Re: Contract Rates & CISSP or not

["Andy Nold" <anold () home com>]

Pooh, Pooh Mr. Crispin,
 I've been called a lot of complimentary and derogatory names in my careers
(three and contemplating a change), so repeating claims of "brilliant" and
"innovative" would be misleading, and might be wholly misleading. My
clearest self-imposed label is "mercenary". I've changed career tracks from
investment banking to corporate sales to technology, to match my maturation
in personality, personal time management, and to secure a stable
(lucrative)income.
Getting the CISSP was, IMHO, a project to prove a base level of technical,
security-oriented competence for people that were not capable -without
meeting me personally- of appreciating of my potential contribution. I would
offer that you reconsider your position of dismissing CISSPs at face value
since I didn't have a lobotomy as a requirement to take the CISSP exam.
With all respect and consideration,
Andy Nold
CISSP, CCNP, CCDP, MCSE -> with other certifications in other fields ; )
----- Original Message -----
From: "Crispin Cowan" <crispin () wirex com>
To: "Darren Reed" <darrenr () reed wattle id au>
Cc: "R. DuFresne" <dufresne () sysinfo com>; <chiman () hawaiian net>;
<firewall-wizards () nfr net>
Sent: Monday, November 26, 2001 3:08 PM
Subject: Re: [fw-wiz] Contract Rates & CISSP or not


> Darren Reed wrote:
>
> > One would hope that this would perhaps deter the snake oil security folk
> > from polluting the waters but there are guarantees in this world besides
> > death and taxes.
> "Death, Taxes, and Imperfect Software: Surviving the Inevitable".
> Crispin Cowan, Calton Pu, and Heather Hinton. Presented at the  New
> Security Paradigms Workshop 1998
> <http://www-hsc.usc.edu/%7Eessin/nspw98.html> . Postscript
> <http://www.cse.ogi.edu/%7Ecrispin/bugtol.ps.gz> 130 KB, PDF
> <http://www.cse.ogi.edu/%7Ecrispin/bugtol.pdf> 92 KB.  :-)
>
> > A different take on the CISSP issue is this: if people with the same
> > experience quote for the same job and the person with the CISSP gives
> > a somewhat higher quote (lets say $10/hr more), is the recruiter going
> > to go for the CISSP qualified person or the other?  I guess the question
> > I'm asking here is does the CISSP equate to X$/hr extra when it comes to
> > the consulting gig and if so, for what value of X ?
> Personally, I use CISSP as a filter for who *not* to hire, as in "if
> they have a CISSP, I don't hire them". Rationalle: we do advanced R&D,
> so I'm shopping for brilliance, not competence & willingness to do
> drugery with dilligence. The CISSP (hopefully :-) assures a minimum
> level of competence, but IMHO the social filter of those who seek such
> certification makes them unlikely to be a brilliant innovater.
>
> My position used to be much stronger: that certificates are for poseurs,
> give me a real degree or a Bugtraq pedigree, or don't bother. But I've
> mellowed in my old age :-)
>
> In summary, I still look at CISSP's (and other certificates that don't
> start with "Bachelor's" or similar) as a negative mark, which I'm
> willing to overlook if the other factors are strong. I certainly will
> not pay extra for it.
>
> Crispin
>
> --
> Crispin Cowan, Ph.D.
> Chief Scientist, WireX Communications, Inc. http://wirex.com
> Security Hardened Linux Distribution:       http://immunix.org
> Available for purchase: http://wirex.com/Products/Immunix/purchase.html
>
>
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