Can I Take CCIE R&S Written Exam Directly?

The Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert Routing and Switching which is also known as the CCIE R&S is considered to be the most prestigious networking certifications in the IT industry. CCIE R&S holders are regarded as the best at networking because of their expert network engineering skills and are highly sought out individuals in the job market. According to Cisco, the CCIE certification holders are going to be represented less than three percentages of all certified Cisco professionals and less than one percent of the networking professionals across the globe. CCIEs are deployed into the most technically challenging network assignments even paid up top dollars for the work which they do.

Many candidates start out their CCIE R&S journey started out with an inspiration to join this elite group of networking professionals. It is considered to be a long and bumpy road but if you are ready to do hard work with persistence, you can achieve your dream of achieving this certification. I have heard from lots of mouths that the aspirants who have gained the training through the SPOTO, have eased up their journey quite a lot.

Once you have cleared the CCNA, you would understand better. On paper, it would make no sense to even do CCNA or CCNP, since CCIE R&S is considered as the best one, and any employer really wouldn't care much if you have acquired your CCNA at that point. But people have a hard enough time getting through the CCNA alone, which is considered about 1/50th of the way there.

Being Prepared:

What do you plan to do in the meantime while you are studying for all of this? A CCIE without any experience is considered as pretty well useless. It’s not like a medical degree where you could start practicing right after you come out of school. A network engineer has been the most demanding IT job in a company IMO, and a large bank/multibillion dollar company isn't just going to hand over the keys to someone who has only read some books and passed a lab. So it is better to gain some experience in the relevant field before you enroll yourself in the IT Sector. 

Taking CCIE R&S Directly:

Though the candidates could take the CCIE R&S directly, the CCNP would prove to be very useful to provide you some of the more advanced structure before you move ahead to the CCIE R&S. It will help you out to solidify some of the more advanced things which you haven’t used in a while. No doubt doing direct CCIE R&S is possible, but it is advisable to do it after achieving CCNP. 

The logical, as well as a useful way of progression of Cisco Certification, is CCNA - CCNP - CCIE as it would help you to move in a logical career progression. The CCNA would help you out to gain your foot in the door for entry-level positions so that you could start getting the experience that you are going to need to become a true IT Engineer. 

Surely you could skip taking exams of CCNA and CCNP. Like that, you will save lots of money as well as time. But, don't skip the learning part of the CCNA and CCNP. Be very strong and thorough with the fundamentals. You are required to be very confident about each and every concept. You won’t require remembering commands, as no one can. But you should understand the logic behind each and every method. Think of problems and try to come up with the solutions on your own. Analyze by yourself why one solution that you have given is better suited than the other. Otherwise, there is no utilization of CCIE certification. 

So, whichever path you select, I would recommend you to have the expert training offered by the SPOTO, in order to ease up your CCIE Journey.