Take the Salary Survey

Many of you reading this already have an IT certification or two (or three, or four). If you have at least one current certification, or know someone who does, then consider today's post a call to arms. We need you. We need your IT certified friend. We need everyone who has an IT certification. More precisely we need information. Not anyone's vital statistics, or their Social Security number, or the password to their bank account. And actually, it's not we or us in the sense of TestOut Continuing Education who are doing the asking. This is the classic case of asking for a friend.

Our friend, or friends, are the good people at Certification Magazine, which you should be reading if you're on any sort of professional path that involves IT certification. It's an excellent career resource. There's a print edition four times a year, and new articles at the website, CertMag.com, four times a week. Certification Magazine covers a variety of topics. At the moment, the website has articles on the front page about virtualization, the Internet of Things, Big Data certification, legacy technology (old computers and software still in circulation), and more.

There's also an invitation to participate in the annual Salary Survey, a massive undertaking that involves thousands of working IT professionals from around the world. Once per year, Certification Magazine does a general survey of all IT certifications to find out how much people with certifications are earning at their jobs. There's a lot of other good information that comes out of the annual survey, and there are smaller surveys conducted throughout the year. Regular readers of the IT Insights Blog will recall that we've referred to past survey data in our thrice-weekly postings more than once.

All of that information comes from real-word IT professionals who are in the tech trenches, taking care of all the IT functions that keep the world turning. Information from anyone who has a certification and works in IT is helpful. There's even a reward for participating in the survey. The survey takes about 20 minutes to complete, and for that small investment of your time, you can get a free one-year subscription to the digital edition of the magazine, or get a one-year print subscription for 40 percent off the regular price of $20.

So take the survey today and help the cause of gathering IT certification data. You'll also be helping yourself, by making Certification Magazine an arrow in the quiver of your IT career toolkit. It's a win-win.