There are way more than 75 IT certifications out there. Like, a ton more. Certification Magazine included more than 900 different IT certifications in its most recent Salary Survey, and that's after considerably shortening the listings for some of the larger and more labyrinthine IT certification programs, like those at IBM and Oracle. There are only so many hours in the data compilation day, however, so the CertMag team drew a red line at 75. The newly released Salary Survey 75 list from the 2020 Salary Survey targets the credentials that appear most frequently in the individual certification portfolios of survey respondents. If a couple of hundred people from the survey pool hold the same cert, then it's probably on the list. If a couple of dozen do, not so much. Cybersecurity credentials typically rise to the top of the list, but cloud identity management provider Okta is the king of the 2020 Salary Survey hill: Its Okta Certified Consultant credential tops the list with an average annual salary among survey respondents of $161,410.
Oracle Certification Reminds You to Keep Kickin' SaaS
Cloud computing maybe hasn't swallowed the IT industry whole, but it often feels that we're headed in that direction. Accordingly, cloud computing certification sometimes struggles to keep pace with the explosive growth of cloud technology itself. A new post last week to the Oracle Certification Blog poses the timely question, "It's a new year. Is it time for you to update your skills?" In particular, blogger Brandye Barrington is focused of the relatively recent release, in September of last year, of the 2019 versions of Oracle's cloud computing certification exams. These new exams replaced the prior batch of cloud certification exams from all way back in ... 2018. Yikes! While it's fairly commonplace in the IT certification realm for credentials to expire after a three-year term, there aren't many that need to be renewed after a single year. Well, OK, there's a bit more breathing room than that: as clarified by Barrington, Oracle's cloud certs are valid for 18 months from the date that you earn the credential. But that still cuts the usual recertification timeline in half.
ISACA Blogger Encourages Good Cybersecurity Hygiene
Speaking, as we have been, of it being a new year and all – for reals, people, 2019 is so eight days ago – cybersecurity analyst and guest blogger Amy Diestler took to the ISACA Now Blog of cybersecurity and governance association ISACA earlier this week to encourage you to set a goal to have better cybersecurity hygiene in 2020. It's been widely (and repeatedly) observed that fallible humans are the weakest link in any cybersecurity scheme, but as Diestler points out, that hasn't stopped many people from continuing to fail to play their part. For example, she writes, most of us fall into the trap (not necessarily fatal in every instance) of using free or public wifi to do stuff online. As Diestler notes in concluding her post, "Human error continues to be the biggest weakness in cybersecurity, but you never know when a New Year's resolution might actually stick."
Books – Eh. Who Needs Them?
A provocative post to the IT and Technical Training blog over at business learning commentator Training Industry asks whether books are still an important educational tool. That is to say, when students or professionals want to learn something new, how often do they use books as a primary component of whatever learning pathway they are on? It turns out that recent data shows that book learning is by no means in danger of fading from sight. Apparently reports of the death of the printed word have been greatly exaggerated. Blogger Jim Zimmerman writes that books often play a role even in situations where another means of learning is given first preference. For example, many people often rely on reading to reinforce what they learn from instructor-led courses. Don't throw away your library card, in other words. Zimmerman rounds out his discussion of the topic by providing advice for people who want to maximize the effectiveness of learning from books, so if you're preparing to study up for a certification exam, or need to brush up skills for some other reason, then it's worth clicking over to read what he has to say.
CompTIA Touts Top-Paying Certs
We'll round out this week's report the way we began it, with a nod to an IT certification salary list-maker. Tech training provider Global Knowledge released its annual IT Skills and Salary Report in the middle of last summer, but here we are at the beginning of, yes, a new year, so the IT Career News blog of tech industry association is going back to the well with a post touting Global Knowledge's top-paying certifications. Two of those top-salaried certs, at least in the United States, are CompTIA credentials: Security+ and Network+. If you missed out on hearing about the IT Skills and Salary Report the first time it was news, then this is good opportunity to catch up with some of the highlights.
That's all for this edition of Certification Watch. Please keep your certification news and tips coming to the GoCertify News Editor.
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