Training or Experience?

I’ve been writing a series of articles on industry certification programs and it once again has brought up the question of career assets.

With so many people pursuing certifications, what drives it? Are they trying to change careers? Are they trying to get a new or replacement job? Is their employer requiring it? Great questions, but from what I can tell, a strong resume and a vibrant personal network are more important.

Training, education, and industry certifications are of great value, but their value declines rapidly, some say at 20% per year. That would mean that 5 years out of school, or five years after passing a certification test, unless refreshed, those credentials don’t mean so much.

So what drives long term professional value? I suspect it’s two things. First, a string of successes or strong performances documented on a resume.

Secondly, it’s who you know. As I watch Harvard and MIT alumni move through the Boston technology scene, it’s their personal network and tenacity combined with the credential of their degree that seems of most value, not the education per say.

Education or Who You Know?

So the strongest thing you may get from the certification is additions to your network. The best long-term value of your education may be the network you develop. Those 1000 names in Outlook may be your biggest asset.

There are new tools that help tie those names together. They are called social networking tools. What they deliver is meaningful automation of your personal network. There are many available; you’ll find me on Spoke and on LinkedIn. Both have tens of thousands of members, and can help you leverage your network. I prefer LinkedIn as it focuses on stronger connections, but Spoke casts a wider net. According to LinkedIn stats, I have access to 52,000 people including 36,000 deal makers. Realistically, it’s not that big, but these tools show incredible potential.

Building Project Networks

Now let’s apply that technology to a large project team. Not from the personal network vantage point, but with the idea in mind of building a network of internal and external technology and project resources, all linked up and searchable. My projection: this will become common in larger companies but will be the cornerstone of the part-time and contract workforce. Many businesses tried this with custom or marginally capable software, but new companies such as LinkedIn have built applications that meet the need.

IBM calls this their ‘Blue Pages’ application; their expertise locator. For little to no platform investment, you can use LinkedIn or Spoke to build that similar application for your project teams.

And lastly, as this is the decade of privacy, these folks have figured out how to hide your contacts so anyone wanting to reach one of your contacts has to go through you. You are the gatekeeper.

Take a look at this technology; with it you can build your project team faster while connecting to a better selection of resources.

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