Documenting Tests and Certifications

Radioteacher — Wed, 28 Oct 2020 22:07:44 GMT

What do you do with your older test results and certifications?

Like many in here, I am a life long learner.

When I started taking certification tests (Novell) in May of 1994, each test report would go in a envelope. By February of 1999, I had taken thirty-seven tests and earned fourteen certifications from Novell, Microsoft, IBM and Compaq/HP.

At the time I worked for a Value Added Reseller (VAR) as an engineer. Some of the certifications, I wanted for myself (Master CNE, Compaq ASE and Microsoft MCSE) and others I earned for the company (Novel Groupwise 4 CNE) so the company could maintain the relationship with a vendor.

After leaving the VAR for a position at a regional bank, I focused on work and what I could do for the company. I helped maintain the security of the systems/infrastructure, worked on networking equipment and the virtual environment. In 2012 I earned my next certification, VMWare VCP5-DCV.

Since then I have earned six more certifications by taking eight more tests.

All of these old tests and certificates showed up again as stumbled upon that old envelope. So I added all of my newest test data and and certifications to it to.

I also added all the data in a spreadsheet.

Out of the forty-six documented test results, two documents are missing(what happened to them), seven tests I failed and thirty-seven tests passed.

The CISSP is the hardest test I ever took.

The result of the Novell Service and Support test 050-046 from June of 1994 was a surprise. To prepare for the test, I read two books over five days which cover parts of the test syllabus. The test was form style not adaptive. The test paperwork said I answered every question correctly which was a shock.

Paul, CISSP

Re: Documenting Tests and Certifications

AlecTrevelyan — Thu, 29 Oct 2020 19:05:52 GMT

I used to work for a security integrator/reseller too and had to endure the never ending cycle of partner certification renewals. I had about 20 certs to maintain so rarely a day went by when I wasn't having to prep for an upcoming renewal. Thankfully we had a vendor manager who would take care of the admin/documentation requirements, and remind us which certs needed to be updated in which timeframes.

When I first started working there I brought some vendor certs with me and was rightly proud of those, but after a couple of years having earned a few more certs and had begun to be caught up in the renewals spiral, I started to gravitate towards certs that could be maintained through continuous professional education and that were vendor agnostic, which prompted a move into a different role to help me escape the renewals nightmare.

I don't even remember half of the certs I used to hold, and frankly don't care to be reminded of them and those constant renewals!

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Documenting Tests and Certifications

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