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I feel like a complete.....starting over....

535irob

So, I had a decent opportunity at a job. The Resume got me in the door and past the first screen.. Talked to one person and that went great. I was asked if I was willing to do a tech phone interview. Sure! I said...

Had 1 day to wait, brushed up a bit on what I thought we were going to talk about. Got the call, first guy that was on the line.. No issues, talking about networking, Switching and what I have done.. did well on that front. Then the second guy comes in, we start on the voice side. I do well for the first few questions.. then i starts to fall apart.

I felt like a dumba$$ after it was all done. So here I am. Sitting with the realization that I need to get back in the game. I need to build up what I know and improve confidence along with quick thinking. These will come with getting back into regular studying, practice and working towards higher certs. It has been a few years from my last studying routine, fell into a lull of just working and was overall not ready. Its time to fix this.

So, I am thinking of going for the CCNP then CCNP voice. I have the global knowledge books for the voice side, But I am thinking I should move towards CCNP first, Improve my R&S, then move back towards Voice. I am trying to find what I need for a lab. Ideally I would like to use GNS3 as space is limited but I am willing to go with hardware.. I have A 2811, 2611Xm and a 3550 switch. Keeping all this powered up just get noisy..

For those with space limitations what have you done? Who has gone CCNP then CCNP voice? Is this advicable or should I just stick with voice?

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Comments

instant000

Are you saying that you're working OK at your job, just you weren't necessarily "on point" as far as a technical interview?

Do you necessarily work daily with the technologies that you were being interviewed about?

Was it an opportunity to move up to a higher position? Or what?

You already have adequate hardware to try R&S, just add a few switches. To do voice justice, you'd have to get modules and whatnot for your routers that cost a bit more than the interface cards you normally add to a router for cabling it up.

That is, if you want to try the home lab route, so that you can be as fresh on the skills as possible.

Otherwise, you could try online labbing.

Hope this helps.

NetworkVeteran

535irob wrote: »

Then the second guy comes in, we start on the voice side. I do well for the first few questions.. then i starts to fall apart.It has been a few years from my last studying routine

Cisco certifications expire after 2-3 years. Are you sure yours are still valid and should have been listed on a resume? Do you have much voice experience? If not, they probably only expected that CCNA level of knowledge you claimed on your resume.

RouteMyPacket

I doubt they asked you anything above what you stated on your resume. You need to be consistently working with these technologies because the certification might get your foot in the door but when it's time to step up to bat, that cert means nothing and your experience has to be there.

535irob

RouteMyPacket wrote: »

..You need to be consistently working with these technologies ...

I think that was the bigger problem. Over the last 6-8 months I really have not done much with Voice since then. I upgraded our clusters to 8.6, deployed CUEAC and did a Jabber rollout. Then never really got back to it. Work duties moved more towards servers, then just recently back into the R&S world with network redesign.

Yes the certs are current, But I do need to start the process of another cert to keep them current...

When it started to fall apart was when I started questioning what I was saying, the "what does this do" "how do you do this" stuff was fine. But when we hit the "This is broke, it only effects XYZ, But you check ABC and 123, all check out ok.. what do you do to fix it and why..."was when I was not confident, and it showed, I stumbled over myself. Which them compiled onto the next questions....

instant000 - Yes I was not "on point", I stumbled..I do Have access to the Voip, and I am one of two managing them. But the desktop support guys do the day to day set ups etc. It was a bit higher position, in a different type of field. A customer facing position.

either way, I put this out so that others can learn my my mistakes. I went into it not 100% ready, my slacking on keeping up with the voice side cost me the chance.

ptlinva

I've done the exact same thing. -= slightly awkward grin =-

There's know way to know it all...just more studying... which brings more confidence...

I'm still trying to land that full-time job myself. I've been a road-warrior working on the platforms for the past two years. I'll have CCNP within the next few months (just passed ccnp switch) and i'll go forward with the massive resume/interview thing again.

Good Luck, my friend. I know exactly how you feel.