We caught up with one of our recent course delegates, Kevin Pattison, a former CISO with a wealth of experience in the area of IT Systems and Security who took part in a 5-day Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) training course tutored by Tom Brett of BSI and passed the CISSP exam first time around.
See what he had to say on BSI’s training below:
How did you come across BSI and why did you choose BSI training?
I found BSI on Google but chose them due to independent reviews from previous students, and logistical reasons.
How did you find the booking experience and general support?
The online booking experience was very simple and straightforward. It's clear that BSI practices what they teach as they didn't request any information that wasn't directly required to book the course.
How would you describe your experience of the training and trainer in particular?
The training was very comfortable and Tom was an excellent trainer. Despite the significant variance in experience and background of the six students, the trainer was able to include us all very well.
Tom offered perspectives that I had not considered on topics that were very familiar to me while encouraging students who would not have as much experience in these fields to ask questions at all times.
He made us all very comfortable and made us all laugh. He gave very practical advice on exam preparation and techniques, gave very good handouts and study material, and even the breaks between sessions were informative.
How did you find the course materials and course content?
The course content was a mile wide and an inch deep, which is exactly what the CISSP curriculum is. Tom gave a good high-level knowledge of every topic and only went in a little deeper either when there were questions about it, or it was a topic that the CISSP course required a little deeper understanding.
Did you feel the course adequately prepared you for the exam?
This isn't a really fair question because I don't think any classroom-based course, no matter how long, can prepare you for the CISSP exam. It did teach me the main things I needed to know and identified where I needed to spend my study efforts though, which I believe is the main reason I passed on the first attempt.
How well was the course catered for and did you find it easily accessible in terms of location?
The course was very well catered for. A very nice lunch was supplied by a different local restaurant each day. The tablet that was supplied to review course material was very useful for following the sessions each day. The location was very useful for me and well signposted.
Would you recommend to a friend/colleague and why?
I would highly recommend the course to a friend, and in fact, I already have! I'd also recommend it to a security team within an organization, even if they're not specifically targeting a CISSP certification as it teaches a broad range of best practices and will help instill a culture of security and best practice in any organisation.
Alongside our portfolio of information security and data protection training courses, we also offer structured on-site training, where our tutors deliver to teams in-house.
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