CISSP Passed. 24th April

PeterHands

Hi all,

After a year of studying I finally passed CISSP at the first time of asking.... Crazy exam with some out of the box questions.

My advice is you don't need to memorise, but understand the concepts and how they are applied. If you don't do that, you won't pass! Simply memorising is not enough. Sure you have to memorise a lot, but it really is understanding what your reading and applying it. If you do that, you'll remember it anyways.

Practice exams that I did, BOSON, Skillset and even the Sybex practice did not come close to the exam. I'd actually use only the Sybex so you can ensure you understand the concepts. Simply spending money on other practice exams may make you feel good that your commiting to studying, but I have to be honest and say it's not needed.

So the tools I used are not nessary compared to what you need to pass. What I advise are the following:

Sybex 8th Edition or Shon Harris - (I used Sybex)

11th Hour - Really good in the last couple of weekes to remind yourself of the key concepts in each domain

Sybex Official Practice Questions

Sunflower Guide

Luke Ahmed Study Notes and Theory - Absolutey essential along with the main core book you read (Either Sybex or Shon Harris)

Mike Chappel Video's on LinkedIn learning or Lynda.com (Same thing!) - Great resource, especially on the train to work and back

You need to put your technical head in a box and only bring it out in certain domains in the exam. There are 25 questions that are evaluation questions. If you get a question that's out of this world, chances are it is one of those 25 so don't despair.....just move on, you'll never see it again!

If you get to 100 and press next..... BREATHE.....if you get another question, thats a bonus, your still in the game and keep thinking like that until the exam ends!

I got to 101 and then raised my hand to use the toilet......

Plan for 50 questions per hour and try to keep to that.....If your head goes fuzzy, go to the toilet, come back and look again!

All these resources need 3 things.....your TIME, FOCUS and COMMITMENT...... It's a long, arduous journey and at times I dispaired, I really did, but I stuck with it.... CISSP is not meant to be easy, thats why so few have it and those that do are considered the best!.... It's WORTH IT!!

The biggest benefit I have found is TIME...I have my life back again and it's so weird to have all this free time I don't know what to do with myself!

Good luck and god speed in your mission! You CAN DO IT!!