Is Six Months Realistic???

To go from no work experience (although have lots of general knowledge) to MCSE in 6 months?

Is this realistic?

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That's my plan! I am going to start in September and I plan on taking one month for each exam. However, I have work experience that will help me out.

jbaello

I think your kinda pushing this, MCSE is such a huge topic, specially for some1 without experience. It is possible depends on how you approach your study, like studying 8 hours per day, but again studying cannot be compared with actual experience, and things will start materializing when you apply it on the real world, or try an actual lab, it almost has to be an orchestra to come out not only as a MCSE but a technically skilled MCSE.

I'm on my 13th month of doing MCSE, I do work fulltime, and have a daughter, I have 5 years experience as a Desktop/IT Support and as a Jr. System Administrator. And still some areas still confuse me sometimes.

This is just my 2 cents I can be wrong, you might be Einstein

goodluck...

nel

i agree with JB, thats a rush. Make sure you learn the material correctly and take your time man otherwise you'll be caught out once you step into the real world.

dynamik

What does a lot of general knowledge mean? Windows XP power user?

What does your schedule look like? Do you have work? School?

It's definitely doable, but there are too many variables for us to give you a definite answer (and a lot of it depends on how hard you are willing to work).

tgriffin

answers:

9 years as the person in the office that 60 other agents would come to for their lap top, computer, copier, printer trouble shooting when the IT guy was not there (he was there about once a week).

I am currently not working and could go full-time all the time

I once went from no flight time to CFI (Certified Flight Instructor) of Helicopters in 6 months

AmpdChaos

You probably can do it.. but it'll kill you.. and i think you'll be over doing it if your trying to get a job and don't have the practical experience to back it up. Alot of employers want experience especially for MCSE.. but you should try for one mcp test first before you try to schedule everything else.. just to get a feel for it..

dynamik

I agree that experience is important, but I don't think it'll kill him to do. I did mine in 16 months while working full-time and going to school. He could probably put another 50, 60, or an even greater number of hours into it per week than I could.

The general troubleshooting stuff isn't going to help you a whole lot on this track though. Unless you've done a lot of work with Windows Server, you're going to have as much to learn as anyone else. Many people, myself included, were surprised at how much unfamiliar material was in the XP exam. Have you ever done mass deployments, unattended installations, performance monitoring, etc.?

jbaello

dynamik wrote:

I agree that experience is important, but I don't think it'll kill him to do. I did mine in 16 months while working full-time and going to school. He could probably put another 50, 60, or an even greater number of hours into it per week than I could.

The general troubleshooting stuff isn't going to help you a whole lot on this track though. Unless you've done a lot of work with Windows Server, you're going to have as much to learn as anyone else. Many people, myself included, were surprised at how much unfamiliar material was in the XP exam. Have you ever done mass deployments, unattended installations, performance monitoring, etc.?

+1 tryout the waters by taking 70-270, you might be surprised with unfamiliar stuff that you have not seen before, I was. Then from there, kinda give yourself a timeframe, what I suggest is an actual lab, there is so many reasons why actual lab, but you'll find this out yourself when you start the track. I suggest obtaining Trainsignal MCSE it's a complete lab video that you can follow along with your study.

Goodluck you could do it!!!

Slowhand

It's very possible to average about one exam per month on the MCSE track. Given, you're going to be studying anywhere from 3 to 5 hours per day, and pulling longer days on weekends and any other day you're not working and going to school. Is it realistic? Sure, if you've got the time and dedication to put in all those hours in a shorter amount of time, rather than giving yourself the usual 2 to 4 months for each test, (which seems to be the average for a lot of people). Keep in mind, some exams are harder than others, and will therefore take longer to study for.

And above all else, (for cripes sake,) do not understimate the difficulty of these exams. Lots of people have a decades' worth of experience, lots of people work with Server every single day, lots of people have thousands of hours of time logged messing around with Active Directory. And lots of people still fail these exams. You have to remember that these are Microsoft best practices tests, and will look very different from what you're used to doing on the job. (There's the right way, the wrong way, and One Microsoft Way.) Study as long as you need to, read the books, do the lab-work, study more books, and do what you need to do to learn the material.

tgriffin

Lots of good input, but my Catch-22 is that this is a career transition for me and I can't seem to find where to get hands on experience while going about this. Any thoughts on that are appreciated.

Sie

This is the golden question!

Most of the time you have to find something entry level, a helpdesk or the like and work your way up.

Charities and volunteer work add experience whilst not reading like "i fixed my mates computer"

As for doing the MCSE in that amount of time with no experience? Yes I think it could be possible but without putting things into practice im worried you would have forgotten the start before you reach the end.

preecy

I'd think it would involve a lot of time and effort but dont see why its not possible providing you have good learning material. Im currently studying the mcse to mcitp upgrade material. Last month i passed the easier client exam, this month im sitting the actual upgrade exam and providing i pass that im hoping to take the last exam next month.

As others have already pointed out, theres a big difference between knowing what microsoft say is needed to pass an exam and knowing for what is required in the workplace.

Slowhand

tgriffin wrote:

Lots of good input, but my Catch-22 is that this is a career transition for me and I can't seem to find where to get hands on experience while going about this. Any thoughts on that are appreciated.

Lab out everything you come cross in your books. While this doesn't give you professional experience, it will give you the opportunity to get hands-on with a lot of things you'd come across in the workplace. The more you do, the more you can say you've actually done when it comes time for interviews.