Waste of Time, Effort, and Money?
In the old days of corporate nonsense, the idea of getting "certified" in something was largely a joke. I think I can safely point the finger at companies like Microsoft and CompTIA who abused the idea of certification as a large scale cash-grab ponzi scheme to extra money from whoever could supply it. Microsoft used to bestow a particular class of partner network "bonus" based on what percentage of the staff had certain Microsoft certifications. Here was the rub: the certifications were horrendously easy. I could try to think about the reasons why, but the most obvious one that comes to mind is the question pools were small and the breadth of material covered in any particular exam were also very small. Also the price point of the exam made it relatively easy to attempt freely (especially when your company was paying). As a concrete example, I distinctly remember deciding to take a particular certification and googling for some practice questions the day before the exam. As I arrived at the test center, I sat in my car for 15 minutes and studied the questions and their answers. I proceeded to enter, sign in, and take a 40-odd question test in 13 minutes instantly receiving a passing mark. The chief reason? Over half the test was in the practice pool, and the rest were minor variations. At this point, I determined that certifications were a huge waste of time, effort, and money.
Along Comes AWS
So then 2013 rolls around, and AWS has been around for 6 or 7 years now, and they start up their own certification program. At the time, I'm interested in cloud computing, and I often bother Aman, Mike, and Larry, the sys admins at Comixology, to learn bits and pieces of what is going on, but I would never pass the test. The following year, Aman and I decide to try and invest some time, effort, and money into preparation. The biggest benefit was acloud.guru (now part of PluralSight) but the practice exams helped too. It also helped that we were now part of Amazon, so we got a 50% discount on exams and we could expense training materials. The Solutions Architect Associate exam was hard. Like no joke, I found myself 2nd guessing and flagging questions for review and racking my brain to remember the innards of one of the covered AWS services. This was not like the Microsoft certifications. I had studied for weeks and still found this exam challenging. Luckily I passed, but now I had the bug.
Moar Tests
A week later, I sat for the SysOps Associate exam, and passed that as well. I didn't feel like a professional, so I rested on those two laurels for 2 years until 2016, when these exams were about to expire (now it's 3 years, thankfully), but you could "recertify" by taking a harder exam, and so I did - taking the Solutions Architect Pro and DevOps Engineer Pro exams one week apart. I passed both and again, breathed a sigh of relief. Note that in the old days, you had to pass an associate level exam to take a professional one, and it would take years but AWS finally did away with that requirement. Just after completing these (and note, at the time, there were only 5 certs to get, and I had 4 of them), in December of 2016 at re:Invent, AWS announced 3 specialty exams - Security, Big Data, and Advanced Networking.
Security, You Say?
By this point I was leaning more and more into the security side of things. I enjoyed that aspect of software development and especially infrastructure development, and had faced more than a few unfortunate hacks over the years. I had left Amazon for Compass, and while the Big Data and Advanced Networking certifications were public by mid-2017, the security exam was still in beta well into 2018 (meaning it was not effective). I decided to try my hand at the beta in March of 2018, but I failed it, by a paltry 14 points. I scored a 736 and needed a 750. That's probably 1 or 2 more questions correct, maximum. Since it was a beta, I got a free voucher to take the test again, and in October, I passed. I also took the opportunity to renew my other professional certifications, as they were coming up for renewal as well, so I had a good set of credentials to show I knew, at least to some degree, what I was talking about when it came to AWS.
What The Hell Is Cloud Practitioner?
In 2017, AWS also started beta testing a Cloud Practitioner exam. If you have more than a few months working in AWS, even a summer internship, you are very likely to pass this exam. The concepts are clear, there aren't a lot of gotchas or trick questions, and ultimately, I think this is mostly for students or recent graduates looking to separate themselves from the pack when applying for jobs. In 2019, I was fortunate enough to be able to work with Adrian Sookchan at the Urban Assembly Gateway School for Technology in Hell's Kitchen. I had done some volunteer work that caught the eye of Samantha Joseph to help high school kids get ready for college and post-graduate technology careers, and with her help, put together a pilot program to get high school students acclimated with AWS, and ideally, pass the Cloud Practioner exam. I'll get a whole writeup on that done one day and link here, but the summary is that I took the test and passed, but hardly any students signed up for it, and of those that did, no one passed.
Pandemic
So the pandemic rolls in and suddenly certs are not top of mind. You couldn't even sit for one if you wanted to, the test centers were closed, and taking it at home was not yet an option. So now we're in 2021, and all my certifications from 2018 are expiring, and I didn't do anything to counteract that. I can't blame the pandemic really, by that point, the test centers were open again and I could have sat, but didn't.
The Mysterious Golden Jacket
Somewhere in 2022, I heard a rumor about a golden jacket that you get when you hold all active certifications possible with AWS. I even saw some pictures on LinkedIn of various folks wearing such a jacket. And, Gary Stafford, our assigned SA at both Peloton and Better, was knocking out certifications at a fantastic clip, and I suddenly, I got the bug again. I wanted that golden jacket. Our Better AM Dan Carini said that no matter what, I'll get this jacket, even if they have to make one custom.
Now Faster, Better
So Alexmil Reyes at Better was already looking to have the company cover a few certification exams for those interested, and I added a handful of requests to the list for myself and my team. Once the paperwork was done, I got to work. First, I dropped the $100 for a new Cloud Practitioner exam. I could have gotten this for $50 by doing the Cloud Quest on AWS Skill Builder, but I instead used that time and effort to collect every digital badge available right now (Serverless, Technologist, Storage Core). I also burned a specialty voucher to take the Security exam, I figured I would have the best chance of passing that right away. Took both tests on the same day in December 2022, and passed both. I was especially proud of the 25 minute time to complete the cloud practitioner exam, although the 95 minutes to do the security exam may be more exceptional.
In January 2023, I took both Solutions Architect and SysOps Associate on the same day, and passed both. I used another voucher and the 50% off coupon that comes with every passed certification test, for a total of $75 for both tests. About 100 minutes for each test, and was pleasantly surprised at the new hands-on lab portion of the SysOps exam. I understand the DevOps exam is also getting that treatment, and so I'm waiting until March when that exam becomes available. In February, I think I will try Databases early in the month, and we'll see if I try Data Analytics later. I had only put in for 5 vouchers for myself (2 associate, 3 pro/specialty), so I will use the last associate on DevOps Associate and the last 2 pro/specialty on some combination of the 2 pros and 5 remaining specialties. This also means I will have to spend $150 (thank you, 50% off coupons) on 5 tests, for a total investment of $925. That's a lot better than the $2950 list price for all the exams, but a mighty expensive golden jacket. I'll update my progress here.
In March 2023, I took the updated Developer Associate exam, and passed. Then in April, I decided to really challenge myself and took BOTH professional certs on the same day, back-to-back. I passed both but I would never suggest anyone, including myself, ever attempt such a thing. What a grueling day. It took until July to finally take Databases, but I passed. A week later, I also passed the Data Analytics exam. These were very similar, so taking both in rapid succession made sense. At the end of August, I took the Advanced Networking exam, and passed. Easily one of the hardest, if not the hardest test up to that point. Today, in early November, I sat for the Machine Learning exam, and passed. I thought I had done much worse, but I got a 786, only receiving a "Needs Improvement" mark in Modeling (which was 36% of the test). While all this testing is happening, AWS went ahead and released a new exam - the Data Engineer Associate exam. I signed up for the beta and will take this exam end of November. That leaves only SAP for December, and I should have all 13 active certs and collect my golden jacket. Will post a photo here once I have it.
I took the Data Engineer Associate Beta and passed. I also took the SAP exam and passed. Then Mike Wakefield (wakemike@) helped me get my Golden Jacket!
AWS has also announced two new exams, both of which will be in Beta in August 2024. I will take those as well, at least once.
But Should I Get Certified?
I would say if:
- you are working in the backend, platform, or security space
- you are between a recent high school and college graduate with under 1 year of professional experience
- you are interested in the cloud infrastructure space