Chapter 11
Ten Test-Planning Tips
So much information, so little time! In this chapter, we recommend nine (mostly) long-term planning tips for helping you prepare for that special day. (No, not that special day; read Wedding Planning For Dummies, by Marcy Blum and Laura F. Kaiser [Wiley], for that one.) We’re talking about the CISSP exam here.
Know Your Learning Style
As you mentally anticipate your study and preparation for the CISSP exam, it’s important for you to understand your personal learning style. For example, you might prefer a long-term study plan as opposed to a one-week boot-camp style training course. And you may learn better in a study group, or by studying and reading alone in a quiet room. Your studying time might be more fruitful if you do it in short, frequent sessions (say, 30 minutes, a couple of times a day), or in less frequent and longer marathons (for example, four hours, a few nights a week).
To make the most of the tips in this chapter, you need to know in advance what works best for you, so you can customize your study plan and pass the CISSP exam with flying colors!
Get a Networking Certification First
The Communication and Network Security domain is the most comprehensive domain tested on the CISSP exam. Although its purpose is to test your security knowledge, you must have a strong understanding of communications and networking. For this reason, we strongly advise that you earn a networking certification, such as the CompTIA Network+ or the Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA), before attempting the CISSP exam, especially if you don’t have at least a few years of experience with networking equipment including routers, switches, firewalls, and more. (For more information on these certifications, see www.comptia.org and www.cisco.com, respectively.) An additional benefit is that you then have another valuable technical certification in high demand within the computer industry.
If you already have one of these certifications, you should find most of the information in the Communication and Network Security domain to be very basic. In this case, a quick review that focuses on security concepts (particularly the methods of attack) should be sufficient for this domain. We dedicate Chapter 6 of this book to the Communication and Network Security domain.
If you haven’t taken a computer-based examination before, getting a networking certification first will also help familiarize you with the testing center location and environment, as well as the general format of computer-based exams. You can take a generic practice computer-based exam to get used to how they work at www.pearsonvue.com.
Register Now!
Go online and register for the CISSP exam at www.pearsonvue.com/isc2 — now!
Committing yourself to a test date is the best cure for procrastination, especially because the test costs $699 (U.S.)! Setting your date can help you plan and focus your study efforts.
Make a 60-Day Study Plan
After you register for the CISSP exam, commit yourself to a 60-day study plan. Of course, your work experience and professional reading should span a much greater period, but for your final preparations leading up to the CISSP exam, plan on a 60-day period of intense study and review.
Exactly how intensely you study depends on your personal experience and learning ability, but plan on a minimum of 2 hours a day for 60 days. If you’re a slow learner or reader, or perhaps find yourself weak in many areas, plan on 4 to 6 hours a day and more on the weekends. Regardless, try to stick to the 60-day plan. If you feel that you need 360 hours of study, you might be tempted to spread this out over a 6-month period for 2 hours a day. But committing to 6 months of intense study is much harder (on you, as well as your family and friends) than committing to 2 months. In the end, you’ll likely find yourself studying only as much as you would have in a 60-day period.
Get Organized and Read!
A wealth of security information is available for the CISSP candidate. However, studying everything is impractical. Instead, get organized, determine your strengths and weaknesses, and then read!
Begin by downloading the free, official CISSP Exam Outline from the (ISC)2 website (www.isc2.org) to get an idea of the subjects on which you’ll be tested.
Next, read this book, use the online practice at www.dummies.com (see the Introduction for more information). CISSP For Dummies, 6th Edition, is written to provide the CISSP candidate with an excellent overview of all the broad topics covered on the CISSP exam.
Next, focus on the areas that you identify as your weakest. Read or review the respective chapters in this book. If needed, obtain additional references on specific topics as needed.
Finally, in the last week before your exam, go through all your selected study materials at least once. Review or read CISSP For Dummies, 6th Edition, one more time, as well as your personal study notes, and complete as many practice questions as you can.
You can download the free (ISC)2 Official CISSP Flash Cards on the (ISC)2 website at www.isc2.org/Training/Self-Study-Resources. You can also purchase the (ISC)2 Official CISSP Study App in the App Store or Google Play.
Join a Study Group
You can find strength in numbers. Joining a study group or creating your own can help you stay focused and provide a wealth of information from the broad perspectives and experiences of other IT and security professionals. You can find a study group, discussion forums, and many other helpful resources at www.cccure.org.
Also, your local (ISC)2 chapter or a chapter of the Information Systems Security Association (ISSA) may be sponsoring CISSP study groups. You can find their contact information at www.issa.org.
Take Practice Exams
No practice exams are available that exactly duplicate the CISSP exam. And forget about brain dumps (actual test questions and answers that others have unscrupulously posted on the Internet) — in addition to possibly being wrong, brain dumps violate the CISSP exam’s non-disclosure agreement. However, many resources are available for practice questions. You may find some practice questions too hard, others too easy, and some just plain irrelevant. Despite that, the repetition of practice questions can help reinforce important information that you need to know in order to successfully answer questions on the CISSP exam. For this reason, we recommend taking as many practice exams as possible and using the results to help you focus on your weak areas. Try the CISSP Quizzes on the CISSP Open Study Group website (www.cccure.org).
Take a CISSP Training Seminar
You can take an official (ISC)2 CISSP Training Seminar. The in-person training seminar (classroom-based or private on-site) is an intense, five-day session that definitely has you eating, drinking, and sleeping CISSP. The online training seminar gives you the same benefits of the in-person training seminar on a computer with a more flexible schedule, including options for weekday, weekend, evening, and self-paced courses. Schedules and additional information are available at www.isc2.org in the “Training Methods” section under “Education & Training.”
Adopt an Exam-Taking Strategy
It’ll be difficult to assess whether you’re going too fast or too slow as you work through the exam questions because the test is now adaptive. You’ll have a minimum of 100 questions and a maximum of 150 questions.
If you’re going too slow on the exam — perhaps two-and-a-half hours have gone by and you’ve only answered 50 questions — rushing through the remaining questions could make matters worse. If you start making careless mistakes and getting more wrong answers, it’s more likely you’ll get more questions rather than fewer, so the test and the clock will both be working against you!
On the other hand, if you rush through the exam — perhaps you’re 30 minutes into the exam and you’ve already answered 80 questions — you can’t go back to check or change your answers.
With an adaptive exam, you need to develop a more in-depth strategy than simply “managing the clock.” Think about what you’ll do when you don’t know the answer to a question. How will you eliminate answer choices to make a better guess? What will you do if you start feeling overwhelmed with panic or anxiety? What if you find yourself losing focus or second-guessing yourself? Have a strategy to deal with these and other possible scenarios during the exam.
Take a Breather
The day before the exam, relax and plan for a comfortable night’s rest. If you’ve been cramming for the exam, set your study materials aside the day before the exam. At that point, you either know the material or you don’t!