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Subject:Re: Certification: Ernest and Scribbler From:Bill Swallow <techcommdood -at- gmail -dot- com> To:"Jason A. Czekalski" <topsidefarm -at- mva -dot- net> Date:Mon, 19 Jul 2010 08:08:57 -0400
> This would only be of value to a hiring manager who understood the
> limitations of the certification. How manay of our hiring managers even
> understand what we do? The very existence of a certification would cause
> problems because hiring managers and HR types would start demanding it
> without having any understanding of what it is. This has already
> happened with the Society for Quality certifications, so this is not
> just speculation. Certification creates a way too tempting shortcut for
> people who don't understand a field and have no interest learning about
> it, even when it impacts them directly.
You will always have some level of ignorance in the workplace. What I
have found from the management side is that the good managers learn
about the various certifications that their staff and applicants hold
(Hey, what's with those letters next to that person's name? I'll
Google it...). You're always going to have apathetic or otherwise
inadequate managers who either accept or dismiss credentials blindly
(the truth stinks, don't it?) but IMHO that's no reason to dismiss
having credentials at all.
> Sharon, who is even qualified to review the work of folks like Gene
> Kim-Eng, Bill Swallow, or even you. The fact is that unless you have
> some huge peer review committee, there is no way certain people can be
> evaluated for certification. And given the Climategate email scandal and
> a few other academic dustups iver the last decade, peer-review has
> gotten something of a dirty name.
You need to start somewhere. Who was certified to appoint the first
college degree? The first PMP certificate? The first
government-approved burger patty?
> This is the same lie that has been used with every license or
> certification to come along. Even those that are "voluntary" (like the
> Society for Quality certs) become a mandate based on the demands of
> those from outside the field.
And so therefore it has no merit? I don't buy that argument at all.
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