Advancements in technology and business process have led you to a path providing two options take the bunny slope or climb the mountain. If you take the bunny slope then you won’t need to worry about proving your knowledge, but if you want to scale that mountain you are going to have to learn the skills and prove that you can actually climb that mountain.

For many, the field of Information Technology promises to provide a stable and exciting environment, but in order to get into that field you must have certifications. The knowledge is such that you cannot simply trust one to say that they know all of the systems in question; you actually need to ask for proof. Proof can be provided in the form of certificates and designations.

For each major software vendor certifications exist that defines an individual’s ability to successfully administer, support and use the advanced features of the product. The IT marketplace now expects entrants to have one or more of these somewhat elusive certifications. Certifications are vendor specific and the IT professional may concentrate on one or more of the certifications from the vendors: CompTIA, Checkpoint, Cisco, Citrix, CIW, Microsoft, Novell, Oracle and Sun Microsystems.

A decision has been made; you have trained and studied for the exams leading to certification in one of the vendor’s programs. Not only do you know this material inside and out, you have also been applying the knowledge in your current job, why then are you nervous about the exam?

It is not uncommon to be apprehensive about taking an exam, for many their minds see the testing situation as proof positive of your brilliance or your incompetence. Further, your mind begins to anticipate how your boss and coworkers will react when they find out just how brilliant or stupid you really are.

Despite the fear, you have made the decision to write the exam. You have taken the day off work and are a bundle of nerves by the time you arrive at the testing centre. In moments your life will be decided, or so you think, as you walk into a testing room ready to prove your skills and merits for a piece of paper. It has all come down to another test, you wrote so many of them in school that you probably thought that you would never have to write another exam as long as you lived.

Today is the day; you have decided that you are ready to take one of your exams. You have studied long and hard, hoping that your brain absorbed all the intricacies of the program in question. You walk into the testing centre and approach with your driver’s license in hand, proof positive that it is really you, even though nobody thinks their drivers picture remotely looks like him or her. If you are brave, you will get the pain of paying for the exam out of the way first, it helps to reinforce the concept that you aren’t going to bail on the exam; you paid for it you write it!

As you are led to a cubicle to take your exam you start to mentally go through the information in your head, problem is if you don’t know it now it is really too late to worry about.

There are two types of tests, those wonderful multiple choices, more commonly referred to as "multiple guess" or in a more comical light; "two wrongs don’t make a right and one left over". The second type of exam presents a task that you must complete. As easy as this may seem, it proves to be anything but easy.. The software that provides the testing is programmed to accept a limited number of ‘correct’ methodologies for completing any one task. So somewhat unjustly you may find your score reduced due to not choosing one of the recorded options.

Sitting at the desk you take a deep breath and await the signal to start the exam. You studied for this and you know your stuff, then why do you feel that failure is inevitable? It is a wonderful trick that the human mind likes to play on its owner. While it is true that you know your information and how to apply it, you allow yourself to be caught up in the fear and anticipation of the test.

If you are uncomfortable taking multiple choice exams, your mind may be playing the tape that says ‘multiple choice, I can’t do multiple choice – I always choose the wrong answer or change my answers – this is going to be terrible.”

If you are taking the exam that relies on completion of tasks, your mind may be playing a tape that says ‘oh great – I don’t do things the way the manuals say, I’m up the creek without a paddle’. Either way you are providing a barrier to your success.

Some individuals do not have the same concern when they sit down, to write their exams as they have a high level of self-confidence and do not even acknowledge that there is a chance of failure. Since the level of doubt is all but non-existent, these individuals have a clear window to seeing the exam without the haze of failure clouding their thought processes.

The moment of truth and the exam results pop up on your screen, they don’t even have the decency to provide an “I’m too chicken to look” option, the information is bold and burning into your eyeballs.

At that point only you, your computer testing environment and the test administrator know if the overwhelming sense of failure was accurate or inaccurate. In truth it doesn’t matter what the result was and it is important to remember that you prepared for the exam, scheduled it, paid for it and wrote it. Those are major accomplishments that should not be diminished by the outcome of the exam.

Sure we would all like to be able to ace every exam, but the truth of the matter is that we often learn far more by not “passing” an exam. The only tip I can give you is to try to enjoy the testing process, it is a personal challenge and it is not a matter of life or death. Many people re-take exams on more than one occasion before they finally get their certifications.

Remember to remove the word failure from your vocabulary and then you won't need to worry that it will pop into you head at some inopportune time.