Last week I passed the Platform App Builder exam, my second Salesforce certification. My primary area of focus is coding but in my current role I’m also doing a lot of declarative development. So, I thought this would be a good time to prep for the App Builder certification.
I used the Focus on Force practice exams again and they were very helpful again. They do a good job of shining a light on the areas where I need to study more.
Next up for me is the Platform Developer II certification, but not now. I’ve been putting off a side project while I study and prep for the exam. I plan to start prepping for the PD2 exam after I finish the side project.
What is the value of certifications?
I know this question has been asked a lot. My recent experience screening Salesforce developers has had me asking it again. My team recently had some open positions and I am one of the two developers who does our tech interviews.
Over a four month period I screened approximately 50 candidates who were interviewing for mid and senior Salesforce developer roles. Some held developer certifications and some didn’t. The bottom line is I did not see any correlation between certifications and technical knowledge.
There were a few jaw-dropping moments as well. Two candidates who both held App Builder, Platform Developer I and Platform Developer II certifications couldn’t answer basic questions about object relationships. One claimed he missed the questions because we were using non-standard terminology. The non-standard terms? Look-up relationship and master-detail relationship.
Obviously, these were outliers and also a failure on the part of the recruiters who were supposed to be doing some basic screening and credential validation. Still, it was an eye opener!
Two perspectives
From the perspective of someone who will be interviewing for a job again some day, I will continue to work on certifications at least until I finish Platform Developer II. At that time I’ll decide if I want to work on any of the architecture certifications. According to the industry surveys like the Mason Frank survey, certifications do matter. Not as much as experience, but enough that I think they are worth the effort and expense.
From the perspective of someone interviewing candidates, my opinion is split. I think it can demonstrate that someone takes their career seriously enough to put in the time, effort and money to prepare for and pass the exams. On the other hand it seemed like some recruiters rely too much on certifications to vet candidates. This resulted in a lot of interviews with certified but unqualified candidates.
I’d love to hear your experiences screening Salesforce developers and what value you find in certifications.
Stay safe
As I write this the corona virus pandemic has most of us confined to our houses. The virus is scary and so is the economic damage that is being done. Lots of jobs are being lost and we may find ourselves in a very different job market than the last time we had to look. I hope you all stay safe and healthy and get through this with as little disruption to your lives and livelihoods as possible.