Ever afraid of looking dumb on the job?

When you study for and obtain your ccna, how much of what you learn must you actually memorize and use to stay employed? I'm trying to retain as much as I can but the information is so overwhelming I don't think I can remember everything by the time I look for a job. I'm very nervous I could end up fired. Has anyone else ever felt this way?

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aordal

I'm constantly worried that I might say something dumb. Know how to remedy that? Shut your mouth.

Seriously though, not everyone knows everything and don't act like you do. Just do your best and don't pretend you're better than someone your talking to just because you have a cert and if you are wrong it's not the end of the world.

dynamik

I'd be more worried about a technical interview to get a job than staying employed once you've got a job. As long as you know where to find the answers to things you don't do regularly, you should be fine. Until then, just keep reviewing and practicing...

mikej412

If you can get the job, you probably stand a good chance of being able to do the job.

We have a 50-60% failure rate on a technical phone screening interview -- and we're asking simple CCNA level questions. We're just not asking questions that someone may have memorized to pass the exam.

The CCNA is more about the knowledge and skills acquired while studying for the exam -- and understanding when and where (and hopefully why) you should apply that to some particular work problem. Memorizing cable specifications, the OSI Layers (which is important during troubleshooting discussions), routing protocol timer values, etc is just a small part of the CCNA.

msethk

Icelegend20 wrote: »

When you study for and obtain your ccna, how much of what you learn must you actually memorize and use to stay employed? I'm trying to retain as much as I can but the information is so overwhelming I don't think I can remember everything by the time I look for a job. I'm very nervous I could end up fired. Has anyone else ever felt this way?

If an employer expects someone to know everything they will never find the right candidate! Alot of what your suppose to know depends on your exact position within the company. I'm also fortuante to work with people who don't have cocky attitudes about everything and we lean on each other for help and support. For that reason, there's never really a dumb question if you don't know something. Alot of tech people tend to be boastful and kinda smart-elicky when you ask them questions. I guess it's an ego thing or something, but I can't stand it. Some people like that can make you feel "dumb" when they don't even know the answer themselves.

networker050184

Just don't lie in the interview about what you know and you won't have to worry about embarrassing yourself.

Once you start putting all the knowledge to practical use on the job it will stick. And don't worry no one remembers it all.

Daniel333

All the time!
The reality is it's an ongoing problem in IT. There will ALWAYS be a new version that is going to make you look dumb. Whether it's your ability to configure Cisco VOIP phones, a site-to-site VPN or even finding out how to determine if a service pack is installed in Word 2007.
You can’t know it all, and everyone knows that.
It's here where your soft skills come into play. Being able to inspire confidence to your boss and end users that you may not know specifically how to do something, but you will have it figured out quickly and correctly.
You won't find the answer to these kinds of problems in your Cisco text books at all. The more things you learn socially, either at work or parties/dates/political events the better. As far as formal education think about your Speech and Debate and Philosophy classes. Shoot, even working in sales helps a lot here. Any situation where you have to interact under pressure helps a lot.
I suppose if life were D&D, I would be saying use your Charisma score here

genXrcist

I think it's worse when a user knows something arbitrary and remote about some small facet of an application, then looks at you like "YOU don't know that?!" As if to imply that somehow they know more than you do because you should have known it.

But then I just remind myself that users are dumb.

Hey, it makes me feel better about myself. hehe

blargoe

I try to surround myself with people dumber than me to avoid this problem.

NetAdmin2436

blargoe wrote: »

I try to surround myself with people dumber than me to avoid this problem.

Brilliant!

But seriously as others have said you won't need to know everything you learned. Every network is different, so it's just a matter of learning your network and applying what you know. If you get the job, your golden.

UnixGuy

Nobody expects you to know everything, but if you write something in your CV then everybody expects you to know that thing! Don't lie and don't give false impressions.

We all forget things, but the confident one is the one who knows what he forgot and can refer to it somewhere and figure it out.

You may forget one Cisco command, but you're not supposed to forget the difference between MAC address and IP Address and you are expected to know what the Gateway does , for example.

KGhaleon

The environment is always changing, new applications or hardware comes and goes each year and sometimes you get caught not knowing anything about what you're working on. We just deployed Office 2007 and I haven't the slightest idea how to use it, but I support it now...so... <_< >_>;;;;

*panic*

kctxau

"Ever afraid of looking dumb on the job?"
Nahhh, I just got used to it

Megadeth4168

KGhaleon wrote: »

The environment is always changing, new applications or hardware comes and goes each year and sometimes you get caught not knowing anything about what you're working on. We just deployed Office 2007 and I haven't the slightest idea how to use it, but I support it now...so... <_< >_>;;;;

*panic*

You speak the truth! I can't tell you how many special applications we use here, and people are always asking me questions about these applications, that I've personally never used, I've only installed them.

The funny thing is, most the time I can figure it out for them by sitting down at their desk for 5 minutes, and actually seeing the software for myself. The time's I can't, well then yeah, I feel a bit weird... I mean, I don't feel stupid, but I know the client who is having issues is thinking that I am.

Luckily, you can usually pass some of that stuff off to "I need to call the software vendor on this issue" or something like that.

BigTex71

An entry from the BigTex Dictionary:

GOOGLE - An internet search site, known to be the #1 tool in any IT person's arsenal.

KGhaleon

Unfortunately when you deal with special proprietary apps, sometimes google just can't help.

kripsak

You don't have to be the sharpest tool in the shed to be the most useful.

carboncopy

blargoe wrote: »

I try to surround myself with people dumber than me to avoid this problem.

Genius!!!

CChN

I feel like an idiot at all times. It's the only thing that gives me motivation to study!