CISSP Study Strategy

Initially I struggled to decide what would be the best approach for this exam & took different initiatives. (Read one chapter, went through YouTube Videos) but as soon as I move on to the new chapter my concepts from previous chapter start to fade away. Even though all of those helps, It was difficult me to judge whether those thing covered what I suppose to know.

The CISSP exam covers eight domains from the (ISC)² Common Body of Knowledge (CBK):

1. Security and Risk Management
2. Asset Security
3. Security Engineering
4. Communications and Network Security
5. Identity and Access Management
6. Security and Assessment Testing
7. Security Operations
8. Software Development Security

At the end I realized the following strategy best suited me in preparing for this exam.

1. Focus only on “ONE DOMAIN” at a time:
   • Correlate each concept with Real-world Case study.  – To stitch the concepts with my brain.
   • Inculcate a habit of Speaking CISSP language frequently.
   • Make use of “Sybex Official Study Guide 8th Ed”
2. Revising the Concepts every next day : This exam consists tons of theoretical concepts which is very hard to digest at times. Hence “Revision again and again is my Key”
3. Practice sample questions : After all practice sample questions available on the web or in books just to verify my understandings and search on the topics case by case.
4. Buddy up with peers who passed this Exam or even appearing for this exam : I had great group discussions with people who recently passed this exam & also studying for this exam in which we could review the domains together and talk over the things we did not understand. This kind of exam preparation is useful because I can take advice and guides from other people who are about to take the exam, even over drinks while sitting in a bar. D’not worry if one does not have a Buddy – “I am always available” 🙂

Therefore, my preparation process would be by going through each domain one after another in the study guides to make sure I understand the language of the exam, the content of the questions and the concepts CISSP aims to teach.

Please feel free to contribute with your own Strategy of Study & feedback. After all as I mentioned Its a Journey, and it gets easier if one proceed in a Swarm.