experienced) opinion on this issue, but from my limited experience to
date, it appears to me that the most important qualities in a system or
network admin, at pretty much any level, are the ability to know how to
efficiently search for answers, and how to troubleshoot problems in
unfamiliar situations.

Anybody that knows how to find answers quickly and accurately, and knows how
to effectively and logically troubleshoot problems, even if they have no
prior exposure to the problem in question, will do well in pretty much any
situation you put them in, whether they have certifications, degrees or even
prior experience, or not.

> my 2 cents,
> 
> --Ariel

My $0.005 (not qualified to give a full $0.02 yet).
-- 
Scott Francis                   darkuncle@ [home:] d a r k u n c l e . n e t
Systems/Network Manager          sfrancis@ [work:]         t o n o s . c o m
GPG public key 0xCB33CCA7              illum oportet crescere me autem minui
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