Google offers certificate to help IT career growth | Hacker News Reader

Google offers certificate to help IT career growth

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95 pointsjonas_kgomo75 comments

I don't mean to come off as dismissive, but as someone who has a bunch of these company-sponsored certificates, does any employer (outside of the one issuing it) care at all about these certs?

I have a few from EdX, something from W3Schools, and something from RedHat that I still put on my resume for some indiscernible reason, but having asked interviewers about it after being hired, they don't appear to have been of any direct practical use.

I'm not saying you shouldn't learn all the stuff required for the certificate, but at the same time, I think it's naive to think that putting it on a resume is going to be much direct help.

Product-specific certs (like for O365, Azure, or AWS) are a big deal and a big help in getting hired into those roles.

General knowledge certs don't seem to be relevant.

Do you think so?

I know some employers do care but more to be able to claim X consultants certified in tech Y than as a guide for hiring.

Capgemini are pretty big on certs but most people we hired didn't have them, just got them after they joined (This is my experience in the UK)

None of them are amazing predictors of success, only a baseline for competence.

Tech consulting shops especially demonstrate a preference for people who have certs relevant to the work that they're trying to sell.

Is that true of the RHCE and other same brand certs? Seems doubtful from content.

It definitely is for cloud provider consulting, as those also factor into your MSP status.

I wouldn’t even say they are a baseline for competency. There are brain dumps for most major certs available online.

Tech consultancies need people with certs because usually a client will say 'i want X people with Y certificate on this project or I'll go to someone else'

Also, when a company wants to call them, say, "Microsoft Silver Partner", they typically need at least X people with Microsoft certificates.

Having been in both sides: Consultancy and Client. My experience suggests that this is far from universal.

100% - they are not a replacement for experience but they get you noticed for sure. Some jobs even require them on the posting.

Well, in theory, it should be impossible to complete these specific certs without having the background general knowledge in the first place. In theory.

I purposefully ignore certificates when looking at CVs. Once upon a time, I actually looked at them prejudicially, because the kinds of candidates I saw with certificates were generally inferior and couldn't code their way out of a paper bag. These days I just don't really give them any weight one way or another.

"because the kinds of candidates I saw with certificates were generally inferior and couldn't code their way out of a paper bag"

Or in this case, because they are entry level and its their first programming job?

The presumption is that they went for the cert after they tried and failed at accomplishing anything.

The third sentence of the article says "...75,000 entry-level jobs require Python proficiency." They're not expecting to hire Guido to those jobs, but someone who knows which side of the keyboard should be on top would be a good start.

Given two candidates, one who went to a training exercise and earned a certificate for it and one who has a Github page that includes a couple disgusting, hacky, buggy Python scripts (mostly consisting of snippets copied from StackOverflow) to automate some analysis that was awkward in Excel, I'd take the latter 99 times out of 100.

> Github page that includes a couple disgusting, hacky, buggy Python scripts

I am more surprised when Python code I read isn't!

Even if it’s their first programming job. I would expect them to know how to program. Programming is easy to learn on your own.

In my country government projects are distributed to software companies via tender. To be able to participate, they often require company to hire some number of certified professionals. For example I got Sun Java certification because of that. Naturally those companies are looking for people who already possess those certificates.

Government projects tend to be not very sexy, though. But they definitely help real world people with real world tasks, so it's a good bonus.

I suspect that they help in getting past the prescreening filters in HR departments. I'm not sure that they do much beyond that, though.

It helps me, when interviewing people (already past the HR screen), to make assumptions about what we don't need to talk about. I'll still do my checks on your knowledge to make sure you aren't just a cert collector who has no real hands-on knowledge, but it tells me that there are certain things I probably don't have to dig into.

Aside from that, I'd agree - it's a variable to plug into a dumb screening system to make you appear on the "good" list.

That's not an insignificant thing.

I’ve never seen any evidence of this happening in real life, but here on HN (and on Slashdot back when I read it) it’s common to see people insist that they would never hire anybody who _had_ any sort of certification. The reasoning usually goes something like “everybody I’ve met who had that certification was an idiot, so I can extrapolate that everybody who has it is also an idiot”.

Of course, there are people here who say the same about college degrees, too.

Agreed. That can really be applied to any credential. Heck, there's even people here that would say the same thing about a traditional elementary and secondary school education.

I was long ago told a story about interviewing a candidate who had on her resume that she was a member of Mensa, and seemed to have no real achievements, at least that she was prepared to talk about, otherwise. The implication was that if you have your IQ certified, you're probably a loser.

The CCIE I got most certainly changed my life with the amount of income I could command.

CCIE is probably the only cert worth a damn. It's hard as hell and they require in-lab, in-person, on-equipment testing or at least they used to. It's very valuable.

The online certs like MCSE, MCSD etc can all be easily hacked via brain dumps. With programming, being able to answer technical questions doesn't mean much without the craftsmanship / artistry it takes to actually build stuff.

Great point, so what do you measure as great signal of someone to hire, besides experience?

Sadly, I don't have much of a good system to handle it; just talking to the person and doing basic whiteboard problems.

Since I'm a dropout myself I typically try and not put much stock into degrees either but I find that they're a bit more reliable than the certificates.

It's going to become more important as programming becomes commoditized.

Rather than work with all clients directly, the major tech companies run partnership programs for smaller resellers and service providers. A partner account is sometimes the best or only way to download administration tools, firmware images, documentation, etc. or talk to actually competent engineering support. It also confers a license to use the company's trademark in your branding and establishes some amount of trust for clients. Microsoft and Cisco are both really into this.

The key qualification for partnership is N staff members with whatever certificate. So it doesn't necessarily mean you'll be hired, but it may be important to the company that you have it.

There can also be business opportunities offered exclusively to partners. My company wants more people to become AWS Practitioners for this reason. I believe Amazon refers work to its partners, although I'm not clear on the details.

Depends a lot on the role. I've conducted a few hundred interviews at this point and you're right that I don't put equal weight on all certs, but they do help me prepare questions. For example, if I see a CCNA recently issued, I can make an assumption that opening with a network question should be a way to ease the candidate into an area they are at least somewhat comfortable in and get over the initial interview nerves. If they flounder in what I would assume is an entry level question in a topic they claim to have expertise, then I know I immediately need to adjust the questions and expectations for the rest of the interview. For some roles this could be an immediate sign that they probably aren't the right fit, but that doesn't mean they don't have knowledge and skills in other areas and it's my job to find those and determine if there's another open role that they could be great in. Or if they are open to a more junior role with an ability to grow, if they show great signs in other areas. So in short, the cert does help me tailor the interview a but better.

In my experience it's the more conservative/less fashionable/less well remunerated entities that care about certs. They serve as something of an insurance policy for managers that don't trust their ability to discern good from bad when hiring.

Edit: they're also used by some organisations to contain salary growth, i.e., even though you're worth x to the company and learnt y and z this year, you don't get a pay rise without a certificate.

anecdotal evidence here, I work as an engine mechanic.

Early in my career I thought about becoming "ford mechanic" certified, but talking to some of the old hands at my shop they all just sort of smirked. 11 years later Im coming to see these certifications are sort of pointless. The general design of a car hasnt really changed that much. control arms, coilover suspension, brakes, steering, and final drive are all relatively similar. You dont see appreciable differences until you start working on really, really big vehicles.

brand certification really only served one point: repeat customer business for dealerships and ticking the "job training" box for your more senior/bored techs. I work with an Acura certified tech currently who handles drivetrain because her certification let her learn about drive shafts...but she spent a solid three months under my wing learning about drive ratios, compression calculations, operational RPM calculations, overtorque, etc...So in this case i guess it was a good way to get in the door. a certificate shows you're willing to learn new things, and work at something youre interested in.

A lot of IT has moved to MSPs. And MSPs care that their engineers are certified in the software or equipment their clients use. It's a selling point, because personnel are the product.

But if the job is working with Cisco network equipment and Windows PCs, a Google cert is worth less than the paper it's printed on. I don't know how many businesses would value a general "IT Support Certification" from Google, because most businesses aren't using Google's platform.

Google certs for G Suite and such tend to be worth it in the education space where Chromebooks for all have taken over.

As a follow up on this, MSPs also get better pricing depending on the number of certified employees they have. For instance, years ago the MSP i worked for needed a number of people to have their VMware VCP cert to get to the next level. Even after someone left, they kept their VCP still associated with the MSP.

Cisco also does the same thing. You need a certain number of CCIEs on staff for better pricing.

I have a handful of certs but I can’t remember what they are or where I stored them. I don’t put them on my resume. The courses were great

According to this(https://grow.google/programs/it-support/), BofA, PNC, Intel, Hulu, Wallmart, and others care about it.

My employer has us get two a year. They generally favor the AWS certs, but certs in other relevant fields, apps, or service work too.

Can you explain how this works? Do you see this as a perk or “busy work”? Does your employer pay for the course and/or test? Do you get to choose which two certifications you complete?

This is a norm in Salesforce consulting. Employers usually cover the cost of certification and they are usually good way to discover gaps in your knowledge,as it's extremely huge platform. The type of certification would depend on the specialisation route one takes.I think most of this would apply to other fields as well.

To add to my other comment where I mentioned AWS. Salesforce Certifications are favorably viewed on as well. Our employer paid for the developer training AND the admin training, as a result, we were expected to get the certification. That may or may not happen, but there is a great deal to be learned in the training courses and I think the certification drives you to study, explored, and ultimately retain much of what you learn.

Depends on the individual. I see it as a perk, they pay for it, they pay for the training, and I end up studying something I may not feel compelled to study because it's not my "day to day".

Some people, for the last reason above, feel it's busy work.

However, after talking to some of my colleagues who work here and those who have moved on, the certifications are great resume builders. They get you discovered on linkedin and in many cases demonstrate some level of knowledge, specifically with the AWS certifications.

Edit: And yes, you can generally choose what you get to work on as long as it's related to the field, and depending on your managers, specifically to your organization. For example, we use AWS, so AWS certs are an easy yes - Salesforce too. However, I tend test the limits and even put in to see if the Google cert from this thread is eligible, but our goals for the year aren't clear yet - so we'll see.

Got one from google, near worthless

I would think listing a W3Schools cert on your resume would do quite a bit more harm than good.

I actually don't list that one anymore, misspoke in my post. I list the EdX and RedHat ones still though.

W3Schools battles css-tricks and mdn for first spot on search results for most of my searches (I'm a front end dev). I agree that their certificates are completely worthless but the site isn't as terrible as it used to be.

The world is a big place. Consider a country or a business owner with limited IT expertise. Businesses moving at a fast pace in such environments have a way ( leaky albeit) to hire talent.

For employees nobody cares. For contractors it matters a lot, and some consulting companies have to maintain a certain level of certified employees to maintain status with their overlord/partner. (ie Microsoft, AWS, etc)

Some certs are probably worth it, if only for your own edification. I've been picking up the AWS-specific ones as time goes on and while I am not impressed with the rigor asked of candidates for the Associate certification, you have to be pretty on-the-ball to pass the Professional exams. (I haven't taken them yet, but the samples convinced me I had best brush up.)

In my experience the only time this matters is when you're doing contracting work and a government entity or company requires X certificate(s) to win a contract. It's amazing how many government contracts require certain, easy to get certificates and you can't work on the contract without them.

Beyond that I have never seen them be useful unless your company has, say, pay raises tied to extended learning (which is a common thing with teaching but that's going to college, not some Google cert).

I’m going to try to speak from all sides.

For context: I am a software developer/architect/team lead depending on how the wind blows. I am also now responsible for guiding the “cloud native initiatives.” I’m going to hit a ceiling in the next year or two as an IC in my market and might want to go into consulting working for a company.

I have six AWS certifications: The three associate certs, two professional and one specialty. The company paid for all but the first. I use them as a guided learning path to help me know what I don’t know.

With six certifications, I run the risk of looking like a paper tiger - someone who spends more time getting certifications than having practical experience. I’m leaving the three associate certs off of my resume. I have enough real world experience on my resume to show that I know the core areas of AWS that they cover.

Consulting companies care about relevant certifications because they can tell their clients that their consultants have them and they need them to keep their “partner” status.

I’ve also been on the other side of the table interviewing candidates. I take most certifications as a slightly negative signal and I definitely don’t think of them as proof of anything. I got my first AWS certification without ever logging into a AWS. I passed the two professional certs and the one associate cert with only nine months of experience with AWS doing small proofs of concepts.

All that to say. I agree completely. Putting it on your resume will only pass you through the HR filter if it is a certification that is required for the company to keep partner status. Any decent hiring manager will ignore them.

I know of quite a few companies that really value the Red Hat certs. Having RHCSA and RHCE as a devops person can really help get you an edge.

Mostly the bigger enterprises are the ones that will care about that. For the most part no startup I've talked to has ever cared.

Having a Certificate basically says you have put time and have knowledge to handle problem/issue when it comes. Interviewers or colleagues may act like that's not big a deal, but actually underlying they know that he knows stuff and you can depend on a certified person.

Does anyone want to comment their thoughts on the course contents/the syllabus for the certification?

1. Crash course on Python.

2. Using Python to interact with the operating system.

3. Introduction to Git and GitHub.

4. Troubleshooting and debugging techniques.

5. Configuration management and the cloud.

6. Automating real world tasks with Python.

To me, this actually seems like a pretty dang good syllabus.

If you don't know these things, this looks like a great crash course. Basically know enough to be dangerous as they say. It'd be great as a primer for any cs degree as well

The only one that I found questionable was item 5, because they specify Puppet, which is a legacy server configuration system that is not particularly great for cloud anything. Ansible or Terraform would make far more sense.

I think it's quite ironic that software developers complain all the time about assessing the skills and experience of job candidates when the whole point of certifications is to establish a specified level of skill and experience in the matter certified.

Many certifications are entry level, but some are not. Many certifications just require you to sit in a room for a few hours and take a simple test, but some certifications are strenuous, in-depth tests that require you to actually study and know the subject tested.

So the certificate here is a participation prize for consuming 120 hours of paid content on Coursera at $50 a month rather than an exam-based certification. Maybe it’s the best Python Automation seminar ever, but it feels like Zynga is trying to take over my career development.

I'm pretty skeptical of any IT cert after having a few really bad experiences with "AWS certified" devs. It doesn't seem to certify competence at all. We had a dev with tons of certs struggle to understand and setup a load balancer.

What's the point of accreditation if there's no actual expectation or understanding of skill?

Anecdote:

A friend of mine told me he just keeps retaking the tests until he passes. For one of his certs, he failed the test 3x. :-/

To pay the institute that issues the accreditation money to make it seem like you as an individual gained some sort of knowledge. These kinds of certs generally seem like a business model for these big companies.

AWS' certifications are entry level

That's a little vague. Cloud Practitioner is entry level, and isn't worth anything. Associate is what I'd expect out of a mid-level infrastructure engineer, though the test is easy enough that I'd want to verify it. And the topic-specific certs are variable (I have the Security one and I wasn't impressed by it, but others look more interesting).

Somebody able to pass the Professional certs, however, I'd be willing to trust somewhat; it's not an easy test and it requires some significant depth of knowledge.

Most employers don't care about your degree (at least in the UK), I doubt many places will care about this.

I am also "Sitecore Certified". Sitecore Certified basically means your company paid for you to sit in a room and complete a training course for a week and do a multiple choice test which can be completed by using the Object Explorer in Visual Studio. Does that make me knowledgeable about Sitecore? Nope not at all.

I'd rather see a website, some scripts on github, talking through a problem rather than a piece of paper saying you completed a course.

> I'd rather see a website, some scripts on github, talking through a problem rather than a piece of paper saying you completed a course.

This is something that is feasible for someone who completes this course. If the job descriptions specifies that a github portfolio is preferable, then I would simply omit mention of the certification (it's free, so no big deal) and link to the profile instead.

> Among the many people who’ve enrolled in the IT certificate, 60 percent identify as female, Black, Latino, or veteran—backgrounds that have historically been underrepresented in the tech industry.

I’m probably just cynical but this seems like it’s just Google trying to pat themselves on the back for “improving diversity”.

I’m curious how many of these IT professionals Google actually hires.

Grow with Google but still not good enough to get into Google.

If Google really wants to improve diversity, how about changing the interview process so it’s not biased towards Ivy League grads. Most people of color aren’t there.

This is also on HN's front page.

https://tomaytotomato.com/certs-waste-of-time/

Interesting juxtaposition.

I wish CompTIA's A+ cert would get fixed. I know of a guy that has his A+, works as a computer repair tech, and doesn't know that you can plug a speaker into most motherboards to get POST Beep diagnostic codes, or how to watch a drive activity light to see if the system is indeed posting/loading and you might have an issue like a bad GPU if you get no display but still have a single "GOOD" POST beep.

I don’t have any computer repair certifications, but I wish I knew more of that sort of thing myself.

Pick up an online copy of your/a motherboard manual. Usually not that long or wordy but describes all of these features it has and has pictures/diagrams for the connectors.

Actually, you'd be surprised. Every mobo I've dealt with recently doesn't include POST beep diag code listings. Not ASRock, not ASUS, not Gigabyte, not MSi.

At least the motherboards tend to have screen printing that tells you which header pins works for switches/LEDs without the need for the manual.

https://xkcd.com/927/

Not sure this applies here. This certificate isn't mean to be a one-size-fits-all, it's just to affirm that the holder knows Python and Git.

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