At 4:56 AM +0000 6/28/03, Carroll Kong wrote: > >I liked Howard's idea, however, yes it is not scalable, but would >improve the quality. My other post suggested, Cisco has not shown >any real attempt to make it that much harder, they do want more CCIEs >out there. If that is what they want, nothing we do will really stop >that.
> >Not true. I do not believe that causality will occur. From what I >have seen bright individuals are usually exploited quite well. Also, >remember, upper management and HR do NOT have the ability to detect >the precocious engineer which I will now call as Doogie Howser, which >further leads to exploitation. I'm not quite sure where this is going to go, but as you may know, I've worked pretty extensively in medicine, have developed expert systems for diagnosis, etc. When you mentioned Doogie Howser, you gave me several flashbacks to some very bright young interns that don't necessarily have the practical experience. Now, one of the hits I took from the economy is losing my COBRA insurance. I have some miscellaneous coverage, but I have to be much more careful about medical expense. About two weeks ago, I tripped in my living room and landed on my knee, bruising it badly. After I stopped screaming, I am satisfied that I did an adequate physical examination to say safely nothing tore or broke. It's staying painful, and my lower leg has been swollen more than I like, as well as bruises turning more reddish. A pure layman might think that was just an unusual color, but someone trained should recognize that as a potential infection. Now, Doogie would probably start by ordering a complete blood count to decide, on the spot, if there is an infection, since the physical exam is equivocal. While I could do the blood count if I had the equipment, I don't. Instead, I reach back to what probably isn't in any textbook, but I learned from watching good clinicians. The complex diagnostic instrument I'm using is a ball-point pen. I outline the red area each night and compare to see if there is significant spreading (also checking for other warning signs that would be immediate red flags). If I see spread beyond a certain level, I'd call one of a couple of physicians I know well, and say "It's looking as if I have mild cellulitis of the lower left extremity. Do you mind phoning in a prescription for an appropriate antibiotic, presumably a second-generation cephalosporin?" I'd probably get the prescription, because that doctor knows I have the experience to know I've done what he would have done. In any event, I'll be seeing people at NIH on Tuesday, as part of a research trial, so I'll get a doublecheck. An experienced physician does history and physical much differently from a beginner. The beginnner will probably start by spending equal time on each body system, where part of experience is knowing how to identify *cough* the appropriate OSI layer and then to hone in on the details. > >Also, I am not saying the knowledge itself is so difficult, in fact, >I am saying it is pretty silly how "sacred" we consider some of this >"covetted" so hard to get knowledge. So, there are a lot of Doogie >Howsers out there. At least in medicine, it's not so much that the knowledge is sacred as it takes practice, and watching experts do things the way they do. One of the challenges of medical (and network diagnostic) expert system development is realizing that the expert took what seemed a non-obvious turn, and asking them why they did that. The really good teachers can tell you. On another thread, I'm trying to mentor as a good medical school professor would -- not answer questions directly, but help someone integrate their existing knowledge. If someone asked me as Dr. Berkowitz "what does the serum calcium do in breast cancer metastases in bone," I might answer "what does the serum sodium do in mineralocorticoid hypersecretion?" (Both go up.). I'm not answering a direct question about redistribution, but instead giving lots of hints at the underlying protocol mechanism with what may not be obvious parallels in other protocol operations. > >My comment was joking about the sheer lack of general knowledge many >IT people have there. If you did not learn about network layering >(in the generic sense), and did not identify the protocols or learn >about the protocols you are working with within a few weeks, how long >is it going to take you? Often a long time, especially when someone mutters a mantra "there are seven layers at which protocols go", and not realize (1) that's only half the OSI model, because service interfaces are just as important as protocol interfaces [Priscilla was talking about that the other day] and (2) OSI doesn't fit everything. From personal experience, I periodically am very deep in a protocol mechanism, perhaps actually writing router code, and suddenly get a new level of insight on what is REALLY going on. At IETF meetings, you often see AHA! looks when the developer of some protocol makes a seemingly random comment, and somebody just realized WHY they did something the way they did it. Eventually, you get to recognize styles: Picasso vs. Dali, Moy (OSPF) vs. Perlman (ISIS). In other words, if you maintain the right attitude, experience both brings truly new information, but should constantly let you see new relationships and insights into what you know. This is one of the marks of a really good physician -- they start seeing similarities in seemingly different diseases, and often that's the start of discovery. Scientific progress doesn't happen when someone screams "EUREKA! I HAVE IT!". It happens when someone says "Gee, that was weird...wonder why it did that?" >They are either not actively trying at all >or their background is so horrible in it you wonder how they even got >to become a "Network Administrator". You can pick that up reading a >few books and doing it in a home lab. (the TCP/IP and Netbios bit). >A lot of this seems like just basic applications of the basic classes >I took in college. And I wonder why people say college is so useless >when it's the basis for most of my success (in a general fashion). >Back to the story though..... > >So, a good number of these Doogie Howsers have no way of easily >distinguishing themselves. Even if you are a Doogie, you do not >necessarily have the rest of the skill sets to acquire a job. i.e. >social skills, people skills, the network of friends, etc. Historically, that's been easier for developers than people in operations. Creative code gets recognized. Writing for publication is an excellent way to distinguish yourself--in many directions. I wince whenever I see a post here in "chat speak", such is u see, yr router is ok. It's probably not fair, but I tend not to take such posts seriously. > >Let us ignore the "job finding" aspect of Doogie Howser. It is not >important in this context. The certification is a "part" of the >criterion one should hit to become more marketable. > >We are comparing who should be allowed to even have a chance to take >the exam. > >> Consider the case of airplane pilots. Just to get an pilot's license, you >> must have a certain minimum number of documented flying hours. To be hired >> as a pilot for an airline, you must have documented proof that you had at > > least several hundred hours of flight time, and sometimes several >thousand. > >Well, even in THIS case it is far more reasonable. Documented hours >of hard testing/working on networking gear in a "lab" by Cisco. That >I would go for. Because, like I said 3 years of router rubbing ... >come on, I am sure you have had assignments which let you demolish >that "knowledge" in a few months! Thing is, you have no idea if they >are actively working on networking for the 3 years. For the flying >case you are directly clocking them for... flying. It is not even >necessarily a "production network" (as in, commercial flying... :) ). When I did IBM system programming, we had an informal rule that you couldn't call yourself a REAL system programmer until you had done something that brought the mainframe down in the middle of prime operations. People learn from sheer horror as well as study. > >I mean come on, hundreds of hours can be conquered within a few >months for aggressive students. That is reasonable. YEARS of router >rubbing? No thanks. > >> > > Bottom line - a caresser CCIE is on average more skilled than >> > a labrat CCIE. >> > >> > Perhaps that is true. (I am not going to argue either way, but >> > I >> > think it's debatable. :) ) >> >> I really don't see how it is debatable. The lab-rat CCIE has just the CCIE >> to his credit. The caressers has both the ccie and some experience. They > > have everything the lab-rat has and more. > > > >"OBI WAN Is HOLDING ME BACK!" says Doogie... hmm. okay bad example. >Maybe we should have held Anakin back longer. bahaha :) Hey, watch out! I watched James Earl Jones in the title role of Othello (very good, but with Christopher Plummer as an absolutely spectacular Iago). When they were fighting their final duel, I kept wanting to yell "DARTH! USE THE LIGHT SABER!" > > >The only thing you did was delay them, and delay potentially >qualified individuals. Are you even sure they will have even a SHRED >more experience after doing carressing for so long? Is that shred >going to really help them when they "study" for the exam by going to >bootcamps, reviewing braindumps, etc? > >> > Oh no doubt, I understand NO system can be 100% perfect. >> > However, >> > this solution eliminates potentially very bright individuals >> > with >> > less years of experience, but potentially significantly much >> > higher >> > quality of experience. I suppose without statistics here, you >> > could >> > easily argue that sample is too small. If I do see some solid >> > statistics on it, I will agree with you then. >> >> Again, it doesn't eliminate those kung-fu masters forever, it just forces > > them to wait. Is that really so bad? > >Right, but it does not eliminate those lab-rats either (who will have >a name change). It only delays bright individuals who wanted to >succeed at their own pace. Let the test judge them, not some silly 3 >year requirement which does not necessarily result in anything that >will contribute to the exam experience, or even their real world >experience. My personal experience is that the ability to analyze and design should be tested along with configuration and troubleshooting. The person I want is the one that knows how to think, not just memorize. > >In such a tough job market, I think we should let those who want to >excel, excel at their own pace (the hourly time for pilots CAN be >done at your own pace, so I would strongly enjoy that modification, >so, let it be some Cisco certified lab where people spend time in >it). > >I will admit though, the exam itself probably is NOT hard enough to >really weed the bad seeds out. If the exam was longer, more >extensive, had more feedback, required written documents (anything >with an open ended kind of answer), had a big party of technical >advisors to review, yes, it would be better. But as Howard pointed >out, this is too slow... and I am sure even you would agree it would >be great but WAY too slow and expensive for Cisco, who clearly wants >to see their CCIE count grow... just like the rest of the major >vendors. I think, however, it's worth exploring how some of these things could be scaled. One-right-answer CCIE labs aren't the best way. I think there's significant benefit from spending some time with a true IOS simulator -- NETSYS, BONES, etc. -- something that lets you demonstrate you can make a system of tens or hundreds of routers work. Cisco, I believe, really needs to soul-search if knowing every obscure knob is really useful. When I do complex network design, I decide what I want to accomplish -- often that's more from reading of RFCs, professional group participation, etc. -- and THEN look up the commands. 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