Are Credentials Important?

Are credentials not important anymore?  I recently was doing some research for a presentation and came across an article that made some interesting points.  As I have learned to do with articles I find online I probed further to find the background of the person writing the article.  It seems her only credentials were that she had written other articles.  Not to belittle the research that a writer does, but do we no longer care if someone is educated on a particular topic? 

While I have been interested in essential oils and what they will/can do for people; when I started to recommend them professionally and sell them in our retail store, I took some courses and got certified in Aromatherapy.  Just a certificate, but I did the work. 

When I decided I wanted to help people who were having emotional issues related to their handling of money and vice versa, I took some courses and got certified as a Credit Counselor.  That way, I felt more comfortable in combining my mental health/substance abuse counseling with budgeting and looking at what my client’s relationship with money has been. 

Since I have begun working as an Employee Assistance Professional, I have taken webinars, gone to conferences and begun the process of becoming a Certified Employee Assistance Professional.  My mental health/substance abuse licenses would have sufficed, but if this is what I will be doing full-time, I want to be well-armed with knowledge. 

If I write, advise, suggest something from my “hobby” world, i.e. cooking, making jewelry, growing herbs, I make the disclaimer that I do that as a hobby.  Anything else I write about, present about, I make sure I have proper education, knowledge, license, certification to do so.  But that’s just me.  If you want to get your information from someone who sells the product, wrote an article, without doing their homework, that’s up to you.