Just finished 4 certs in 4 months

As a personal challenge of mine, I wanted to finish the year strong with "4 certs in 4 months" (September to December) and did it!

1. CHFI (Computer Hacking Forensic Investigator) - added credibility to my work transition into routine host analysis/forensics

2. GICSP (Global Industrial Cyber Security Professional) - work in a sector where this is valuable
3. CEH (Certified Ethical Hacker) - just finished a Vulnerability Analysis master's course, so wanted this to finish it off.
4. CIW Web Security Associate - ran out of money

, so took a stab at this and enjoyed it, although no marketable value

Watched tons of videos (Cybrary, ITPro.TV, YouTube) and read all the books cover-to-cover (minus the CIW exam) to get trained up.

These certifications have already helped me get an edge on fellow employees that might have looked similar until now.

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Comments

olaHalo

Awesome!
How long did you study a day? What is your typical study session like?

josh.armentrout1

might as well talk to ciw and submit two more exam reports to them to upgrade theirs. not marketable, i know. i took it as well right after the sec+ exam without study.

makv1961@gmail.com

All these 4courses, have u done thru online

fmitawaps

Wow, that's quite a bit of work! I don't think I could ever push brain **** myself that hard to do so much in such a short amount of time. I have done some cert testing of brain **** my own, and with the level of detail they go into in the questions, I'd never feel confident going brain **** into a cert test with only one month at best of studying the material.

Brain-D

Congrats !!!

Dakinggamer87

sammen89 wrote: »

As a personal challenge of mine, I wanted to finish the year strong with "4 certs in 4 months" (September to December) and did it!

1. CHFI (Computer Hacking Forensic Investigator) - added credibility to my work transition into routine host analysis/forensics

2. GICSP (Global Industrial Cyber Security Professional) - work in a sector where this is valuable
3. CEH (Certified Ethical Hacker) - just finished a Vulnerability Analysis master's course, so wanted this to finish it off.
4. CIW Web Security Associate - ran out of money , so took a stab at this and enjoyed it, although no marketable value

Watched tons of videos (Cybrary, ITPro.TV, YouTube) and read all the books cover-to-cover (minus the CIW exam) to get trained up.

These certifications have already helped me get an edge on fellow employees that might have looked similar until now.

Congrats!! Well done

fuz1on

Great job!!!

danny069

That is quite a feat sir, congrats!

fmitawaps

Go back and reread my previous post in this topic a bit more carefully........

Iristheangel

fmitawaps wrote: »

Wow, that's quite a bit of work! I don't think I could ever push brain **** myself that hard to do so much in such a short amount of time. I have done some cert testing of brain **** my own, and with the level of detail they go into in the questions, I'd never feel confident going brain **** into a cert test with only one month at best of studying the material.

Er?

To be fair to the OP, I passed the CHFI and CEH each with a month of study. The books were REALLY small and they are pretty much entry level certs. I never took the specific CIW cert he took but I took a few in college as part of WGU and they never took more than a month to study. The ones I took I felt are pre-entry level. Can't speak to the GICSP though. I have zero experience with that cert.

I think it's doable for at least 3 out of the 4 certs he named. Plus I have no idea what his experience level is or even without it, if he's just sitting at home studying full time. In my personal experience, I was always able to knock out entry level certs within 1-2 months of beginning my studies. I slowed down with the professional and expert level certs though. CCNP #1 took me a year. CCNP #2 took me about 9 months if memory serves me correctly.

thomas_

fmitawaps wrote: »

Go back and reread my previous post in this topic a bit more carefully........

Stop acting like a douche. Just because you don't think you can do 4 certs in 4 months, doesn't mean he used **** to pass. Then after everyone ignores your post and you post a second time to remind people of your first post just blows my mind.

SeekBytes

Congratulations for the pass. I would be too scared any time to take an exam. Last time was the Sec+ and I ended up reading, at least, two books to compare the information. Watched two video series: CBT Nuggets, Prof. Messer to add notes to my own cram. The last stage was to take online flashcards and any test I could find around.

I would like to be more confident and finish my CCNP R/S with an average of 2 months for each module. Let's see how it goes

Kind Regards.

dustervoice

Congrats well done!!

PJ_Sneakers

These 4 certs in 4 months doesn't sound like cheating to me either. Hell, I doubt the GIAC and CIW tests even have "****" available because they're so obscure.

techfiend

I'm not aware of the difficulty of all of these certs but it's more believable then the (in)famous MCSE in 90 days. I was able to complete the MCSA 2012 in about 80 days but I worked with a majority of the topics daily and I took the easy way out in the 74-409 to replace the 70-412.

tmcg

Congrats don't understand why some would try discredit you.

DAVIS NGUYEN

Congrats!

abyssinica

fmitawaps wrote: »

Wow, that's quite a bit of work! I don't think I could ever push brain **** myself that hard to do so much in such a short amount of time. I have done some cert testing of brain **** my own, and with the level of detail they go into in the questions, I'd never feel confident going brain **** into a cert test with only one month at best of studying the material.

Though difficult, it is possible to do what OP did in a perfectly legal way through hard and consistent studying...ok, cramming. You need some wicked motivation, discipline or both. OP had a goal - "4 certs in 4 months" and probably also aimed to be able to write about it here afterwards. Those alone would've motivated him.

si20

Congrats OP.

Not meaning to be negative in any way, but i'll be 100% honest with my thoughts. How much have you actually taken from it? There's a part of me that wonders how much you've actually learned. For me, when I pass an exam/cert, I like to have got as much as possible from it. If I was to get 4 certs in 4 months, i'd probably gain very little knowledge overall, because i'd only be concerned with getting answers correct to pass, rather than understand the underlying concepts.

mistabrumley89

Congratulations

!!!

I feel like it depends on the persons experience. I took A+ (both exams), Network+, BCNE, CCENT, and CCNA all within a month. I lucked out and got some expiring vouchers for free. The only exams I really even studied for were my A+ exams. All of the networking certifications fell in line with work. Albeit they are kind of entry level exams. I had been doing networking for 2 years prior to taking them. Watching CBT Nuggets almost everyday for 2 years lol. White board discussions in the office every week. I think there are different circumstances that OP may not have disclosed, particularly experience.

Remedymp

You're a (nerd) stud!

signumfidei

I passed the MS Azure Implementation exam with under 2 weeks of study while working. However, I did have 400 hours of hands on Azure experience, and attended an Azure course for 1 week (but it didnt really cover the exam). I sat the exam knowing I had the MS second shot, but luckily I didnt need it.

gncsmith

Congrats!

DoubleD

nice one

johnnyarks

did u have a job during the 4 months of study?

22306

its doable... i get off work at 3 pm.. i can study for about 5 hours a day and then go to sleep. so 5 hours of studying every work day would be 25H per week and i can probably do 20 hours of studying on the weekend. that would be 45 hours per week (monday to sunday). there are 4 weeks in a month. so that would be 45*4= 180 hours of studying per month and you repeat that for 4 months that would give him 720 hours to study. (hope my math is right)

John-John

Since November I have finished MCSA, VCP, and CCENT. If I get the CCNA this month that will be four as well. I didnt cram though. I've been working on VCP and MCSA for about a year and I have been studying for CCNA for several years on and off. I did Cisco Academy in 2012. I just want to get it done and going while I am hot.

Claymoore

If you meet the exam audience recommendations - services implemented, years of experience, etc. - and the vendor has done their exam blueprinting properly, you should be able to walk in and pass the exam without studying. Those don't often line up, so we are either learning new things or getting into exam shape on features we haven't used yet.

So if you have the experience, passing exams quickly shouldn't be a problem. I passed the 2003 MCSE exams in 2 months and I frequently take 2 exams in a day. The best I have ever done is pass 3 Microsoft exams in a week. They were beta exams, so no concerns about braindumping.

nascar_paul

Congratulations!

sammen89

Yes, I work for the federal government in a mid-level cyber security function. Average over 40 hours a week.

I believe the Network+, Security+, SSCP, and Computer Science background set me up with good fundamentals to be successful in this goal. Additionally, I've learned that 90 mins a day of uber focused studying (no distractions) is better than 4 hours of highly distracted on/off studying.

Now back to focusing on my Masters in CompSci (GT).