Amen, sundialvcs. I do the same thing with folks I hire. I'll take "I don't know this particular thing, but I'd start to work the problem like this...." as a VERY acceptable answer, over someone who "is having many certs", who parrots back a textbook-answer, but can't answer the NEXT thing in the chain to look at.

At a client's place of business this afternoon, I saw this very memorable quote:

I must say that this quote really stuck with me, because to me it truly emphasizes what is (to me ...) most important in I.T.:
IMHO, our present culture of "certifications, etcetera" runs directly counter to what I consider to be the actual reality of our profession. It inculcates in the minds of up-and-coming candidates that "you will be rated, and therefore you must rate yourself, by 'what you presently know.'" While I have no doubt that this mentality has sold millions of dollars' worth of 'certifications,' I suspect that the purchasers of most of those credentials today rightly feel short-changed.

In reality, anyone in the I.T. business will regularly be confronted by "something that they do not (yet ...) know." Although the temptation that is presented (and, usually seized) by the neophyte is to pretend, the experienced soul instead uses "the fifteen-minute rule." ("If you can't find the answer in fifteen minutes or less, ask.")

And, quite frankly (IMHO), we don't presently teach that. In our interviews, we maybe don't look for that (enough). Of course we expect to find candidates who possess a level of technical experience commensurate with that of the rest of our teams, but we also need to be looking for ... well ... a certain sense of humility to go along with the pride. Because the challenge of I.T. is far too big and far too complicated to be tackled by "one single super-star," no matter how much that super-star might know. It is, instead, teamwork ... and "slogging teamwork" at that.

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