Overall, most certifications appear to have little influence on compensation. The top two ranked certifications in terms of influence were CIS IT Service Management and Certified Application Developer at 8th and 19th respectively. The ranking of certifications took into consideration both the influence of having the certification and the influence of not having the certification. For the two aforementioned certifications, the difference odds of being compensated above median value compared to one’s peers increased by about 13 percentage points. It is interesting to note that these are also the second and third most popular certifications. The popularity of the ITSM and CAS certifications appears to place them in the perfect position of relevance: rare enough to be of value but popular enough to be considered attainable by employers. The vast majority of certifications, however, have very low rankings with many appearing at the lowest importance ranks.
While some certifications do appear to have a strong individual importance such as CIS Vendor Management and CIS Cloud Management, their popularity limits the influence on the population as a whole. It is difficult to tell whether the individual influence trend on these certifications would continue if their popularity increased. Certainly, there is at least a level of saturation which when reached, such as the Certified System Administrator certification, where the value is reduced.
This should not be taken to mean that there is no value in most ServiceNow certifications. It is still possible, in fact probable, that certifications act as gatekeepers into specific peer groups. In a scenario where everyone in your peer group completed the same certifications, certifications would be expected to have a low influence on compensation.
Trade or Vocational Degree or Certificate or equivalent
0.00%
50.00%
50.00%
Associates Degree or Certificate or equivalent
20.00%
30.00%
50.00%
Bachelor’s Degree or equivalent
39.23%
21.54%
39.23%
Master’s Degree or equivalent
42.37%
16.95%
40.68%
Prefer not to disclose
33.33%
33.33%
33.33%
Highest level of education completed is ranked 28th out of 92 features in terms of importance in predicting compensation. The calculation method was also biased in favor of features like Education Level with multiple values. It is likely that the importance is actually lower than indicated, despite it already having relatively low importance.
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