Preparing for a Microsoft exam
Microsoft certification exams follow a role-based approach, with a focus on areas of tech based on either your current role or a role that you would like to pursue. Two incredible resources that can be used to plan both your certification path as well as your career progression are found at the following links:
There is a multitude of ways to prepare for any Microsoft exam and each of us approaches this differently, from hands-on learning, microlearning, and reading books to taking practice evaluations or instructor-led courses to help grow our current skillsets. I recommend the following three-step process for preparing for Microsoft exams, so let’s review the steps together.
Step 1 – Reviewing the exam skills outline
When any new Microsoft certification exams are published to the public, one of the first questions I ask myself is is this exam right for me and my career? Starting with the exam page for the exam you are pursuing, you will quickly find details at the top of the page indicating what skills and expertise you should have or want to gain. Let’s start by reviewing the details for the AZ-801 exam together by navigating to the following link: https://docs.microsoft.com/learn/certifications/exams/az-801.
This screenshot shows the details for the AZ-801 Microsoft certification exam:
Figure 1.1 – Exam AZ-801 overview page
This AZ-801 exam is a part of the requirements for the Microsoft Certified: Windows Server Hybrid Administrator Associate certification, and it requires a related AZ-800 exam to achieve the Associate certification. Note that we will focus only on the exam objectives of the AZ-801 exam.
Step 2 – Review the skills measured and practice to improve your skills
As you continue to scroll down the exam page, you will find the Skills Measured section, giving the exam participant an overall view of what high-level skills are being validated. Each objective shown in the following screenshot is weighted on a scale and, depending on the type of question, may span multiple objectives in the same question:
Figure 1.2 – Exam AZ-801 skills measured
Step 3 – Identify additional learning materials
Scrolling further down on the exam page for AZ-801, you will find an additional section that provides two ways to prepare for your exam – online (free) learning through Microsoft Learn and instructor-led (paid) learning. These two separate resources provide great value, depending on the level of effort you are willing to put forth or spend on additional professionally moderated training:
Figure 1.3 – Online versus instructor-led learning for the AZ-801 exam
The next section will provide additional details and guidance on free resources provided by Microsoft to prepare you for your exam experience, as well as any supplemental content.
Exam format and exam demo experience
Microsoft certification exams have recently released an online exam demonstration experience to be more inclusive and help reduce the anxieties of preparing for and sitting an exam. This new online experience gives the exam candidate a real-world look into the type of exam questions that appear and gives the candidate a feel for how the questions work and function. Let’s take a closer look by visiting the following URL: https://aka.ms/examdemo.
Microsoft certification exams comprise the following types of questions:
- Multiple choice questions contain multiple answer choices and have only one correct answer. These types of questions may have several varieties and may appear to you as part of a series or a set.
- Multiple choice, multiple select questions require one or more selections and indicate how many answers to select for providing the answer.
- Drag and drop questions may include text, graphics, or code. Interacting with these questions requires you to drag or move objects to target locations in the answer area. One, many, or all of the available answers may be used to successfully complete these questions.
- Build, list, reorder questions contain a list of movable actions or answer choices that must be arranged in the correct order in the answer area. Again, one, many, or all of the available answers may be used to successfully complete these questions.
- Active screen questions contain interactive screen elements such as menus, option buttons, or boxes to select. Several variations of these questions include selecting a drop-down element to complete a statement or section of code, or changing the up/down arrows to increase or decrease the answer value.
- Hot area questions contain one or multiple clickable areas where the selections represent the correct answer. Think of these questions as an interactive screen, menu, or configuration page where you actively select the correct actions.
- The preceding question types may be grouped into a case study. You will need to answer questions based on case information, which can be reviewed from the left-side menu option, and will typically contain an overview, environment details, and requirements section.
- Exhibit questions typically contain a screenshot, design document, or configuration page where you need to review and identify either a problem or a resolution to the question. Exhibit questions may also have multiple exhibit tabs, so you must select each tab to review all the presented material to correctly answer the question.
- True/false and best-answer scenario questions will really test your understanding and mastery of the exam content. These are typically delivered in a sequence with no option of navigating back to a previous question. The question will be providing you with a specific scenario, asking you whether the recommended answer appropriately solves the question or issue presented.
For an additional review of exam features, visit the following URL: https://aka.ms/ExamFeatures. The next section will cover how to best utilize Microsoft Learn for any supplemental experience in addition to this book.