Which certificates matter? And why?

Earlier this year, some of you had kindly responded to two polls.

The first one suggests that we may not always trust polls.?

The second one was about the importance of certificates.?

The winner of this poll was the certificate for tropical dances. Did the respondents know that at high school our teacher made me dance in front of the class mates - as a bad example? But I am optimistic that those who voted for this option had the opportunity to testify to the certificate’s validity.

My own vote was for the typing-with-10-fingers certificate. At the age of 17, I enrolled for an evening class in my home village to learn how to use a mechanical typewriter. I always hated wasting my time, and learning to type fast with 10 fingers was perhaps my best long-term investment - a decade prior to obtaining a PhD and teaching myself not to waste time with manual formatting in MsWord (please use MsWord Styles instead).

The safety course for seafarers allowed me to formally work as crew on Hoffmann Shipping’s Antigua and Barbuda flagged tween-decker, which in turn may have helped me later in life to get my first job with the International Maritime Organization.

And what about managing 10 mm film projectors? The ability to fiddle with film roles was never really brought to any use. But at that time the certificate allowed me to do a summer job with young children in a youth camp in Denmark. And, who knows, it thus may have helped me prepare for brining up my own three sons.??

The poll only allowed for 4 options. Looking at some other certificates among my files: The UN Security in the field taught me how to identify land-mines; fortunately, I did not need this knowledge so far. The driving license is just a reminder that I looked younger when I was 19. And the Hispanics course in Barcelona ended up helping me with a better understanding of Spanish and Latin American history and culture when, much later, I lived and worked in Latin America.

Certificates are a recognition of having completed a task or step in life. They may subsequently open unexpected doors for new tasks and steps.

Thank you LinkedIn for having insisted that I upload my certificates. I enjoyed the reflections and memories.?