Whether you’re looking to learn a new skill, bolstering your resume a bit to help you stand out in a competitive job market, or trying to pivot into an entirely new profession, certificate courses are excellent tools people drastically undervalue. The best part is that a lot of these certificates can be had for the low, low price of Free.
Google Digital Garage
Digital marketing is an interesting field to be in right now because it’s changing every day. For digital marketers, Google is the authority to pay attention to. This series of free tutorials, workshops, and classes from Google ensures that you’re up to date with everything in their online marketing suite and beyond, and teaches participants everything from lead generation and email marketing campaigns, to “mobile friendly” web protocol, building a web presence, putting together ad campaigns, and more. When you complete all the classes, you get a sharable certificate to include on places like your resume, LinkedIn, etc. Link
Medical Terminology Certification
The American Association of Medical Assistants is an exceptionally prestigious organization, and in a workforce clogged to bursting with competition, young practitioners, assistants, and RNs need to do everything they can to stand out from the crowd. The Medical Terminology Certification from the AAMA is an excellent resource made available on their website and is completely free to take. It’s a simple technical test to help gauge one’s knowledge of medical terminology. Keep in mind that it’s not to be used as a substitute for the AAMA CMA Exam, but looks good on a resume all the same. Link
OSHA Certifications
OSHA is short for Occupational Safety and Health Administration, and if you work in production in the private sector or pretty much anywhere something dangerous can happen, you’re very familiar with the name. OSHA offers 27 free courses in various workplace groups, including Career Training, Environmental Health and Safety, Food and Beverage Program, HR, Ethics & Compliance, and several other categories. While it won’t necessarily lead you to more money in the workplace right off the bat, it will get you bonus points in an OSHA-compliant workplace (which is pretty much everywhere). Link
CPR and First Aid Courses
CPR and first aid certificates are excellent and everyone—yes, everyone—should obtain them. Aside from being great additions to your resume, they demonstrate to employers that you care about taking initiative and demonstrate a desire for personal accountability that other candidates may not have. You probably won’t be able to leverage a higher pay rate because of them, but they look good in any industry. Link
Active Listening Certificate
The ability to listen is an invaluable skill inside and outside of the workplace, and active listening is particularly useful—especially in the hospitality and service industries. Seven Cups of Tea is a well-known mental health app that allows people to talk about how they’re feeling with professional listeners in real-time. Active Listeners aren’t technical clinical professionals and aren’t allowed to give advice, but in a workplace setting, listening is everything. If you’re in Human Resources, any kind of training in active listening and non-invasive behavioral therapy can be a valuable addition to your resume. Link
Psychology First Aid
The National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN) offers over 300 free Child Education certificates for adults, and the Psychology First Aid cert is excellent for aspiring teachers, caregivers, nannies, au pairs, etc. It looks good for anyone trying to do anything that involves working with children or adolescents, or is involved in the fields of psychology or behavioral therapy. Link
FEMA Training
Any kind of training or certification from FEMA—the Federal Emergency Management Agency—looks excellent on a resume because it demonstrates that you’ve taken time and effort to study preparedness in the face of disaster, and that you’re ready for anything. There are over 195 active courses you can take in order to learn about what to do when everything goes wrong. Plus, it looks great to employers because it demonstrates that you understand basic command structure and how to handle emergency situations. Additionally, you may or may not be able to transfer them to college credits, depending on your college/university. Link
Google Analytics Certification
The Google Analytics Certificate is also another priceless free offering from Google that helps employees gain a leg up in a very crowded job market. The course, different from Google’s Digital Garage, is more specifically centered around their Digital Advertising platforms, and can help people obtain specialization certifications in things like Search Advertising, Mobile Advertising, Video Advertising, Display Advertising, and Shopping Advertising, and will show you how to do it all, from start to finish. Whether you’re an entrepreneur looking to make your way into the ecommerce game, or you’re in-house at an agency and you want to make the best impression you can, this is an excellent free tool that’ll make your resume shine. Link
