However, some IT certifications are more popular than others. The reasons range from the cost to the pay rate associated with it to the difficulty of the program. Here are the top 5 most popular IT training courses.
ITIL Foundation
How popular is the ITIL Foundation certification? Roughly one in eight IT professionals hold it. This is partially because it is an industry standard. It covers the best practices in IT service management, and it is often a necessity if you want to move into management in the IT department. A fair number of those with this certification also have the Project Management Professional certification or PMP.
CompTIA+
The CompTIA certification is held by roughly one in eight IT professionals. Among those who are COMPTIA certified, it is more than two thirds. The COMPTIA A+ certification proves that you are familiar with the installation, maintenance and troubleshooting of both hardware and software. This certification opens the door to employment on the computer help desk or as a field technician. Many then move on to the Security+ certification so they can qualify for better paying jobs in IT security. For example, they don't just install the updates on the server and remove buggy software from your computer, but they identify and resolve malware infections on the device.
CISA
CISA, short for Certified Information Systems Auditor, is held by roughly ten percent of IT professionals. It is the leading cybersecurity certification in the industry. And cybersecurity is such a big deal that just over half of IT staffers have at least one cybersecurity certification. Furthermore, CISA professionals are better paid than average.
CISA is more popular than the CISM or Certified Information Security Manager and CRISC or Certified in Risk and Information Systems Control. Professionals with a CISA certification are likely to be cross-certified with the ITIL Foundation program. A few go ahead to earn the CISSP certification.
CCNA
The CCNA or Cisco Certified Networking Associate credential is specific to Cisco hardware. It replaces the CCNA Routing and Switching certification. However, this certification is almost necessary for network engineers. This is why it is held by about ten percent of IT professionals. Then you're qualified to maintain wired and wireless networks. Earning the CCNA certification gives you a strong foundation in managing Cisco hardware, and it is the launching point for nearly every other Cisco certification.
Business Intelligence
Companies are collecting a massive amount of information, but we have far fewer tools or knowledgeable experts to make use of it. This is why business intelligence is a rapidly growing field.
Microsoft Power BI is a training program that teaches you how to use a variety of tools and industry best practices to create useful visualizations of data or draw insight from the information that's being collected. You can use a mixture of dashboards and reports, setting things up so that management knows the state of operations at a glance.
This certification is unique on our list for being equally valuable to business professionals as IT professionals. Mastering business intelligence could allow you to work in consulting, operations management, data analysis or marketing.