IT Certifications are often a fact of life in IT. Unfortunately, beyond some of the gifted external Consultants & SMEs I manage or work with, not many of my co-workers frequent the training/IT cert treadmill. I can’t say I blame my them, keeping up certs can be a pain. Even so, I find myself doing at least one or two IT certifications every couple years. I get bored if I am not learning something new and growing. So in figuring out which certs I’m going to tackle next, I thought I would share my very own personal list of the best IT certs you could have in 2013.

I don’t care who you are, if you work in IT and you want to be in demand, secure, and more confident you really could do worse than these certs.

Put another way: obtain any one of these and you won’t have to worry about employment or money. Money certainly isn’t everything, but if you are good and have a few years experience any two of these certs will put you into six figures in short-order.

VCDX — Everything’s virtual in IT. And from the enterprise to the corporate cloud, VMWare is by far the heaviest player here. Many of my friends that have the VCP4 or VCP5 are aiming to go here next, and this single cert is going to go far in the next few years. This is a really good one to get. If you’re in a Hyper-V shop, then the MCTS: Windows Server Virtualization is a good alternative cert.

PMP — This is THE Project Management cert to have for any IT career that involves working on architecture/infrastructure projects. Studying for PMP can be dry, but the 20+ year-old PMBOK isn’t considered THE bible for managing projects for nothing. Learning and understanding the disciplines within the PMBOK is a fantastic place to be. If you want to move from network engineering over to managing the infrastructure projects you’re working, this is a cert you need to get. If you manage software development projects, this is also the go-to cert.

CISSP — If you’re an information security professional, or someone who works projects building secure network architectures, this is a really fantastic cert to have. Also, if you’re looking to get into any government Network Security jobs requiring clearance then you will have to get this cert.

RHCE — This is the Linux cert to get, and is always in demand. Pair this with the CISSP and you can find yourself in position to work as an IT security engineer, Pen Tester, or similar security-related pro.

Cisco CCIE Routing & Switching — Still seems to be the Grand Master of all IT Certs. One of the most difficult and challenging certifications to get, and still one of the certs with the fewest human beings in its ranks, the CCIE R&S is the reigning King. Get this cert and, if you have a few years of experience and know what you are doing, you’ll never be without options.

Bonus —

MCSE (formerly MCITP, and MCSE prior to that — next year it might be MCISE!) — I’m including a classic go-to cert as a bonus 6th. If you manage Windows-based servers and/or an Active Directory, which is the case in just about every company these days, you could do worse than the MCSE. With the MCSE you can most definitely get your “foot in the door” if you are trying to get into the operations side of Enterprise IT, grow past Helpdesk/Tech positions, etc; however, gone are the days where this cert can exist solo on your resume for applying for a high-salary IT gig. Best to augment the MCSE with additional MCTS certs, or the RHCE, if you are wanting to go north of a junior sysadmin job. There are exceptions, such as greybeards who only ever got the MCSE cert but are geniuses, so my advice is aimed at newcomers to IT here.

If you work in IT, which credentials or certifications do you plan to get in 2013? Any I left out?

Originally published at julianwest.me on January 7, 2013.