Going for the CISA.

Ordered the CISA RM and QAE DB and took my first small question set today. Scored a 73 out of the gate with 100% in two domains. Not bad. Will keep pounding the DB and attempt on the 31st. Hoping to be in the mid 80s by then.

Find more posts tagged with

Comments

pinksj

All the very best.

cfirsten

Same here, good luck to you!!! I found the CISA to be more difficult than CISSP IMHO. The questions were no joke, be careful. Maybe it's because it's more audit focused and less InfoSec. Again everyone is different and while it might've seemed difficult to me(I was also not that well prepared in all honesty) other people found it relatively easy. I consider myself lucky to have passed it and not knowledgeable

.

Good luck man!!

JoJoCal19

I'm going to fail this today. I'm getting about 80% or so in domains 2, 3, and 5. About mid 60s to 70 in domain 1, and about 50% in domain 4. Domain 4 is kicking my ass. Will be interesting to see with their scaled scoring model if I can pass with being so crappy in domain 4.

justdavey

Good luck!

scasc

JoJoCal19 wrote: »

I'm going to fail this today. I'm getting about 80% or so in domains 2, 3, and 5. About mid 60s to 70 in domain 1, and about 50% in domain 4. Domain 4 is kicking my ass. Will be interesting to see with their scaled scoring model if I can pass with being so crappy in domain 4.

How did the exam go? Hopefully not too taxing.

NetworkNewb

JoJoCal19 wrote: »

I'm going to fail this today.

I know that feeling!

JoJoCal19

PASSED!!!!! Wow that went completely the opposite of how I was expecting it to go!!! I started the exam and it felt super easy. I mean the opposite of how the QAE DB questions were. They seemed way easier, and unlike the QAE DB, I could easily eliminate 2 answers easily, and the answer kind of stood out to me. Well I'm glad that is done and off to the CRISC in three weeks! Should be MUCH easier.

p@r0tuXus

Congratulations! Don't forget to update your certifications and signature! You've got a couple whoppers to pin on there.

tphan3

Congratulations! What do you think was harder: CISA or CISM?

JoJoCal19

p@r0tuXus wrote: »

Congratulations! Don't forget to update your certifications and signature! You've got a couple whoppers to pin on there.

Thanks! Oh yea haha. I actually am getting the paperwork done on both tomorrow and submitting them.

tphan3 wrote: »

Congratulations! What do you think was harder: CISA or CISM?

Well that's interesting actually. In prepping I found the CISA infinitely harder. As mentioned, I was getting my rear kicked by two of the domains and was scoring in the 30s then 40s in one of them. Not much better in the other. At the end of my studying I brought them up a bit, but not much. So going into the exam I felt that the CISM was by far easier to prep for. Well flip that during the actual exam. I felt the questions of the CISA were really straight forward and easy. My experience DURING the exam would lead me to believe the CISA is easier. It will be interesting to get my official scores back.

MitM

congrats!!

JaBaRo

Can you post some sample questions?

1Sep1969

JoJoCal19,

Do you have any tips or suggestions for those taking the exam? Are there certain topics we should focus more on?

wd40

Congratulations

JoJoCal19

wd40 wrote: »

Congratulations

Thanks!

1Sep1969 wrote: »

JoJoCal19,

Do you have any tips or suggestions for those taking the exam? Are there certain topics we should focus more on?

As for tips all I can recommend is to pound the QAE DB. I didn't even flip open the book until the day of the exam to review a couple of topics I wrote down that I had trouble with while doing the QAE DB.

These were the topics:

CISA Topics to Study:

Sampling Methods
Overall high level audit process
Assessment types
Audit tools (Generalized audit software, integrated test facility, regression test, snapshot, embedded audit module)
Testing types (substantive, analytical, compliance, control), (Unit, Integration, Sociability, QA)
Types of Audit Risk
Confidence Coefficient
Sampling methods (stop or go, classic variable, discovery, probability proportional to size)

For me, the actual exam was far easier than the QAE DB.

JaBaRo wrote: »

Can you post some sample questions?

Hi JaBaRo, unfortunately I can't do that as it violates ISACA's policies.

ekster

Congrats! Jojo.

Approximately two weeks ago I passed the CISA exam (score 629). My ISACA experience doesn't match yours. My exam questions were more difficult than the QAE. Further, aforementioned CISA topics weren't even addressed during my exam. In fact, I answered at least 10 "data classification" questions (if not more ...). Just warning everyone that they shouldn't simply study above topics. Simply take some example tests (DB/ QAE) and review the CISA manual once, and you should be fine.

cheers.

JoJoCal19

Ekster, I should clarify my response above.

IMPORTANT

The list of topics above was my response to areas that I marked as my weak areas. It is NOT the only topics to study. Those were only from Domain 1.

JoJoCal19

CISA officially passed! Scaled score of 654

Job Practice Area
Scaled Score

The Process of Auditing Information Systems
727

Governance and Management of IT
618

Information Systems Acquisition, Development and Implementation
559

Information Systems Operations, Maintenance and Service Management
618

Protection of Information Assets
713

I can't believe I scored that high. As mentioned, studying was super hard. I wasn't doing well in a few of the domains, but when I took the exam it felt so easy, so I guess I shouldn't be too surprised.