by Vik Malhi, CCIE Instructor with IPexpert Inc.
CCIE Voice Core Knowledge Open Ended Questions- storm in a teacup?
Vik Mahli
CCIE #13890, CCSI #31584, Senior Technical Instructor - IPexpert, Inc.
is one of the full-time CCIE instructors at IPexpert, teaching and developing products and courses for the CCIE Voice track. With over 10 years of IP Telephony training and consulting experience and a wealth of technical certifications, Vik has proven that he is one of the top Cisco CCIE Voice instructors and consultants in the world!
We are almost 6 months deep into the new format of the CCIE Voice Lab exam and after the initial apprehension that greeted the introduction of the short answer questions has this been a case of "storm in a teacup"?
Let's backtrack a little and look into the initial reasons why Cisco decided to make candidates endure an additional check- as if an 8 hour lab exam wasn't hard enough already. I am led to believe that whilst the majority of candidates sitting the lab (and the realm to which I am referring is the CCIE-Voice track) were either (a) undercooked or (b) sufficiently baked and were reliant on lady luck dealing them a reasonable hand, there were, how shall we say this, a small percentage of "discrepancies" that could not be accounted for. And so the 4 short answer / open ended / core knowledge questions were designed to add some degree of check and balance that was missing from the pure 8 hour lab format.
Has it worked? Who knows. But one thing for certain is that there isn't nearly the same volume of disgruntled candidates claiming that this was the *only* reason they succumbed to the lab.
The better question is how should one go about preparing themselves for what appears to be a pot luck section. I think it is important to stress that the questions are taken from a pool based on the CCIE Voice LAB blueprint. The grading is not automated. The proctor will read through the answers which must be typed and submitted before the documentation that accompanies candidates during their lab journey is made available.
It is also alleged that by preparing yourself for the CCIE Lab you, as a by-product, will also be preparing yourself for the 4 questions if you focus on the essential troubleshoot and debugging tools and commands. One can also familiarize oneself with the mandatory bedtime reading namely the relevant SRND's and other Cisco docs. These are absolutely essential and cannot be underestimated especially the UCM SRND, Features and Service Guide and CME Admin Guide.
One takeaway from the opening 6 months of OEQ is that if you are ready to pass the lab portion you are ready to answer the 4 questions. And the great thing is you only need 3 out of 4 correct answers!
IPexpert is a premier provider of Classroom and Self-Study Cisco CCNA (R&S, Voice & Security), CCNP, CCVP, CCSP and CCIE (R&S, Voice, Security & Service Provider) Certification Training with locations throughout the United States, Europe and Australia. Be sure to check out our online communities at www.ipexpert.com/communities
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