Would you cheat to get 'certified'?

Sadly, too many do!

There appear to be a number of people willing to:

- memorize certification test answers - post certification test questions and answers on the web for others to use - charge clients for their time while posing as a certified developer/implementor/etc. without actually knowing the material they are supposed to know - taking digital photos of certification tests and posting these online

Don't believe me? Check out this story on SD Times.

Years ago, I busted an employee who was charging our firm for time spent studying courses even though he really didn't. What he did was copy answers from one employee's test and pass these off as his own. Amazingly, he didn't see what he did was wrong.

I did.

I told him that he committed FRAUD. He did so on two accounts. First, he was paid for time to study this material even though he did none of the work. Second, he was passing himself as knowledgeable in these subjects to clients and project team members and yet he didn't know any of this material. Clients were disappointed and financially poorer. Our firm was embarassed and poorer, too.

I fired him that day.

There is no excuse for such behavior. It says that employee is a short-term thinker who doesn't understand the long-term implications of their behavior. It also says that this person will put their immediate financial rewards ahead of their future, the company's future and the company's reputation.

I also went looking for those who enabled this cheating. Their participation in this fraudulent activity didn't speak well of them either. HR got to deal with them.

Does certification mean anything? It probably does for most certificate holders but employers and firms utilizing them should create their own tests just to be sure.

I support certification programs. I don't support cheating.