I cleared the PMP exam on 13th August 2012.

Hi All,

I cleared the PMP exam on 13^th August 2012.

Here is my side of the story,

June End 2012,

I took the training from Knowledgewoods, Mumbai at Andheri. When, I first register for the training, I thought, it would be just the formality to earn 35 PDU (Professional Development unit), which is needed for PMP. But, training was informative, and got the Head First Hardcopy as well as Soft Copy book, MindMaps (This are key to remember ITTO for 42 processes), and other notes.

June, 2012.

I first started with Head First and found this book does clear the concept, but not par with the questions which you get in PMP exam.

So, I got the Rita Mulcahy-PMP® Exam Prep 7th Edition, and start preparing from it. My study plan was 2 hours daily, and 4-6 hours on weekend for PMP. I am the project lead for Software Company. And believe me it requires real self-motivation and commitment to stick to the schedule plan. I live in Mumbai, and fortunately and unfortunately, I have hour long commute to office and back. I read these books on my tablet during travel time, and even snoop come time from office, to read 2-3 pages.

First, I read headfirst, which is completed in 30-40 mins, and then RITA, which takes around 2-3 hours for finishing one chapter. Then, I go back again for second read from RITA, to see and make notes of some points which I could miss in first Read. This takes another hour. So, basically, it should take 2-3 days to complete one chapter, if you take 2 hours daily.

Now, the most important part, I took the questions which are there at the end of chapte r, first from Head First (as they are easier) and then from RITA (tougher and closer to PMP exam question). Reading book will just make you learn 20% and appearing question, will make you learn rest 80%. Infact, appearing question will clear your concepts; book reading is just like storytelling, you don’t grasp much.

This goes on for still the end of July, and I manage to finish both Head First and RITA all 13 chapters.

July, 2012.

I start taking sample test from the Knowledge woods, but it didn’t help me much, because most of the question answers don’t have explanation, and this would help me, because I need explanation to understand, by Answer C is right choice. This is because, in PMP exam, question won’t have same word as question appeared in Mock, but would be on the similar line of context.

Then, I came across PMZilla site, where many people recommended PMStudy (

http://www.pmstudy.com/

). PMStudy gives one mock test free, and I appear it. It was the ground shaking moment for me, because many questions were from PMBOK study guide and I didn’t read at all.

Initially, I was looking for some free test options; I came to BrainBok (

http://www.brainbok.com/) which offer free 50 and 200 test questions on the similar lines of PMstudy. This made me to take, PMstudy PLUS pack. Exam layout was very similar to PMStudy site; In addition, there was onscreen calculator button to do some basic calculation for PMP exam. Thank god, I　didnt encounter any to the power formule question in exam, otherwise, I　had no idea, how to do that on simple onscreen calculator

Here one for point, taking 200 question in one go takes 4 hours, but it very difficult to get 4 hours in one go in normal working lifestyle. So, I took in bit of 50-75 question and continue rest in next available time slot. Most sites allow you to break and continue format.

Once done that, I took PMP Exam Prep by Christopher Scordo, this book you can find of PMI Knowledge Centre -> eReads and Reference section.

More the test you take, more confident you are with clearing PMP exam. But caution here, take quality test, as there are thousands of PMP free test available of net, which are not authentic and could misguide your concepts. Same question would have different answer on different sites.

I found Rajesh Nair notes on PMzilla, which was superb and help me get one shot revision to most of the concepts in 9 knowledge area.

How do I know you are ready for exam, if I start scoring 70-80% percent in most, of the exams, I was sure, I　am ready for the exam.

Remember, PMP require a lot of concepts to be remembered, revise daily to keep all those information in the head till time of exam.

　

August First two week

I had 3 week leaves pending (thanks to last year sat-sun working and busy schedule), I took 8 days leave for PMP. I schedule exam on 13^th August.

On Exam day, I didn’t study much, had good night sleep a day before, as to keep my brain free from anxiety and help it concentrate on 200 questions for next 4 hrs. After giving exam, prometric test machine screen went blank for 30-40 sec. This took my heart off, and then the feedback screen appeared. I was thinking in my mind, Dude, where my result. After feeling feedback form, again screen went blank for 20-30 secs, then appear most waited screen. You Passed, Phew!

　

Lesson learn

During training, you should apply for the PMI membership around that time. It because it will give you access PMI knowledge eBook and references, where you will find PMBOK study guide and much more.

Cleared the exam, some tips about studying and the lessons learnt

About Exam

1. The exam was easy. In fact I would say it was very easy as compared to mock exams I gave like Farndale, Lehmann e.t.c.

2. I completed the exam in 3 hours 30 minutes.

3. Most of the questions (around 70%) I guess were not lengthy at all and only comprised of 3, 4 lines.

4. The 3rd question in exam was about calculating EVM. I was confident (I like maths) because the question looked so easy and straight forward. But when I attempted it I failed. I tried a number of times but couldn't find right answer so I started to panic. That's when I realized I have spent almost 8, 9 minutes on this question so now I panicked some more. I was like WTH!!! and MARKED this question for later review.
I had already lost precious time so I did later questions quickly and keeping a watch on time remaining. This was the only question which I marked and in the end when I tried to solve it again, I did it in a few seconds. I was making a silly mistake due to which I was not able to solve it so my advise is do not panic.

5. All mathematical questions where either related to EVM or calculating communication channels for stakeholders.

6. Initiation was my strength as well as Planning but not Execution and Monitoring & Controlling but I was surprised to see I got P in those areas while in Initiation I got MP. Closing was never my strength infact I didn't even read about it much and only read it thoroughly 4, 5 days before exam.

7. There were some Critial Path questions which were very easy.

8. Before result was shown on screen, I was 100% sure I have passed the exam.

9. I tried to memorize all ITTOs which helped me in getting a few more questions right on the exam. Although now PMI doesn't ask direct questions like giving you 4 options and then asking to which process this Input belong. Now they ask a combination of ITTOs.

10. Prometric center staff was very helpful. The environment was perfect as well as AC temperature. There was no noise or anything. Plenty of parking space outside.

How did I prepare?

1. Well on 4th May 2012 I decided that I need to do PMP. There was a course being started on 6th May 2012 by AUC Technologies conducted by Asad Ullah Chaudhry who is one of the finest here. He has got all PMI certifications (PMP, PgMP, PMI-ACP, PMI-SP, PMI-RMP) except CAPM. So I enrolled in it and 6th May was the first class. It was Sunday based course and took 10, 11 weeks.

2. For the first two months I used to study 30 to 45 mins daily except Saturday and Sunday. I tried to get concepts and hang of it.

3. After that there came a gap of around 15, 20 days when I didn't study at all.

4. After that I started giving some more time. After I scheduled my exam I tried to give at least 1 hour daily.

5. Tried to memorize all ITTO. I memorized Initiation and Closing 100% which I know everyone can do.

6. I had memorized Planning around 95%.

7. For Execution and Monitoring & Controlling I would say I had memorized around 70-80%.

8. If you are taking a course before you have studied yourself then I will advise that you prepare first before you go to class. For e.g. if tomorrow is your class where they will teach you about Create WBS process then you must read it before it as it really helps in understanding and you don't keep a blank face in class.

9. Try to read PROCESS GROUP wise rather than KNOWLEDGE AREA wise because this is the logical order of how projects are done and it will help you develop understanding.

10. Do not read PMBOK completely at once. First read one process from it. Then read same process from another book like Rita, Kim Heldman, Andy Crowe and then read that process again from third book (if you have time). It is explained in next point as to how I studied.

11. I would first read process from PMBOK. After reading I would develop aroud 20-25% of understading. Then I would read the same process from Rita (this is a must have book very nice and good explanation and it covers certain areas which are not present in PMBOK). After I am done with Rita my understanding would increase to around 50%-60%. Then I would read HeadFirst (another great book) and then I would finally read that process again from PMBOK and that's when I would developed 90% understanding of the process.

12. So I will recommend this is how you do i.e. go by process by process. But before that read first 2 chapters of both PMBOK, Rita and HeadFirst to developed your understanding as to what exaclty is PM and the concepts behind it.

13. There are 42 processes so let's say if you do 2 processes daily then it would take you 21 days give or take 2, 3 days depending on how fast/slow you go because some processes are lenghty while others are small.

14. I will recommend you do not memorize ITTO until you have gone through all this once.

15. Once you are done with this process, repeat again and then you will start to recognize/memorize ITTO.

16. Do not try to memorize sentences from PMBOK in English instead think about them in your local language.

17. You know how learn PMP the best way? There are two ways; either you teach it or you practice it. That's why you will see all teachers who teach PMP have very strong concepts. So you do the same i.e. I will suggest you stand in front of mirror and suppose there is a large audience in front of you and you have to teach them what you have learned.
I used to do the same during my 40 mins brisk walk daily i.e. during walk I would talk to myself like I am explaining to someone what I have read.

18. Give the following tests.

Lehmann 75 questions
Lehmann 175 questions
Farndale 262 questions
HeadFirst 200 questions
PMStudy 200 questions
Some other tests I may be forgetting.

Some of these tests will tear you apart like making you totally naked in front of thousands of people which is a good thing because it is better to be torn apart before PMP exam rather than during it.

19. Make sure you practice a lot of maths questions. Because maths questions on exams are like GOLD mine. If you understand it and you know the formula then you can sure shot do it. There is no subjective/objective thinking, no multiple answers because a maths questions can only have one answer so if you have mastered it, you sure will increase your chances of winning.

20. After I got my result I understood why some people who got 4MP and 1BP passed while others who got same grading failed. That's because PMI scores on overall percentage as to how many questions you got right. Doesn't matter what you get in Process Group. So let's say if passing percentage is 61% which most people say then it means you have to get 106 questions right out of 175. Although it is understandable the more better you perform in any process group then obviously your chances will increase but again PMI judges you on overall questions you get right in exam. Thisis written on the result sheet you get when you pass/fail the exam.

A Project Manager’s Guide to Successful Meetings

Love them or hate them, the running of project meetings is a big part of any project manager’s role. You might find this a worrying idea at first but there are some simple tips which can help you run successful and productive meetings. 　Here are some of the best ones to get you started.

Turn Up On Time

You weren’t thinking of sauntering in a few minutes late, were you? I am sure that you weren’t but you definitely can’t forget the importance of your presence at these meetings and the image you need to give out. Apart from these points, getting there a bit early will mean that you can settle down and think about the meeting before it all kicks off. I like to get there about 10 minutes early to check out the conferencing facilities and anything else which might need to be sorted. If the meeting room is far away I would build in some extra contingency to ensure I don’t turn up late.

Know What You Want

Not every meeting can result in ground shaking results but you should at least know what you want before each one starts. This is a very important point when you get to the sharp end of the project but it is equally worth bearing in mind at any stage. You might simply want to get to the end of the meeting with any problems in some cases and this is fine provided that you have the objective clear in your head. If you enter that meeting room without knowing what you are after then you are leaving yourself open to running into problems. Sometimes all you will have to do it think clearly for a few minutes before leaving your office but this thinking time could make all the difference.

Get Clear Action Items

Most meetings end up with action items being drawn up. However, it isn’t always clear who needs to do what and by when. I usually ask one of my team members to note down the action items and to run through them at the end of the meeting. These then get added to the minutes and then onto the agenda for the next project meeting. By doing this you will probably always have a list of outstanding action points on your agendas. This might look a bit messy but it is a good way of keeping on top of everything which needs done instead of running the risk of forgetting what people have agreed to do.

Get People Involved

A lot of stakeholders don’t really like going to project meetings. There are different reasons for this apathy but it is fair to say that in a lot of cases they just don’t feel as though they have much chance of getting involved. If you are going to go to the bother of inviting people and they make the effort of turning up then you should be sure to get them involved. Some stakeholders are simply quieter than others when it comes to making their feelings known but you need to make it clear that everyone is entitled to make their voice heard. Going round the table and asking people for their individual opinions on a one by one basis might seem a bit too much like being in school but it can work. 　Some people only need one opportunity to get involved for them to feel more confident about participating and speaking up in the future.

Enjoy Them

After those previous points it might seem a bit weird to say that you should try to enjoy the meeting. However, what else can you do? You are going to run a lot of project meetings in your career and if you don’t find a way of enjoying them then they could turn into your worst nightmare. I suppose that we each need to find our own ways of enjoying these meetings. I like to try and get a bit of fun into them and I always encourage presentations and anything which is a break from just sitting around and talking. You shouldn’t be afraid of trying new things and looking for interesting ways to get more out of the experience. The people who are your stakeholders will largely define how formal or informal you can be but in my experience no one really has any problems with a more laid back approach as long as you are serious about the issues which you need to be serious about.

Passed PMP 8/11 with 4Ps and 1 MP! (See my lessons learned)

May 2012 - I bought Rita's book and read through that along with PMBOK . Took me about 3 and a half　weeks to do this, just so I could figure out the scope of what i was studying for. My average score across all her exercises was 82%. After this, i proceeded to schedule my exams for Aug 11, with a plan to give myself 4 weeks to study plus 1 extra week for a buffer. My friend suggested Rita and PMStudy, also gave me Rajesh's notes and Jaya Prashins ITTO table. These I would incorporate in my study plans

Overall Study　Plan

Plan was to read all the material in 2 weeks- that equated to:

Week 1:

　　1 chapter a day during the week after work and 2 chapters each on Saturday and Sunday.

Week 2

: 1 chapter a day during the week after work through Thursday. Fridays were spent reviewing Rajesh's notes, Rita's process charts, explanations for the questions I missed on Rita's chapter questions, Rita's flash cards, formulas, and Jaya Prashins ITTO table. Then Saturday and Sunday, I took practice exams.

I repeated the above one more time with some adjustments.

How it all unfolded

Week 1 & 2:

　July 9th thru 22nd, this time I read Rita for the 2nd time and HeadFirst. Did all the exercises in both books. I used PMBOK as a reference this time. After getting through the material, i did Oliver Lehmann 75 (73.3%) and Exam Central (83%).

Week 3 & 4:

July 23rd -Aug 5th.. I only read Rita's book.　I decided to do the　PMStudy free exam at the end of the week 3 and half way through the material, after reading on PMZilla that it was the closest to the exam and how it breaks down your score by knowledge area. I scored 77.14% on the PMStudy Free Exam. Continued the material through week 4 including focusing MORE on PMBOK　because a lot of the PMStudy exams were exact sentences from　PMBOK. My weaker areas corresponded to HR, Risk, Ethics - these were the areas i had planned to study during week 4 so it worked out and i didn't have to change my study plans. I supplemented with Rajesh's Notes plus the ITTO table from Jaya Prashin. Toward the end of week 4, i bought the PMStudy 4 exam pack, took Exam 2 (since exam 1 in the 4 pack is the free version which i already took) and i scored 86%. On that weekend, i did Exam 3 (85.71%) and Exam 4 (86.29%). I redid Rita's chapter end questions with each chapter during this 2 week　period and i averaged 89% across all chapters (up from 83% average the first time)

Week 5:

At this point, i had　1 week left before my exams　　i used this time to revise the chapters i felt were harder for me- Time, Cost, Risk, and Procurement. For other chapters that i was good with, i just reviewed Rajesh's notes and just spent time really understanding the ITTOs. I chose not to memorize it. It was just too much and i didn't have it in me to memorize. I would make up stories for each process and that way i really got to understand it. I also found relationships that helped me e.g Variance Analysis is almost in all M+C processes, Reserve analysis is found where there might be risk in estimating e.g Estimate duration, costs, budget, monitor + control risks. Performance reports are in Control scope, cost, schedule (think baselines), etc. I did not do any mock exams in this one week.

I also found WPI/WPMs very confusing. Someone on PMZIlla pointed to this article-

http://www.deepfriedbrainproject.com/2009/09/work-performance-information-reports.html　i read it once and i was never confused again. FANTASTIC article.

I took friday Aug 10th off from work- i reviewed Rajesh's Notes, Jaya's ITTO, Rita's process chart, and formulas. Light reviews on all these..

About the Exam

The scratch paper i think is like 6 pages of normal　 8 by 11 paper. More than enough to get you through the exam. I dumped out Rita's planning process chart plus all the formulas, after spending 7 mins on the actual tutorial. Layout is very similar to PMStudy except the inbuilt calculator.

Alos Similar to PMStudy in terms of situational questions. It had very few direct definitions from PMBOK like the PMStudy exams, i think PMStudy does that to make sure you really understand and know PMBOK. I only remember one exact PMBOK definition on the exam which was the definition of a checklist from Plan Quality.　 There were other　definitions on the exam but not phrased word for word from PMBOK like PMStudy does it. I thought the exam was a bit harder than PMSTUDY.. just a tiny tiny　bit.

Not too many calculations- about 8-10. A lot of them were easy and very direct.　I found maybe 1 or 2 took me a bit longer to figure out but i was able to.　It took me 3 hrs and 10 mins to get through the exam.. I was averaging about 2 and a half hrs on PMStudy exams 3 & 4- the last mock exams i took. When i went back to review marked questions, i got through most but not all of them before the clock timed out.

Waiting on the score at the end while the computer is saying: Updating...pls　wait　was nervewrecking. I felt i did OK but you never know.. Then they prolong it even more when they make you take the survey. Then I saw that i passed!! woohoo..

　

Last Words..

It took a lot of hard work, dedication, and sacrifice to stick to the plan. I was studying an average　 of 3-4 hrs a day after getting off　work. mainly because i was tired after working all day. Weekends I was spending 6-8 hrs studying. It probably took me longer because my current employer does not have a great methodology for project management so it took me longer to learn the concepts and i was determined to pass it at first try! I cut out many extracurricular activities- no gym, rarely going out on weekends, no tv, internet, etc. It was only for 5 weeks, it was worth the sacrifices.

PMZilla lessons learned forum was invaluable. Reading peoples experiences helped a great deal.

Rita's book is the best.. You will learn the stuff. Her questions are harder than the real thing. Yes, she has a negative connotation and i envisioned her as my mother standing over me with a whip making sure i was doing my homework lol. My only issue with Rita is she doesn't present the ITTOs in a big picture view.. she makes you understand the details.. this is where Jaya Prashin's ITTO table was invaluable (see below)

HeadFirst was great to help me understand some areas i struggled with on Rita's because it makes it fun to learn. I only read this book once. I would not 100% rely on this book to study. It had typos and a few discrepancies from PMBOK.. It explains the material in a fun real world manner but i think it also what makes it lacking in value. Use this for areas that are hard to understand. I wouldn't use it as a main study guide.

Rajesh Nair's notes- wow, what a treasure!! I did clean up these notes a lot for my own use. I found some discrepancies against PMBOK, removed the typos, and highlighted all the exam spotlights in red color. I also added some of my notes here as well..

Jaya Prashin's ITTO doc- LOVED this too.. i could take this to work with me and review at lunch time.

Practice exams are a MUST!!!!

Can't stress this enough.. When you think you know something, you realize you don't know it as well when you see it on the practice exam and are struggling with　 answering.

Oliver Lehmans 75 exam ( 73.3%). Much much harder than the real thing but def a must take.

PMStudy- The situational questions were similar to the real thing but all those PMBOK defintions on their exams were very few on the real thing. I think they place them there to ensure you know PMBOK. I scored 77%, 86%, 85%, 86% respectively on Exam 1-4. Definitely worth the investment. Take the free exam once you have been through the material well enough at least twice then you can use the results to know where to focus your efforts.

I had 2 issues with　PMStudy- Issue 1:　they vary their dummy questions every day on the paid exams! So if i go in today and take the exam, when i go in tomorrow to review, my score would have changed because the dummy questions from yesterday are not the same as dummy questions from today. Yet they keep your　answers the same.　I found this annoying because unless you review all your answers same day, you wont really be able to tell for sure which ones you missed and where you needed to focus. I was very surprised that　no one else complained about this. This is not disclosed on their site, i had to email them for them to get an explanation. If you do the free exam, all the questions change daily so those might not be all　the same questions you took, yet your answers stay in place.　Issue 2: 　PMStudy contact address is in Arizona and Maryland yet when i paid for the exam, i got charged an international transaction fee even though Im in the US!! 　When i looked at my credit card online, it has a location of Bangalore. This is in no way disclosed　on their site. I searched high and low. Now that i'm done with the site, i will contact them because its not right that why don't disclose this. They need to make this known.

ExamCentral- Very easy. I only did one exam here and scored 83%.. Its a good starting point but like others said, its much easier than the real thing, don't spend too much time doing these