Mentioned below are the details of what I did in those 5 weeks to achieve my PMP certification.
WEEK 1 - I attended a 5 days full-day class-room training program offered by a PMI Registered Education Provider (REP) viz. SABCONS, Bangalore, India. Key benefit was the orientation on how to analyze a question and select appropriate answer. They also provided a question bank of roughly 500+ good quality questions by Knowledge area with answers explained. I would not have attended any PMP prep training had it been not funded by my employer.
TIP- It is NOT mandatory though helpful to attend a training program from PMI’s REP. You can fulfill the education requirement, if you have received education/trainings on Project Management from other sources as well e.g. took courses related to Project Management during your university education or attended Project Management Training by your employer.
TIP- If you can fulfill the education requirement otherwise and have real PM experience and fair understanding of concepts , then you may consider skipping attending any prep training program and save your dollars.*
TIP- In case, you plan to attend a training program, then it would be very helpful if you finish at least quick reading of PMBOK® Guide before attending the program. Also, choose your trainer carefully!
WEEK 2 –After finishing the training, I started with studying the PMBOK® Guide 5th edition. It has 13 chapters and I finished first 5 chapters of PMBOK® Guide in this week. I read the chapters thoroughly focusing on any new concept/information/terminology that I did not know earlier. Some of the concepts or the terminology of PMBOK® Guide may be quite different from your company standards or from what you have been practicing in your day-to-day life. So, it is important to understand PMBOK® Guide language and terminologies. I did not memorize ITTO (Input, Tools & Techniques, Output) and usually there will be very few questions on ITTO in exam.
After finishing these chapters, I took the chapter-end tests from Rita Mulcahy’s book PMP Exam Prep 8th edition and the question bank provided by my training provider. I also submitted my application to PMI during this week.
TIP- If you do not have a good quality question bank provided by a training provider, you may also go through the chapter-end tests from “Edwell PMP-Exam-Preparation-Boot-Camp-Participant-Manual” in addition to Rita's Book.
TIP- First Pass of PMBOK® Guide needs to be thorough and line-by-line. Mark/highlight all the important concepts and the concepts/terms new to you. Second Pass is needed only for your not so strong areas (where your score was below 65% in chapter-end tests).
TIP- No need to memorize ITTO (Input, Tools & Techniques, Output), however one needs to understand what Tools & Techniques are appropriate for a given process and also the relationship among ITTO.
TIP- It is advisable to take the chapter-end practice test for 3-4 chapters together after finishing the studying instead of taking it after each chapter. This way you can test your retention power.
TIP- You need not study the chapters in any specific sequence, but it is advisable to go through the first four chapters of PMBOK® Guide first.
WEEK 3 – I finished another 5 chapters from PMBOK® Guide and corresponding chapter-end tests from Rita’s book and trainer provided question bank.
WEEK 4 – I finished rest all the chapters from PMBOK® Guide , including Annex A1, Appendix X3 (Interpersonal Skills), PMI Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct. By the end of fourth week, I had finished first pass of PMBOK® Guide and only selected chapters from Rita’s book and Edwell Manual (HR management, Procurement Management, Risk Management and Stakeholder’s Management).
During this week, I started to feel confident about my preparation and knowledge. Hence, I went ahead and paid the PMP examination fees.
TIP- The chapters, where I scored less than 65%, I read those chapters again from PMBOK® Guide and also referred the contents from Rita’s book and Edwell Manual.
WEEK 5 - After all this ground work, I knew that I was ready for the PMP examination. But how do I confirm this? Here comes the role of full-fledged mock tests. I used the below resources as suggested by my trainer, that are absolutely free and of good quality. I, also did some research on google and found good feedback about his recommendations.
- 200 Questions by Headfirst Labs (Offline PDF)
- 200 Questions from Edwell PMP-Exam-Preparation-Boot-Camp-Participant-Manual (Offline PDF)
- 200 Questions test from www.pmstudy.com (Online)
- Oliver Lehmann’s 175 Questions (Offline PDF)
- 100 Question from iZenBridge (Online)#
TIP- It is advisable that you have read Chapter 15 of Rita’s book and/or Chapter 1 of Edwell’s manual before taking these mock tests.
TIP - Without finishing the ground work and being clear about concepts, attempting mock tests may give false indications.
TIP- Objective of doing many mock tests is to orient yourself to how to analyze a question and gain confidence for the real examination. Please note that none of these mock questions will get repeated in actual exam. Also, doing mock-tests are not mandatory but advisable, since they provide good practice.
TIP- If your score is above 70% in any 3 of the above tests, then you are ready for the examination. Please avoid over study. Scores above 60 % is also OK, but anything below 55 % indicates you need to re-visit your weak areas.
On the Saturday morning of week 5, I scheduled the PMP test on Prometric web-site for the earliest available slot that was for coming Monday afternoon. Now, I needed to relax for the next 48 hrs.
I went to the Prometric Center at the appointed time and finished the test in 3 hours. Last 1 hour, I spent on reviewing the answers. At the end of the examination, the message flashed on the screen declaring that I had passed the exam successfully. I collected the result from the Prometric Center and found that I passed with Proficient grade in four domains and Moderately Proficient grade in one domain.
TIP- Read the question carefully and read ALL options before you choose your answer. Please do not get misled by irrelevant details/red-herring in the question and answer what is being asked.
TIP- This is not a quantitative oriented exam, so do not expect more than 8-10 questions needing formula/calculation; however there may be another 10 -12 data based questions that need only interpretation and do not involve any real calculation/formula e.g interpretation of CPI, SPI , AC and EV values.
TIP- PMP examination has no negative marking for wrong answers and has only one correct answer. So, do not leave any question unanswered.
TIP- Use the mouse’s right-click button to strike-out wrong options.
All the best for your PMP preparation!
EDIT 1 - *Due to my education and professional experience, I knew about 80 % of the concepts already. However, for people who do not have sound foundation of concepts or lack real PM experience of full project life-cycle , a prep training program would be a good start and very helpful. My trainer, Mr M R Sriprasad, is very experienced and he explained the concepts well with simple and relevant examples and provided a good road-map for PMP prep.
# Not suggested by my trainer but of good quality.
EDIT 2 - I have shared my experience and perspective of the PMP exam preparation. You may utilize other resources and follow a different road-map as suited to your context.
Image Source - http://www.whizlabs.com
