The value of professional certifications for a global IT consulting corporation

Professional certifications recognize practitioners for their knowledge, skills, behaviors and attitude specific to a profession, a function or a job activity (Benson, 1991 p.238; Graber & Rothwell, 2008 p.240). Enterprises are increasingly adopting professional certifications to structure, recognize and efficiently communicate the competencies of their employees to their internal and external stakeholders (Barckdale & Lund, 1998; Fertig et al., 2009; Robertson, 1999). Ultimately, through certifying their employees, corporations expect better individual and organizational performance (Fertig et al., 2009; Hale 2000). This qualitative study examines the existing literature on professional certifications, it defines a theoretical framework around the implementation of professional certifications within corporations, and finally, it researches, within the context of an IT consulting firm, the conditions under which they seem the most appropriate, and identifies the situations where gains on business performance can be obtained. The research paper demonstrates that the use of internal or external professional certifications is situational, where the organizational driver for implementing a certification is the prime element that helps determine the type of certification to employ and the implementation approach to select. The study also shows that internal professional certifications are primarily implemented for the purposes of productivity, organizational capability development, and company-specific capability requirements. External professional certifications are primarily implemented for the purposes of market recognition, to meet the mandated requirements of clients, and for strengthening partner relationships. Ultimately, for specific business situations, hybrid models of professional certifications are introduced as a way to benefit from both worlds, while optimizing organizational performance gains. Additional recommendations for ITCorp have also been identified. This study contributes to the literature with a conceptual framework which can be further used in other research projects to analyze the individual and organizational impacts of professional certifications. Additionally, new findings, which have not been documented before in the academic literature, may be applicable to other corporations or industries