A question I often get is “what certification or knowledge should I pursue to get me a better job?”.
Or variants such as “which cert is going to get me employed?”.
Here is my opinion on it.
Certificates only bring you so far. Most companies aren’t looking for people with knowledge. They are looking for the results that the knowledge brings, such as improved processes, new revenue, etcetera.
Today’s major innovations are in using generative AI.
But the truth is, nobody knows for sure how to use it profitably.
There are no universally good, recognized, AI certificates right now. Sure, there are many AI certifications, but none that stands out as foundational, in my opinion, but I am open to your thoughts.
So what you should be doing to advance your career, is experiment yourself. This is easier than ever. You can take examples from your personal life and automate them.
For example, I am currently traveling a lot, so I decided to create some information workflows around that, but also to do it securely.
I created a free Gmail account that I send travel information to. Then I give n8n (a workflow orchestrator) access to only that account, not my other email accounts. With that, I created a daily workflow that researches good coffee shops close to my destinations and summarizes my upcoming travel in an email to my main account.
No risk, hardly any cost, and a great way to learn.
Beyond this, the hottest development is agentic coding. It can literally be as easy as writing a few lines of text, and you’ll have a fully working application in no time.
The safest and easiest way to get started with that currently is with Claude Code for the web https://code.claude.com/docs/en/claude-code-on-the-web (you will need a paid account).
I tried a variety of workflows earlier, which you can have a look at here: https://digitalinfrastructures.nl/posts/claude-flow-parallamr/
An explanation of big mistakes to make is here: https://digitalinfrastructures.nl/posts/monkey-coding/
Back to the question: if you want to advance your career, you may want to spend your time experimenting with technology that brings value, and learn to understand what the pitfalls are. Discuss that with people who share some understanding of the business you are in.
Right now, I think that beats certifications.
Let me know your thoughts, I am thinking of better ways to support you in this. For example, you might want to discuss what experiments to do yourself.