The IT Certification Conundrum: Are We Chasing Paper or Practicality?

Remember when an MCSE or CCNA on your résumé would get you an IT job without hesitation? Flash forward to the present, and that same document may not even make it through the initial AI-driven résumé filtering.

We're seeing an increasing rift in IT hiring—a simple question that hiring managers, recruiters, and candidates can't quite agree on: ?? Do certifications count anymore, or is experience supreme?

??Did we outgrow the old system of credentials, or does it simply need to be thoroughly rewritten?

The apt answer? Depends. The detailed answer? The IT community's fixation on certification is becoming further and further out of sync with the actual ability needed to survive in the current cloud-based, AI-fueled environment.

The Problem with the Traditional IT Credential System

IT hiring for decades has followed a predictable equation: Degree + Certification = Job Security. However, the pace at which tech is changing—especially in areas such as cybersecurity, DevOps, cloud computing, and AI—has exposed vulnerabilities in the model:

?? Certifications become outdated too rapidly. A cloud certification received in 2021 may become obsolete by 2024 as AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud keep making updates.

?? They never necessarily demonstrate real-world ability. Passing an exam and debugging real-world IT issues are two vastly different propositions. Learning commands by heart or sticking to test dumps will not aid when resolving an unplanned cloud outage at 2 AM.

?? Employers care more than ever about hands-on experience. Based on a CompTIA 2023 report, 74% of IT hiring managers list hands-on experience as the priority over certification during candidate evaluations.

?? Certifications represent an economic hurdle. Most valuable certs—such as CISSP, AWS Solutions Architect, or Google Professional Cloud Architect—are thousands in training and exam costs. This gatekeeping disproportionately disadvantages skilled professionals who can perform the work but cannot afford the certification.

Are IT Certifications Completely Useless? Not quite.

Let's be honest—certifications are not completely worthless.

? They assist early-career IT people in getting through the door. For an inexperienced individual, an AWS or Cisco cert can serve as a credibility factor.

? They are essential in the regulated sector. Finance, healthcare, and government sectors tend to require professionals to possess security clearances and vendor-specific certs such as CISSP, CISM, or ITIL.

? They legitimize specialized knowledge. Credentials such as OSCP (Offensive Security Certified Professional) for ethical hacking or Kubernetes certifications for container orchestration are still valid because they attest to a degree of depth of knowledge beyond regular job functions.

What Should IT Hiring Focus on Instead?

If certifications are no longer the gold standard, what should IT hiring emphasize? The answer: practical, demonstrable skills.

? Portfolio-based hiring. Rather than posting certs, candidates should present GitHub projects, open-source contributions, bug bounty reports, or real-world case studies.

? Technical tests that reflect real-world job work. Google, Netflix, and Microsoft have abandoned cert-laden hiring and use problem-solving interviews instead, where the candidate works on actual IT situations.

? Experience-based hiring. Some of the top cybersecurity talents were autodidact hackers before they ever received a cert. Some of the top cloud architects created systems prior to taking a vendor exam.

So, Should You Still Get Certified?

It's your career trajectory that matters. If you're entry-level in IT, certification might be a benefit. If mid- to senior-level, the proven ability will trump any score on an exam.

The real question isn't whether or not certifications are worthwhile—it's if hiring managers, recruiters, and the industry at large are poised to place the value of on-the-job capability ahead of documentation.

?? What’s your take? Are certifications still relevant, or is experience the only thing that matters now? Are they still a valuable benchmark, or has hands-on experience completely taken over?

?? Join the conversation in Culture Corner by HRTechCube! Drop your thoughts, share your experiences, and let’s challenge the status quo of IT hiring. ?? #CultureCorner #HRTechCube #ITCareers