I finally passed the AWS Solutions Architect Associate after procrastinating for over a year! I am a bit late as I promised myself to get AWS SAA certificate by Dec 2023.

Back when I passed the AWS Cloud Practitioner exam in Feb 2023, I mentioned that there was no immediate need for me to get any cloud certificates simply because I didn’t get the push to do. My previous employer did not have any plan to utilize cloud services (that I was aware of).

Now with my current employer, I am working extensively with AWS as I primarily work on chatbot using Amazon Lex. The Lex bot is utilizing various services within AWS and getting myself certified really does provide me a high level understanding especially on what I am working on. The knowledge I’ve gained helps me to better understand the intricacy of the chatbot system they have set up and also enable me to add on it although I may not work with most of the things I’ve learned like setting up and maintaining a VPC or IAM.

I did spend quite a significant amount of time to prepare for this certificate. It took me nearly 3 months to prepare and I started preparing much later than expected because I was prioritizing my on job training.

During the 3 months of preparation, I was watching Tutorial Dojo videos but I found it to be quite boring. Ultimately, I decided to read up the notes prepared by TD and subsequently go through the exam questions instead. As I answered the questions, I would look through the discussion to better understand the reasonings. As the exam date got closer, I started to go through TD’s mock exam questions to simulate the actual exam. That was how I prepared myself for the exam.

Was it enough? I don’t think so but it was good enough to pass the exam.

My next goal is to get the AWS Machine Learning Specialty certificate by Dec 2025. I am giving myself more time for it because I need a break from studying and also to refocus my energy on other goals.