A Case for Foundational Learning

Somewhere along the way in our careers, foundational certifications can start to feel optional, or at the very least, less relevant.

I want to make a case for the opposite.

Foundational learning doesn’t prepare the learner with all of the skills that are needed in a role, and it doesn’t replace experience. What it does do is expand and challenge our way of thinking.

How to capture a problem.
How to reason in ambiguity.
How to think about thinking, about problems.

As security engineers progress into advanced roles, refreshing foundational knowledge can quietly hit the backlog. The work is no longer about configuring individual services in isolation, but about complex, interdependent systems under pressure. Work that includes considering real-world tradeoffs and systems that don’t fail neatly.

That’s exactly when foundations matter most.

Foundational certifications give us mental models. They help us understand several why's behind why something broke, not just that it broke. They anchor us when we’re deep in abstraction and complexity.

Take CompTIA A+, for example. One of the recurring themes in the material is a simple question:

“What should I do next?”

At face value, it’s obvious. In practice, it is more difficult. When sitting in a spiderweb of partial information and competing priorities, the question What should I do next? encourages you to pause and assess.

That same mindset shows up in ITIL 4 with the principle “Start where you are.”

Both phrases point to the same idea: progress doesn’t require perfection. It requires clarity about your current state and honesty with yourself and the organization on where you are today.

Starting where you are means using the tools, data, and constraints you already have—right now—rather than waiting for an ideal future state. In real-world environments, this approach can save hundreds of work hours.

Instead of designing the perfect solution upfront, you design the next best realistic solution. Then you iterate. And iterate again. Over time, you get closer to the ideal. Not by freezing in planning, but by moving forward intentionally.

Foundational certifications aren’t about memorizing facts you’ll never use again. They’re about reinforcing ways of thinking that scale with you as your career grows.

We don’t outgrow foundations; we build on them, we repair them, and we build on them again.