05 Jan 2010

I’m Skeptical About Salary Surveys and Certifications

by Josh

This link crossed my Twitterstream the other day:

Top 15 Highest Paying Certifications in the Technology Industry

Looking for the source document I found it here.  Many of my comments come from page 9 in the PDF.

I want to throw a few comments out and see what you think.  Leave a reply below.

  • This data is 2 years old based on the protocol info given on page 12.  Why is it making rounds on blogs now? As bloggers we make mistakes (I make my share) but come on, let’s do a little research before regurgitating it!
  • Average salaries for PMP and CAPM are nearly equal?  Wha? Is it just me, or does this completely run counter to the demographics and requirements of these two certifications?
  • The posts out there are touting the table on page 9 of the PDF without much context, furthering the impression that “If I get xxx certification I’ll have a good chance at landing the average salary on this table!” – Sorry but this is wrong! Even if the data is accurate, note that professionals who have been managing projects for decades go back and get a certification.  This can artificially shift the average up.  In other words, this can only demonstrate correlation, not a causal link.  If you read the PDF it shows this clearly on page 10 with the statistic that:

“In our survey, more than half of respondents stated that certification has had no impact at all on their salary.”

Remember too that this is self-report data.  I’d be much happier with company-provided anonymous salary data along with job role/class, tenure with the company, years of experience, formal education, etc.  THEN you could control for other variables (tenure, experience, education, gender [unfortunately we haven't eliminated gender bias across the board yet, so this has to be controlled for], etc.) and try to isolate a more distinct relationship between certification and salary.

I like certifications in general.  That’s not the point of my rant here.

I just don’t want anyone to get the impression that a certification of any kind is going to double their salary.

If you go for a certification, do it for the right reasons.  You can see how and why I passed the PMP exam if you like.

pmStudent e-Learning
  • Like all great surveys of this type - and even some that have appeared here.

    Where's the baseline or control group? What's the average salary in the classification without a certification? What the standard deviation for that group. Is the PMP for example within 1 standard deviation? If so, then the number is pretty much WORTHLESS.

    Like all market surveys, be it Standish or a simple minded sample for students learning something in the classroom, the absence of a statistical significance assessment means several things:

    1. The person creating the survey was not paying attention in the high school statistics class and has failed to grasp the notion of statistical significance.

    2. They're trying to sell you something.

    The book How To Lie With Statistics, Darrell Huff, W. W. Norton (I own the 1954 edition) is a good place to start.

    My favorite quote from the inside cover is:

    "Statistical thinking will one day be as necessary for efficient citizenship as the ability to read and write," - H. G. Wells

    I guess not
  • Location and industry make a huge difference to salary expectations. This survey is an IT industry survey. While it includes a breakdown of where those IT professionals work, they are still IT people, so we could assume that the PMPs amongst them manage technology projects. They aren't managing construction sites or business change initiatives, or groups of oil engineers. Equally, location is important, with some cities attracting a weighting because of the high cost of living. Dissecting the data gives you a much better picture of the reality but it doesn't make for as good headlines!
  • Thanks for the comment Elizabeth, great points!
  • Hi,

    I found the recent survey for 2009 here, http://images.globalknowledge.com/wwwimages/pdf...

    It appears the CAPM is removed as a popular certification. Interesting that even in this survey the PMP salary high. However if you correlate it to people who have the role of project manager, the salary is lower even within the population who took the survey.

    I agree with you a market adjusted survey has a higher rate of accuracy for your role and location. Additionally, certification just relays you know of the tools and techniques. Using them productively in applicable situations is were experience comes into play.

    Thanks for sharing!
    Elyse
  • Thanks for locating the more recent survey Elyse! I'll take a look at it shortly.

    Great points too about the role being played in an organization and the actual use of concepts to create business value.
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