From: Gary Duncanson (gary.duncanson@googlemail.com)
Date: Wed Jan 16 2008 - 05:31:55 ARST
David,
Good luck with that. Any time off you can get to dedicate to your studies
will help you. The problem you will have is justifying it to your boss.
Unless you are prepared to take your chances contracting make sure you keep
your employer onside. Work something out with your boss which is sensible
and doesn't strain your working relationship because if your CCIE plans go
south you will most probably still want to have a job there. At the same
time work as often as you can evenings and weekends. Even with a month off
work to prepare you will find an August date aggressive if you expect to be
truly ready for it. Things may easily run into 2009 so an understanding
employer is crucial.
Good Luck
Gary
----- Original Message -----
From: "David Altoft" <davidaltoft@googlemail.com>
To: "Joseph Brunner" <joe@affirmedsystems.com>
Cc: <ccielab@groupstudy.com>
Sent: Tuesday, January 15, 2008 10:28 AM
Subject: Re: Time off to Study
> Hi Joe, I like the Tuesday-Thursday off idea but I think that would be
> harder for me to justify to my manager. I'm in IT and we are in a small
> team of 4 FTE's and a contractor so only working 2 days a week would be
> harder, if I went for a 2 month stretch or a 2 x 1month stretches (which I
> actually think is a better idea) it may be easier to justify as we would
> potentially redistribute the work load and would be a shorter disruption
> ie
> 2 months off vs 4-6months of 2-3 day weeks.
>
>
>
> I have a bit of a lab that I used for CCIP and the written and I was ok
> until recently but work has become a lot heavier and will continue that
> way
> for the foreseeable future. I have an August lab date booked in Brussels
> and
> to have any hope of keeping that date, I have to learn a lot between now
> and
> then and nights & weekends won't get me there.
>
>
>
> The issue with taking the time off is that having a CCIE is not a pre-rec
> for this job, we aren't doing the level of work. Whether I was to stay
> after
> I passed the LAB would depend on what opportunities were created for me,
> if
> I would be doing the same kind of work then I may start looking elsewhere.
> The other option is to resign and then get a contract in 2months time
> after
> my bulk study, though knowing that I have a job in 2 months to come back
> to
> is comforting and would let me focus entirely on my study.
>
>
>
> Thanks for the advice, I still need to talk to my manager but this gives
> me
> a few different things discuss ie shorter week, 1 month at a time, 2
> months
> together. It shows that I am committed to my study but I am also
> considering
> the organisation and not just my own interests.
>
>
>
> - David
>
>
> On 1/15/08, Joseph Brunner <joe@affirmedsystems.com> wrote:
>>
>> I recommend (and I followed) take Tuesday-Thursday off. So you have the 3
>> middle days of the week to completely dive into your studies. This gives
>> you
>> the weekend to be less serious about your studies (as humans naturally
>> are
>> going to be). Its very hard to say "I'll just study after work, or on
>> weekends". You'll probably never get anything done that way. One thing
>> that
>> worked wonderfully for me in the last week before the week of an attempt,
>> was coming in to work at 4am and cracking full-steam until 12pm noon. It
>> gave me my best biologically inclined focus hours to the task at hand (or
>> the 30+ in each IE WB VOL 2 lab).
>>
>> I used the afternoon on those days to review the doc cd (and surrounding
>> areas) for everything I faced in my lab that day. Also I recommend NOT
>> doing
>> a multicast/qos/security ONLY day. I think that softens your triathlon
>> ability you'll need to call in the real lab. You need to equally as good
>> with all facets of the CCIE coin.
>>
>> Be very serious about telling your employer that "this trains pulling out
>> of
>> the station" meaning its going to happen for me. The only question is
>> whether I'm going to stick around after it happens. I'm sure you boss can
>> put his ego in a tick-tack box long enough for you to grow up into a
>> CCIE.
>>
>> -Joe
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: nobody@groupstudy.com [mailto:nobody@groupstudy.com] On Behalf Of
>> David Altoft
>> Sent: Sunday, January 13, 2008 1:41 PM
>> To: ccielab@groupstudy.com
>> Subject: OT: Time off to Study
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>> Does anyone have any thoughts/experiences on taking time off work to
>> study?
>> I am contemplating taking 2 months off work to study, though I am yet to
>> approach my employer. I'm not sure whether it would be an effective use
>> of
>> time or whether I would burn out after a few weeks of constant study. The
>> other option is that I use the money that I would have lost by not
>> working
>> and spend it on a bootcamp, though realistically being at the beginning
>> of
>> my study rather than towards the end, I'm not sure how beneficial a
>> bootcamp
>> would be. I have the IE work book and CoD so I would rather spend the
>> time
>> working through those and doing some labs.
>>
>> I am aware of the financial impact that this will have but I am finding
>> that
>> there aren't enough hours in the day to make serious headway in the
>> material
>> that I need to cover for the lab. I can imagine that most people in this
>> group are suffering the same time scheduling problems and wanted to hear
>> from anyone that has taken time off to study and whether they found it
>> useful or not.
>>
>> Thanks,
>> David
>>
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