Finally passed my IST exam after two attempts — here's what actually helped

I failed my first IST attempt back in March by about 12 points, which honestly crushed me because I'd been studying on and off for six weeks. The problem was I wasn't being strategic about it — I was just reading through the manual and calling it good. After that first failure I completely changed my approach.

The biggest shift was using a proper IST practice test routine. I started doing timed sets of 25 questions every morning before work, then reviewing every single wrong answer. Not just checking the right answer, but actually understanding why mine was wrong. That took longer but made a huge difference. I also found a study guide that broke down the behavioral competency sections by domain, which helped me stop treating the exam like one giant blob of content.

Ended up scoring an 84 on my second attempt last week. For anyone else prepping, my main exam tips: don't skip the scenario-based questions in practice, those showed up heavily on the real thing. What resources did you all find most useful for the technical vs. behavioral split?