At 3:53 PM +0000 6/26/03, douglas mizell wrote: >Jeez, > > That is ridiculous, the program is run by Cisco, a private >corporation. It is not a government entity and requiring those types of >prerequisites makes no sense. How do you quantify experience anyway?
Several ways. In an actual certification context, the Nortel architect level certification requires that you submit five writeups of networks you have implemented, followed by an open-book design exercise that has realistic, not speed-typist, requirements. All of these writeups are graded by a board of human experts, which obviously limits the scalability of the program. The idea of presenting case studies is one of the methods used by medical specialty boards. Admittedly, they have the advantage of being able to approve residencies (or equivalents for nonphysicians), and require successful completion of an appropriate program. But for board certification, there are still oral examinations and case presentations. In the pre-1995 days of CCSI certification, there was no exam per se, just a variable period -- often several weeks -- of in-person oral exams, team and observed teaching, and lab exercises, that still just got you a provisional certification. Your full certification came after several months of satisfactory class evaluations. Interestingly, the old CCSI program was extremely flexible. I remember several occasions where it turned out I was the expert in residence (e.g., on OSI addressing) on a particular topic, and an ad-hoc workshop was set up, both to evaluate my presentation but also pick my brain. The CCIE program was introduced in mid-1993, so it's newer than CCSI. Sometime in 1995, the CCSI format changed to something more scalable, involving passing a written and coming to Cisco for two days of "charm school" and observed teaching. In the pre-1995 CCSI, there was rarely more than one or two people being evaluated, so you could have multiple proctors evaluating at the same time. >What >about a guy who has fifteen years in the industry, gets his CCIE but has >worked on the same technology, same network etc for years, he is not working >with new technology so has no real experience with it either. Returning to your original point, I have much less concern with "years of experience" than the ability to perform in the real world and explain what you did. I recognize this may be more difficult when the emphasis is configuration and troubleshooting, but it's still do-able: give writeups of how you solved particular and challenging problems. The ability to describe and document a troubleshooting approach is extremely valuable -- it speaks directly to things that you would do as a senior staffer and presumably mentor. I have some questions that I use in interviewing people where I tell them I really don't expect them to have the exact answer (although I'd be pleased if they did), but I'm looking for them to be able to make me understand how they approach the problem. One of the first five CCIEs uses a related strategy. He'll interview by giving you symptoms and asking what your next steps would be, with his giving you results. A favorite question is based on a two-router, two-serial line production environment where the routers were moved during the night, and the people doing the move accidentally switched the serial cables to the wrong routers. In the example, all the routers were running IGRP, so it wasn't that you didn't get some meaningful protocol activity -- but lots of very weird things as well. >A "labrat" as >you call it has taken the time to explore the new stuff and will at least >have an idea how to work with it in a production environment. There are two >side to this arguement but I think there are a few who seem to be angry that >a motivated individual is able to study and pull off something that they >believe is reserved for only experienced engineers. It would not be in >Cisco's best interest to load the CCIE with unnecessary baggage. The fact is >that if you can pass the test you are probably an above average guy >technically and have the potential to learn and master just about anything >that could reasonably be expected of a network engineer. > >Regards, >Douglas Mizell >CCNP/CCDP Message Posted at: http://www.groupstudy.com/form/read.php?f=7&i=71463&t=71143 -------------------------------------------------- FAQ, list archives, and subscription info: http://www.groupstudy.com/list/cisco.html Report misconduct and Nondisclosure violations to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
