How To Earn Your CCNP Certification

By Chris Bryant, CCIE #12933

It is not the critic who counts,
nor the man who points out how the strong man stumbled,
or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.
The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena,
whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood;
who strives valiantly;
who errs and comes short again and again;
who knows great enthusiasms, great devotions;
who spends himself in a worthy cause;
who, at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement,
and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly,
so that his place shall never be with those timid souls
who know neither victory nor defeat.
       - Theodore Roosevelt

Welcome to How To Pass The CCNP ! I’m Chris Bryant, CCIE #12933, and I’ve been on the same path you’re on right now. Whether you’re working on your first CCNP exam or your last, this article will help you create a plan for absolute success on each of your exam days!

Notice that I said “each of your exam days”. Most CCNP candidates face a four-exam path to this coveted certification. Before we begin working on your plan to get to the CCNP, let’s take a quick look at the different testing options.

Path One: Four Exams

Path Two: Three Exams

The first choice you’ve got to make is which one of these two paths you’re going to take. My personal recommendation is that you take the four-exam path.

For those of you who have read my How To Pass The CCNA ebook, I recommend to CCNA candidates that they take the Intro and ICND exams separately, simply because there’s so much information you’re responsible for on the CCNA composite exam.

That advice applies here as well. There is more than enough information to learn for the two exams when taken separately. I encourage you to take the four-exam path.

Whichever path you choose, the next step is the same. I chose a pyramid for The Bryant Advantage’s logo to emphasize that learning Cisco technologies (really, learning anything) is much like building a pyramid. When you look at one of the Great Pyramids Of Egypt, you tend to look at the peak. However, without a solid foundation, that pyramid wouldn’t last thousands of seconds, much less thousands of years.

According to the Cisco Learning Pyramid, the CCNP is the middle layer of a three-level pyramid, with the CCNA as the foundation.

Before attempting to build on this foundation by earning your CCNP, solidify the foundation. Review everything you studied for the CCNA, and I mean everything.

This step involves being very honest with yourself. Did you have a particular weak spot that you happened to get by with on the CCNA exam? Cisco exams are very good, but they’re not perfect. My point is that if you have a weak spot, or a technology you’re not comfortable with, that weakness is truly going to be exposed at the CCNP level.

These weak spots will cost you dearly on the CCNP Troubleshooting exam. Fix them now, not later.

It’s better to fix a weakness now rather than waiting until after a $125 exam. Take a strong, honest look at your Cisco skill set, and make a list of any areas that you need to strengthen your skills in.

Starting On Your CCNP Success Path

First, you need to decide to succeed.

Sounds like common sense, doesn’t it? That’s because it is. However, I see Cisco certification candidates at every level decide to fail. They’re already programming themselves for failure, and you must not do this.

Too many Cisco certification candidates take a hesitant, “maybe I’ll fail” approach to their study.  You must eliminate this attitude and replace it with a “I have passed” approach.  Act as though you have already passed, and your passing score on exam day is a foregone conclusion.  When you show up on exam day, you're already a CCNA; you're just there to make it official.

I spend 15 – 45 minutes a day writing down my goals for the day, the month, and the year.  I have found that writing down my goals cements them in my mind, and your mind is the world’s most powerful computer.   By reminding yourself on a daily basis that you are going to pass the exam, you actually program your mind for success. 

If you’re not writing your goals down on a daily basis, you’re missing a great method of accelerating your life and your career.  It takes 15 minutes a day, and it’s the best investment you’ll ever make.

You must show up on exam day with the attitude that you have already passed the exam. You’re simply there to make it official.

The truth is, you DO pass or fail before you show up on exam day. The exam is simply a tool that gives you feedback on your efforts to that point. We’ve all seen Cisco exam-takers sitting in the lobby of the testing center, or in their car, frantically going over their notes.

You will avoid this last-minute “cramming” by planning your study time NOW, and following through on that plan. You don’t pass on exam day; you pass every single time you turn off the TV and study; you pass every single time you get your hands on real Cisco equipment; you pass every time you make a sacrifice of your personal time to invest that time in study.

Developing Your Study Plan

One question often asked by CCNP candidates is “what order should I take the exams in?” I recommend you consider this order:

• Building Scalable Cisco Internetworks

• Building Cisco Multilayer Switched Networks

• Building Cisco Remote Access Networks

• Cisco Internetwork Troubleshooting

My reasoning is that you’re already familiar with many of the topics covered in the first two exams from your CCNA studies. While the final order is up to you, I highly recommend you take the Troubleshooting exam last. It’s a difficult exam, and you’ll need your solid CCNA foundation along with everything you learn while studying for your first three exams in order to pass it.

Don’t get me wrong: the Troubleshooting exam can certainly be passed. However, it’s difficult to troubleshoot a technology that you haven’t really studied yet. Leave the Troubleshooting exam for last.

Schedule your exam now. Today. Right now.

From experience, I can tell you that this technique works as well at the CCNP level as it does at the CCNA level. People complain about timetables and deadlines, but the truth is that people do their best work with a deadline. Pressure is not necessarily a bad thing.

Schedule Your Study Time, And Track It.

Ever hear anyone describe their study time like this?

“I studied for the CCNP for five months and failed!”

Do not make the mistake of measuring your study time in months.

It means nothing when someone expresses their study time in months, but you hear people do it all the time. It’s a totally inaccurate way of measuring how much studying you’ve done, and it’s also a good way to fool yourself as to how much work you’ve actually put in.

I’ve used this example before, but it bears repeating. Sam studies 90 minutes a day, six days a week. His study time is quiet and uninterrupted. Sam does this for eight weeks.

Bill studies 45 minutes a day, six days a week. His study consists of studying in front of the TV, and taking phone calls and instant messages while thumbing through a book. Bill does this for twelve weeks.

Over two months, Sam puts in 72 hours of solid study.

Over two months, Bill puts in 54 hours of subpar study.

Yet Bill will cry, “I’ve studied for three months!”

Make a commitment to study “x” minutes a day, stick to it, make sure your study is uninterrupted, and track your study time. You’re much better off to get six hours of quality study time a week than to get 10 hours a week of constantly interrupted time.

You can track your time using Excel, or even Notepad. Every day, write down how much time you spend studying and the topic(s) you studied. You HAVE to write this down. Not only will you have an accurate picture of how much study you’re putting in, you’ll be able to make sure that you’ve spent adequate time on every exam topic.

Keep Your Goals Away From The Trolls!

It’s a sad fact of life that not all your friends or coworkers are going to support your decision to pursue the CCNP.

I’m reminded of a person I worked with years ago who walked by my cube and saw a Cisco certification book on my desk. She then spend ten minutes telling me why certification stink, anybody can get them, there’s a three-month-old baby in Texas that has an MCSE, blah blah blah….

You know the interesting thing? She would tell anyone who asked her (and plenty of people who didn’t!) that certifications didn’t mean anything. Know how many she had? None.

There are two reasons that these trolls will badmouth your certification pursuits. First, they’re threatened by your ambition. Second, they’re not doing anything with their career or their time, and they’re not comfortable around someone who IS doing something to advance their career and their life.

And these people are EVERYWHERE. I don’t care what Internet forum you go to, or what certification you’re after; when you declare you intentions, there will be people lining up to tell you that it won’t work and you’re wasting your time.

Keep your goals away from these trolls. Do not spend time with these people, whether it’s in person or on the Net. Study after study shows that professional computer certifications, particularly Cisco certifications, are definitely worth pursuing.

Carrying Out Your Study Plan

You’ve scheduled your exam; you’ve created a document to track your study time; you’ve planned exactly when you’re going to study. Now this plan must be carried out, without exception.

What exceptions? Cell phones. Instant messages. Televisions. Significant others. The list can go on and on.

It’s one thing to have a plan, and it’s an important thing. Now you’ve got to make sure you carry it out to its fullest potential.

That’s easy to say until you’re studying and a friend calls, or you remember that TV show you really wanted to watch is on tonight, or a friend sends you an instant message while you’re studying for your exam.

You MUST make these sacrifices to achieve your CCNP. To paraphrase the Marine Corps slogan, the pain of missing a TV show is VERY temporary, but the pride of passing your CCNA with flying colors is forever.

TV will be there when you’re done studying. Your significant other will be there when you’re done studying. And believe it or not, you do not cease to exist when you turn your cell phone off. J Turn the phone off, turn your TV off, turn your pager off, turn your instant messenger service off. The world can survive without communicating with you for an hour or two. Remember, it’s better to have 90 minutes of great study than 180 minutes of constantly interrupted study.

Budgeting Your Study Time

CCNP study consists of time spent studying book, taking practice exams, and spending time working with Cisco equipment. Let’s take a look at these three categories.

Book Study: I’ve never understood why some people (usually the trolls we were talking about earlier, or a close relative) talk about book study like it’s a bad thing. “You can’t learn about technology from books”, they say.

What a load of manure THAT is. You have to learn theory before you can understand how a router, switch, or protocol operates. The best way to learn theory is to read a good book, preferably more than once!

Practice Exams: Practice exams are good in moderation, but don’t use them as your main focus of study. On occasion, I’m asked for CCNA or CCNP study tips by candidates who have taken the exams and haven’t passed yet. I ask them what they’re doing to prepare, and they reel off a list of practice exams they’ve purchased.

Don’t fall into this trap. Practice exams are fine if used as a readiness check, but some candidates just take them over and over again, which renders the basically useless. Combine that with the fact that some practice exams cost $200 and up! That’s money you’d be better off spending on real Cisco equipment.

Lab Time On Real Cisco Equipment. Again, I speak from experience: This is the most important part of getting your CCNP, excelling in the real world, and laying the foundation for your CCIE studies.

Even if you have no interest in the CCIE, you’ve GOT to have real hands-on knowledge for the CCNP exams. The only way to develop troubleshooting skills is to work on the real deal, not on “router simulators”.

A simulator is a software program pretending to be a router. You’re not interested in being a “pretend” CCNP; you want to be a real CCNP with real knowledge of routers and switches.

Besides, as someone who’s done plenty of screwing up in a lab, I can tell you… you do your best learning when you screw something up and you have to fix it yourself.

That’s how you develop your troubleshooting skills! You can read about all the show and debug commands you want, and play with them on simulators, but you don’t really understand how things work on Cisco equipment until you’re working with the real thing.

This is true at every level of the Cisco learning pyramid. I can show you the show ip protocols output, or what a BGP routing table looks like, and you might remember it for a little while. But when you use it for real, you WILL remember it.

You can either build your own home lab, or rent remote rack time. I have several articles on my website that will help you put a home lab together.

One way or the other, there is no better way to develop the self-confidence and troubleshooting skills that you must have to pass the CCNP exams and excel in the real world than to configure real Cisco routers and switches.

Working with real Cisco equipment will help you get past what I call “simulator question anxiety”. If you spend any time on CCNP internet forums, you’ll see discussion after discussion about these exam questions. (Reminder: It’s an NDA violation to discuss Cisco exam questions.) To a certain point, this concern is justified; the simulator questions carry more weight on your exams than any other question, and you’ve got to get them right or you will most likely fail the exam.

There’s no reason to be anxious about them if you’re prepared, though! You don’t want to be the person who walks into the exam room in terror of these questions. You want to be the person who walks in confident in their ability to perform any CCNP-level task. The only way to get there is to work with real Cisco equipment.

The Big Day Approaches…

As exam day nears, you know you are on your way to success because you have already completed these steps:

At this point, some CCNP candidates are panicking. They start “cramming”, hoping they can jam all that information into their heads in the last minute.

This is a study technique that needs to be left behind when you leave high school. Cramming for exams is for teenagers. You’re a professional, in a professional field. You do not cram, because you don’t have to. You made a plan and stuck to it.

Now as we approach exam day, use these techniques to maximize your effort.

First, get lots of rest. LOTS of rest. A well-rested candidate is a successful candidate.

Second, if you are not familiar with the location of the testing center, drive to it several days before the exam. The last thing you want to do is drive around like a mad person the day of your exam, trying to find the testing center. (Or, as happened to a friend of mine that the testing center had moved to the other side of town!)

If you have a morning appointment, make sure you allow for rush hour traffic patterns. There’s one testing center in my city that takes 15 minutes for me to get to, except for one hour in the morning – if I go then, it takes 40 minutes. Allow for rush hour!

Do NOT rely on MapQuest or any other “driving directions” website the morning of the exam. They’ve been known to be wrong. (Trust me on this.) Call the center and ask for directions. Many testing centers have directions to the center on their website, but it’s always best to call.

Mentally rehearse your success. See yourself passing the exam, because that is exactly what you are going to do.

Finally, take a practice exam the same way you’ll take the real exam. Time yourself, use a pen and paper, and use only 40 – 50 questions.

(By the way – there is no scientific calculator available to Cisco certification candidates in the exam room. You have to know how to perform conversions involving hexadecimal, decimal, and binary numbers. Get as much practice on this as you can. CCNP exams place an emphasis on VLSM.)

The Day Of The Exam

Today, all the planning and work you’ve done for your CCNP exam pays off. You wake up confident and ready to go, because you’ve followed these steps and you know passing the exam is a foregone conclusion.

There are still things you can do to maximize your chances of success!

Show up on time.   Yes, I know everyone says that.  The testing center wants you there 30 minutes early.  So why do so many candidates show up late, or in a rush? Again, if you have a morning exam appointment, make sure to allow for rush hour traffic.

Use the headphones.   Most candidates in the room with you understand that they should be quiet.  Sadly, not all of them do.  Smacking gum, mumbling to themselves (loud enough for you to hear, though), and other little noises can really get on your nerves in what is already a pressure situation.  In one particular testing center I use, the door to the testing room has one setting: "Slam!". 

Luckily, that center also has a headset hanging at every testing station.  Call ahead to see if yours does.   Some centers have them but don't leave them at the testing stations.  Wearing headphones during the exam is a great way to increase your powers of concentration. They allow you to block out all noise and annoyances, and do what you came to do -- pass the exam.

Prepare for the "WHAT??" question.     No matter how well-prepared you are, there may be one question on any Cisco exam that just stuns you.   It might be off-topic, in your opinion; it may be a question that would take 10 of your remaining 15 minutes to answer; it might be a question that you don't even know how to begin answering. (It could also be a beta question. Beta questions don’t count toward your exam score, but you’re also not told when a question is a beta!) I have talked with Cisco exam candidates who got to such a question and were obviously so thrown off that they didn't do well on any of the remaining questions, either.

There is only one thing to do in this situation:  shrug it off.  Compare yourself to a major-league pitcher.  If he gives up a home run, he can't dwell on it; he's got to face another batter.  Cornerbacks in football face the same problem; if they give up a long TD pass, they can't spend the next 20 minutes thinking about it.  They have to shrug it off and be ready for the next play.

Don't worry about getting a perfect score on the exam.  Your concern is passing. If you get a question that seems ridiculous, unsolvable, or out of place, forget about it.  It's done.  Move on to the next question and nail it.

Finish with a flourish.  Ten questions from the end of your exam, take a 15-to-30 second break.   You can't walk around the testing room, but you can stand and stretch.  By this point in the exam, candidates tend to be a little mentally tired.  Maybe you're still thinking about the "WHAT??" question.  Don't worry about the questions you've already answered -- they're done.   Take a deep breath, remember why you're there -- to pass this exam -- and sit back down and nail the last ten questions to the wall. 

There is one final piece of advice I’d like to give you for exam day:

BE AGGRESSIVE!

You’re in that testing room for one reason: to PASS .

Occasionally I hear someone say that they’re taking an exam “just to see what it’s like”. That’s not a winning attitude. You’re not there to see what it’s like; you’re there to pass so you don’t have to see it again.

Would you work on a router or switch with the attitude of “let’s just see what happens”? Not on my network. Go in the testing room with an aggressive attitude. You’ve planned; you’ve studied; you’ve sacrificed. You’re ready to seize your destiny and pass the exam.

We play the game to win the game.

We take the exam to pass the exam.

And from someone who’s been there – there is no feeling in the world like seeing “PASS” on that computer screen!

Some Final Exam Tips

CCNP candidates have taken a Cisco exam before, but remind yourself of these exam rules:

The Cisco certification program has made tremendous professional success possible for me. That success is waiting for you. By following the plan I’ve laid out for you in this ebook, you can begin creating the foundation for an incredible future.

To your success,

Chris Bryant

CCIE #12933

chris@thebryantadvantage.com