In fact, if money is limited (less than $ 50,000 USD) then you can’t get in top universities’ admission (e.g. carnegi mellon univ. Pitsburge, Pennsylvania, US), so then, you can’t get highest salary than those indians in the market today who don’t have any degrees even.
$ 50,000 USD needs 5 years for me to gather, excluding & considering my personal life’s expenses.

I decided to gather the following within 5 years from now and within less than $ 30,000 USD. as follow:

1) Security+ certification. $ 2,000 USD
2) ISO 27001 Implementer and Auditor. $ 4,000 USD
3) BS 25999 certification. $ 2,000 USD
4) Firewall, SIEM, AntiVirus, VulnerAudit, & Sec. Web certifications. $ 5,000 USD
5) CISSP. $ 4,000 USD
6) PMP. $ 3,000 USD
7) CISM. $ 3,000 USD
8) LPT & CEH. $ 5,000 USD
9) CISA. $ 3,000 USD

I hope this article is beneficial to all of us and to our friends and families.

I wish you a great career.

Sincerely,
DMQ

There are two directions to go in technology either deeply technical or broad understanding. Both directions have value.

The advantage of a degree is you can take it anywhere and it will last a lifetime. A certification is only good for a limited period of time. My BS and MBA are still good 20 years after I got them. My original certifications I don’t even put on my resume any longer.

In the future there will be a glut of IT people on the market. Those with certifications will always lose out to those with degrees.

Speaking of a degree in Security… why? You are never going to catch up to the top people in Security. The more mature the security field gets, the more difficult it is to remain at the top.

Sometimes technical people pick a focus that is great today, but then over the years everyone is attracted to that focus as well. Suddenly there is a glut of people and the salaries go down.

Better to focus on areas of technology that people are not looking at right now.