Friday, October 6, 2006

Thoughts on Certification

 I got an email asking a question about certification that I thought others might find interesting.

Hello,

I'm new to the QA arena, and haven't found a mentor yet, beyond the publications of those like yourselves. So far, I don't see that there is one internationally accepted certification for QA in general. I know there is the CSTE http://www.softwarecertifications.org/, and the ISTQB http://www.sqe.com/certification.asp?f=dis&ci=stf , which at least one of you worked on. My perception is that CSTE is a bit more accepted (when I search dice.com for both acronyms, I get a few more for CSTE, but still not many), but otherwise it's certification specific to tools like WinRunner or languages.


I have found also that CompTIA ( www.comptia.org) suggests these:

CompTIA A+
CompTIA e-Biz+
CompTIA i-Net+
CompTIA Server+
Certiport's Internet & Computing Core Certification - IC³

But no one else inside QA seems to have heard of them. Are they helpful, or is CompTIA just trying to earn money? Are there general certs that help QA?

Thanks for any insight you can offer! Keep up the great QA work!

and my response...