I know, it sounds scary asking that question as a Microsoft Certified Trainer but I think it does need to be asked. For those of you who don't know, Microsoft is taking a "new direction" with their certifications. Instead of having "premier" certs like the MCSE or the MCSD they are now offering shorter and more specialized choices like the MCTS or the MCITP. I don't think I like that.

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So we have arrived at my last reason for failure and I think it is sometimes the most difficult one to deal with. So difficult in fact, that over the next few columns I will be trying to address examples so that you can better understand this problem. Many people fail because they simply don't understand what Microsoft is looking for.

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Continuing on my theme that we can "make our own luck" to a certain extent, I want to touch on one of my main weaknesses when it comes to taking any type of standardized test including Microsoft exams. I am a big victim of second guessing. I look at a question, I get a gut instinct answer and I should be happy. I'm not. I look at it. I read more into it. I assume that they might have meant something different than I originally thought.

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Last entry we talked about bad luck being your downfall in an exam. While I think that is a problem, I tend to believe that we make our own luck. My next two entries will be dealing with things that we do, that some people look at as "bad luck" but really are just our own lack of preparation or belief in our own potential. The first is nerves.

I have taken around 30 Microsoft exams. I have studied for and passed most of them the first time. Guess what?

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There are a lot of things that can derail your success in an exam. A lot of them you can prepare for but there are going to be times when all of you preparations fail and things just go poorly for you. In other words, you are a victim of bad luck.

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So if you read my last entry, you know that I feel that not having enough practical experience (I have never liked the phrase "real world"...it sounds too philosophical) is a possible reason for failing an exam.  The funny thing is the opposite is also true.  In other words, too much experience and not enough book knowledge is a prescription for failure too!

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How else can you fail a Certification Exam? It is time for reason number two. I think a big weakness that people run into is too much "book" knowledge and not enough "applied understanding" of the technologies involved.

I get plenty of students that have never run a network or never written their own programs in my classes. I am happy to try to get them to understand as much as possible about the subject at hand but only so much can be done in five days. I can teach someone how DNS works or how to write and read from a file in VB code but the theory isn't enough. There has to be some practice work or you can be easily fooled by some of Microsoft's questions.

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I think it is time to start looking at how to get you to be able to pass your exams. I think the best way to do that is to give you a list of things that can cause you to fail. I am going to be looking at each thing in a different entry so we can spend a few paragraphs talking about how it happens, why it happens and how to prevent/deal with it. As of now, I have thought of seven things that can happen to anyone while taking any certification test. If I think of more (or have more suggested) we will tackle them too.

So, the No. 1 reason why people fail -- one I see all the time -- poor time management.

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I decided to make my first blog entry of 2008 just be a few wishes for the new year in the hopes that Microsoft notices. The other hope is if enough of you agree and maybe make mention of them so that some changes may be brought about.

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Since we are trying to answer common questions, I wanted to make a quick mention on THE biggest topic of conversation every few years. Should I get certified on the present version or should I wait until the new version comes out. This is especially important now since Visual Studio 2008 was just released and Windows 2008 is on the horizon.

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What makes the question from yesterday a trick question? A trick question is one that can be interpreted in more than one way. The answer to it can be very different depending on just a few words. Let me show you what I mean.

As written, the correct answer is b...6g. The problem is there are two ways to get the same answer. I tried to make it a bit simpler because I didn't want the example to be a math question. The thing you have to think about though is what if instead of 2g on the first drive, we only had 1g. What would the answer be then?

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Over the years I have heard it said many times that some people feel that Microsoft uses trick questions in its exams. For the most part I think this isn't true. I think that their questions are tough and take a bit of thought to get the right answer sometimes but if you really know the subject in question, there shouldn't be a problem (except in case of taking the exam in a non native language, always try to take it in your language whenever possible). There is one example where I think Microsoft can be unfair in the wording of their question. That is what we will look at today.

In one or two exams in my past, there has been a question related to striped volumes that I feel can be worded in such a way as to be misleading. It goes something like this....

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I wanted to expand a bit on my last post where I mentioned that Microsoft asks questions about the exceptions. I don't just mean errors or things crashing. While they do want you to be able to handle those issues, there are other concerns. There are known problems (more commonly called "features") that crop up in day to day operations that can cause endless frustration when trying to support a network UNLESS you already know them. That is the topic for today.

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The most powerful tool in the arsenal of trying to pass any certification test is knowing what is going to be asked. There are three main ways to do this. The easy way is to just go to Microsoft's web site and look up the exam. You can do that here. You can check by number or by certification. The different exam skills that are being tested are listed there.

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Most of what I do in IT is a lot of fun to me but there is one part of my chosen field that is a bit of a hassle. I have never enjoyed going to customer sites.

 The great majority of my classes are run in my office in midtown Manhattan but on rare occasions I have to travel to a customer's location to teach a class in their own training facility. One of the main reasons I don't like it is I lose control of the environment. In my office, we do the setup, we maintain the hardware and we know what has been done to things before we even start the class. At someone else's office I have no real ability to guarantee that things are the way they should be other than through trial and error while I am testing/running the class.

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I was asked recently about the value of some of Microsoft's online learning classes and if they are worth it from a getting certified point of view. I have only looked at the ones Microsoft has offered for free so I can't say for sure how good they are but what I have seen has gotten my attention. Here is a link to one of their free offerings as an example:

https://www.microsoftelearning.com/eLearning/offerDetail.aspx?offerPriceId=127516

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I really can't tell you how to study. You know how you learn best. What I can tell you is what I do. My preparation for taking an exam uses three things. The first is I read through all the course material at least twice paying special attention to anything that Microsoft marks as important or that is listed as an exception.  In my years of taking Microsoft exams, those tend to be where they find questions.

The second thing I do is try to do all the practices and labs again. I try to do things a bit differently. I try to push the directions and do things a little differently so I can maybe break something and try to fix it. This helps me become more familiar with the tools and os itself.

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Ok, our imaginary certification candidate has looked into schools and decided what classes to take to get the certification they want. They have spent a lot of money and now they want to make sure that they can get everything possible out of their classes.  What do they need to do?  I have a few suggestions.

The first and what should be most obvious is to GO TO CLASS!

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I know it has been a week since my last entry. I do plan on continuing with my advice on taking classes but I just got back from a very good weekend in Florida. It wasn't a conference or a convention or even a class. I went to meet friends and had a great time.

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So you want to take a class and NOT waste your money. What do you need to do?

The first thing is find the right school. The best places to go use Microsoft Certified materials as their main courseware. They might supplement it with their own books but I think it is important to have the information that Microsoft has decided is important in your quest for a passing grade. I really believe that you need to learn their info because it is their operating system/software. I think they know things about I that others might not. I feel that will serve you not only on the exams but when you are working in the field in the future.

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