How do you land that dream job? One way, get a cloud certification!

In this article, we are going to cover a few reasons why I believe every developer should get a cloud certification.

Alright, let’s get into it 🔥.

When you learn anything it takes time, energy, and focus. During the process of learning something new, you gain knowledge which makes you more marketable. When you become more marketable you are given more opportunity to grow.

Cloud computing is something we often write about at Serverless Guru. It’s a revolution which is still in full effect and has already changed most of the software industry since AWS (Amazon Web Services) was launched back in March of 2006.

Now there are a handful of competitors to AWS including Google, Microsoft, and IBM. Which are all competing to win over companies by offering services which reduce cost, optimize workloads, increase developer efficiency, make better products, and everything else in between.

It’s now 2019 and cloud computing has been accelerating exponentially. Off the back of that exponential growth, we have seen a tsunami of innovation. One of those innovations has been something called, serverless. Serverless has many meanings and depending on what the cloud vendor is selling they may label it differently. However, the end result is the same. Serverless allows you to focus on your product and the benefits are astronomical. Astronomical is a strong word and maybe you’re doubtful now, but I encourage everyone reading to learn more about serverless as it’s the embodiment of doing more with less.

At Serverless Guru, we write extensively on the topic of serverless and all things cloud computing. Why do we write so much? Because there is so much to say. Here are a couple of benefits, when you utilize serverless and all things cloud computing:

• Higher levels of automation with IAC (Infrastructure as Code)
• Lower operational overhead with fully managed services
• Faster innovation due to shorter feedback loops and rapid prototyping
• Lower costs with per-second billing

These are some of the things that you can take advantage of when you understand how to effectively leverage the cloud and the core reason that Serverless Guru exists as a serverless consulting company. We actually take it to the extreme and try to focus entirely on serverless whenever possible because in our belief serverless will define the next decade in the software industry.

The software industry has been shifting from virtual machines to containers over the past few years. Docker and Kubernetes are some of those buzzwords which you’ve probably heard recently. However, the tides are shifting. Under the hood, the virtual machine and container still exist. But we are starting to care less and less.

Here is a simplified example, when you buy a car you don’t need to know every detail of the manufacturing process. There is a shared responsibility between the car manufacturer who has built the car and the car buyer who will be driving the car. Meaning we can leverage the millions of engineering hours that went into designing and building the modern car without knowing anything more than how to press a couple of pedals and turn a key.

This should be how the software industry operates as well and to be fair it’s already possible, but most companies are still trying to be both the car manufacturer and the driver. Meaning every day thousands of companies are trying to build cars from scratch and fix their old broken cars instead of using a car that has already been built, optimized, and even comes with a mechanic! That is what the cloud offers. That is why you should get a cloud certification.

Companies need you to fix their problems. They need you to help them focus on what truly matters and eliminate the things that don’t. If you are already a developer then I would encourage you even more to get a cloud certification. In my view, knowing how to write code is not the only technical thing that makes a good developer in 2019 and beyond.

To be an effective developer over the next decade you need to couple that programming experience with an understanding and ability to leverage cloud computing. And if you move now or better jump all the way to learning serverless, you will make yourself more attractive to employers, command a higher salary, and will be given more opportunity to grow because you will understand what other developers don’t and that will make you highly sought after.