I've been blessed to work at Eyeris with some of the very best people in the world. Surprisingly, many of our most impactful team members over the years have not had what you would consider traditionally a good "pedigree." Equally suprisingly, many of the platinum-pedigreed hires have failed to make remarkable contributions.
I believe that most companies and workgroups and projects do NOT really have spectacular challenges or expectations. They face fairly normal issues, addressable with a normal degree of success by people of normal skills/practices/approaches. For those applications, it is perfectly reasonable to rely on degrees and training courses and other "certifications" to improve the recruiting odds of finding someone whose actual skill level will meet your needs.
But, if your workgroup is trying to tackle something truely extraordinary, here is my advice: ignore the traditional "certified" path. Look instead for someone whose individuality, self-reliance, novelty, and creativity make it almost certain that they would NEVER EVEN THINK ABOUT trying to get someone to "certify" them. Fishing in this pond, you're far less likely to find someone of average skill, but far more likely to find a guru who'll make the extraordinary happen for your team.
