From:



IMPORTANT READ IT CARFULLY

I finally passed with a score higher than I expected.

Thanks to everyone for your help during my study.  Here is

my "lessons learned" in order to finalize my "PMP certification

project".

Preparation

~~~~~~~~~~~

I followed the 35 hours course from my local PMI chapter in

marsh/april 2003.  I learned a lot of trick there and I don't know I

could have passed the exam without it. The last three hours before

the exam, I re-read the Powerpoint presentation of this course.

I had a surprise then.  I thought that, after the course, I would

only have to study for a couple of weeks and pass the exam.  How

wrong I was!!!  Our first teacher told us that we should study

between 100 and 150 hours in order to pass. I put the material on the

side during summer and really start my study in september.

I submit my application form for the exam in the first week of

november via PMI website.  I received my confirmation 4 days later

(one of the person who attended the same preparation course as mine

has waiting more than 2 months for its confirmation after he sent is

application by regular mail).  Lesson: APPLY ONLINE!

In october and november, I studied about 10 hours a week.  In

december, I studied an average of 3 hours per day.  My objective:

pass the exam before Christmas.

I read the PmBok twice.  The second time, I did "active reading";

while reading, I took many notes in an 80 pages notebook (about 3

pages par chapter).  I also did a big map of all the processes, there

inputs and there outputs and the way they interact with each other. 

That really really help me understand the PmBok.  Lesson: Do that!

I didn't bought Rita machintruc's book nor any other costly

material.  I felt I didn't need any of these.  I think you don't

necessarely need them.

My company doesn't have a formal documented framework for project. 

So, based on the PMI but adapted to our particular organization, I

built one and submited it to the management in place.  That was a

hit!  Management likes it a lot and mandated me to continue working

on it (part time but it is better than nothing).  I had to explain to

them what is "scope management", "earned value management", "risk

management" and so forth.  Doing this, I often had to refer to the

PmBok.  That also helped me a lot.

I have discover the PMPCert group only three weeks before my exam. 

Two great benefits from this discovery.  The first one is that you

showed me how to analyze the questions: in which processus are we? 

Do I understand correctly the context of the question?  What do they

ask?  That might look basic and simple but I think this is another

key for a successful exam.

The other great benefit is TRANDUMPER.  I did a lot of test

(somewhere between 2500 and 3000 questions).  That really helped me. 

Lesson: tests are a great way to learn the material.  Do as many as

you can!

While doing the test (before answering the question), I wrote down

how sure I was of the answer (100%-sure, 75%-almost sure, 50%-

hesitate between 2 answers, 25%-guess).  This is another tool which

help me a lot during the exam.  At the end, I was having the

following result:

o I was generally "sure" or "almost sure" of 65% the answers.  Of

those 65%, my answers were correct at 90%.

o I had around 30% of "50-50" questions.  I generally answer these

questions correctly between 60% and 70% of the time.

o I had less than 5% of pure guess.  My results were so variable that

I considered that no guess was correct.

Regarding the Trandumper test, I work principaly with the CTSA series

of question.  I scored around 78% on those tests.  In the last week

before my exam, I took Reddy (78%), ExamCram 1 (88%), Examcram9

(79%), Sybex (76%), Ohio (87%), Balaji (76%), PMP Simulated Test Demo

(86%), Dallas (88%).  I have found that Ohio, Examcram 1 and PMP

simulated test and Dallas too easy.  So I assumed that my target note

was around 78%. 

Was I ready?  I was not that confident but I had to go forward ... 

There is not a great margin between 78% percent and the passing

score.  My fear was that I could have very few "sure or almost sure"

questions during the test.  Imagine if I only have 50-50 questions; I

could then be in trouble ...  There is also the perception that

discussion on this site tends to say that you can pass the exam when

you score in the mid-80's at practice tests...

The day of the exam

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a 2 hours 30 minutes drive from home (Quebec city) to my

test center (Montreal).  My test was scheduled at 13h00.  I planned

to take the bus at 8h00 in the morning to be in the test center

before noon.

A major snowstorm hit my region the day of the test.  Everything in

my hometown was closed.  We received over 20 inches (50 centimeters)

of snow.  The highway between Quebec City and Montreal was almost

closed.  I decided to take the bus at 7h00 and finally arrived in

Montreal at 11h15 (the 8h00 bus arrived in Montreal at ...

14h30!!!!).  Anyway, I was there on time.  Other lesson: RISK

MANAGEMENT and RISK RESPONSE PLANNING!!!  What could happen might

happen!

The exam

~~~~~~~~

During the tutorial, I dumped a schema showing all 39 processes and

there interaction (a mix of figure 3-5 to 3-8 on the PMBok with a few

personal notes).

I answered all 200 questions on the first pass which took me 3

hours.  I wrote down the "degree of assurance" for each question.  I

marked all the 50-50 questions.  Only two or three questions took me

more than 3 minutes to answer and I decided to answer them right away.

I then compile my numbers and got the following results:

1 - Sure and almost sure: 124/200

2 - 50/50: 66/200

3 - Guess: 10/200

Based on that, I assumed that I have 112 good answers for "sure or

almost sure".  I only need 30 more good answers out of my 66 "50-50"

which is less than 50% and less than what I normally get in the

practice test.

So I started to relax!!!!  I was quite sure to pass at that time!  I

reviewed my 50-50 questions and realized that, in many case, I could

have put an "almost sure" quote on it.  I also changed a couple of

answers. 

2 minutes left. 

Submit. 

Pass: 165.  (I was expecting in the 150's).

My appreciation of the exam

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Altough I have found the exam moderately difficult, I've got a better

result than many practice tests.  The number of "easy" question was

almost the same (62%).  The number of very difficult question was

also almost de same (5%).  I really think that I scored better than

90% on the "sure" and more than 65% on the "50-50" questions.  I feel

that the questions were "less tricky"!  As hard, but less tricky.

You must also rely on your experience.  The question and the answers

are not always straight from the PMBok.  I think experience is a big

factor to succeed in the exam.  Know the process.  Know what is an

I/O (Input / Output) and what is a tool.

Now, I can release my resources from this project.

Project completed.

Daniel Tremblay, now PMP

Quebec City, Quebec, Canada

Hello Everyone,

I took the PMP Certification Examination yesterday (12/12/2003) and

I passed. YES!!!

If you plan to take the PMP exam, consider developing your own brain-

dump cheat sheet.  I understand that some folks may not agree with

me on this.  However, in the exam should one encounter an

unfortunate brain freeze (risk event) the brain-dump cheat sheet

(contingency planning) may help get the concentration/confidence

alignment back and even help you remember what you momentarily

forgot.  So, is the brain-dump cheat sheet worth your time

investment? You decide.

Also note that unless you truly have a project management

experience, the exam will be quite challenging.  At the very least,

you aught to have a project manager's thought process. Memorizing

the PMBOK should not be considered the only tool needed to pass the

examination.  There will be few questions with answers that appear

just about the same.  Your project management reasoning will be your

key guide to the right answer.

If you are seeking a study material, I have read a lot of

recommendations on Rita Mulcahy's PMP exam preparation book ($89)

and her fast-track CD ($299).  At one point I even thought about

ordering her whole study kit (RMC PMP® Exam Prep System - $393). 

Instead, I invested in Kim Heldman's PMP Study Guide book ($59.99). 

My reasoning was simple: Heldman's book was more affordable and had

a CD with a decent number of test questions.  I am not discouraging

anyone from purchasing or using Rita's materials.  I just happened

to find a more cost efficient way of preparing for the PMP exam.

I have observed that some individuals want to attempt as many prep-

test questions as they possibly can get their hands on to prepare

for the PMP exam – an overkill by any standard. If you have a

Project Management experience and if you have studied the PMBOK, the

objective of taking the prep-test questions should then be to help

gauge the weak-spots in your understanding of each knowledge area

and associated processes.  The questions in Kim Heldman's PMP Study

Guide CD can help you achieve that goal.

A few PMPs in this group have recommended reading the PMBOK 2-3

times. Make sure you take notes on each chapter as you go along. 

Review these notes as often as you can. Attempt the prep-test

questions in the last two weeks preceding your PMP exam date to

reassess your learnings. Re-study weak concepts in the PMBOK and you

are all set to take the exam!

Do let me know if this information has helped you. Good luck!

Regards,

Saif Shariff, SCPM, PMP

I passed with 166 on Thursday. If you have managed few projects, exam is not that difficult. Many of the questions can be related to actual situations and wearing a halo behind your head, you can choose correct option. (remember PMIsm and Code of Conduct etc.)

 

Material used for study.

 

1. PMBOK

2. KIM Heldman

3. Rita's PMP cert.

4.Files from this group

and most important is the archive of correspondence exchanged among the members of this group. For few questions I could relate to the discussions in this group and pick the correct option immediately.

 

4 hours is a long time and to sit and focus. Many of the members in the past has given detailed instructions relating to taking the break and get some fresh air. I found all such instructions very useful.

 

Thanks to elceem and all the members of this group. Without this forum it would have been a major challenge to go for such certification.

 

Thanks

 

Vijay

Here is what I have started doing.

    Instead of memorizing IT & TO, I am trying to understand their pupose for a particular process. It has helped me in understanding and in turn memorizing.

In PMBOK Pg 33, the planning processes diagram has also helped me a lot in this. The matrix presented in PMBOK Pg 38 has also helped a great deal.

 

Hope this helps.

thanks

Puneet

Here are some thoughts for my fellow PMP study sufferers out there:

** THERE ARE AS MANY WAYS TO PASS THIS TEST AS THERE ARE TYPES OF

PEOPLE**-- One of the most productive and reassuring things I did

while preparing was to do a search on this forum using the

word "passed," to pull up people's various approaches to studying. 

It made me realize that there are many different ways to pass this

test, and you just need to find what works for you. By this time in

our lives, most of us know what works for us in terms of test

preparation-- be true to yourself.  If you are a visual learner, if

you need things to be color-coded, if you need to go to the test

center beforehand to feel comfortable-- listen to that. Don't believe

someone who tells you that there is only one approach that works--

this forum proves it. 

I found this was also helpful when I felt like I got into a

studying "rut" to look at some of the "passed" notes again for new

ideas of what to study.

** KEEP IT FRESH AND INTERACTIVE**-- Let's face it, the material is

dry and hard to absorb by pure memorization. In addition to the

Trandumper and other practice tests, there were 2 tools that I found

especially helpful:

- PMP Tools daily crossword and word search puzzles

():  I am a puzzle person by nature, and when I got

tired of studying, these puzzles were a great way to feel like I was

goofing off while still learning. I found that over time, these

puzzles really helped me learn the vocabulary more than memorization

would have (for me, at least).

- PMP MEMORIZE IT v2.xls (posted here in files section):  This is a

spreadsheet set up as an interactive quiz to learn the process

groups. I copied this onto my desktop at work and when I had a spare

10 or 20 minutes, would quiz myself. I found this was a great way to

memorize the process groups in a fun way.

** THINK POSITIVE FOR YOUR TEST PSYCHOLOGY **-- This is a tough test,

but it is important not to get psyched out by it. I think it is

important while studying to take lots of practice tests and get used

to the idea of answering questions you aren't sure of and thinking

positive even if you think you have wrong answers. Remember, you just

have to pass the test -- your score doesn't matter beyond that-- and

the test *is* designed so that most of us are going to miss a bunch

of questions.  I should mention that I was surprised at the number of

very straightforward questions-- ones that if you knew the material,

you could get straight off the bat.  However, there were plenty of

tough ones, so I was glad I had practiced.

** STUDY THE PMI PROFESSIONAL CODE **-- One area that I was not

prepared well enough for was the Professional Responsibility section--

there were a number of questions that directly pulled from the PMI

document and none of them were anything like I had seen in practice

tests.

TEST CENTER

I had a good experience with Prometric. One thing to let people know,

in case anyone else comes up with it-- I found that there was some

bug on the website so that I could not schedule the test at the site

closest to me. I called them and was able to schedule it with no

problem. 

As other people suggested, it would be a good idea to find where your

test center is ahead of time-- mine was 10 minutes from my home but

was hidden in the back of a parking lot and was very hard to find. I

was really glad I had scouted it out before test day.

Good luck to the rest of you studying out there-- you can do it!

Marie

I took the exam yesterday and passed with a 190.  If you find that

score hard to believe so did I at first.  I must have guessed right

on almost all of the questions that I could only narrow down to two

choices.

I also went into the exam overprepared, if there is such a thing.  I

have a fair amount of project management experience but it's all been

in software development with one company so there was a lot in PMBOK

I wasn't familiar with.  I've been studying for six months, well over

100 hours put in total.  My study materials were PMBOK, Rita's book

(4th edition), and the ESI Sample questions and Study guide (4th

edition).  I read PMBOK and Rita's book three times each and took

notes in a spiral notebook on the things that weren't familiar in

order to reinforce them.  I went through all of the sample tests in

Rita's book and the ESI book twice.  I also downloaded the trandumper

file from this site and took most of those tests, including retakes

of the questions I missed.  I highly recommend the trandumper tests;

I think a few of the answers given are wrong and some of the

questions seem unfair but practicing all of those test questions and

researching the ones I got wrong really prepared me.  Yesterday there

was only one question out of 200 that included a term I wasn't

familiar with.

My nickels worth of free advice is not to get discouraged during your

studies.  On my first pass through the Rita and ESI tests I was

getting marks below 70% on some of the chapters. I just kept

hammering away at it until the material that was new to me started to

make sense.

I'm selling the Rita book and ESI book on this site if anyone's

interested.  Good luck to all of you in your studies.

Just wanted to perform a lessons learned to help benefit the PM

Knowledge area. ;)

I took the test yesterday at 9:00 AM CST and passed with a 173.

About my studying:

I studied for about 3.5 - 4 months.  I used the common materials

that everyone knows about.

PMBOK - actually very important to know and understand this

Rita - This book is great, in my opinion.  If you go through the

book, and understand what EVERYTHING is, you are most likely ready

for the exam.  The life cycle game is an excellent learning tool.

Sybex (Book & Study Guide) - The book is great.  It was the first

book I read after the PMBOK.  It is really layed out quite nicely. 

I didn't complete much of the study guide.  I really didn't need to

buy it, but I was nervous about the exam and thought "the more

material, the better".

Rita's Audio CDs - I listened to these for approx. 2 months on my

commute to work every day.  They are a great tool, as well.

This site - the Notesv.5 file is great!  Thank you to it's author. 

I also enjoyed reading about other exam success stories.

About the exam:

I had troubles finding the exam site.  I should have heeded the

warnings and found the site ahead of time, but I didn't.  I arrived

well ahead of time, and the proctor allowed me to start early.  I

did a brain dump during the tutorial of the life cylce game, EV

formulas, estimate ranges, communication formula, PV formula, and

process group interactions.  This was VERY helpful to me, since it

reassured my answers.

I felt very prepared for the exam.  Real world project management

experience is a MUST have for this exam.  I do not think I would

have passed without this experience.  I made it through all

questions in about 1 hour 30 minutes.  I had only marked about 6 or 7

questions, and after reviewing them, I submitted the exam.  I had

told myself before I started the exam that I was going to list the

questions out in the .9, .5, .25 format list, but I just had a good

feeling that I had at least passed.  I was very surprised that I got

a 173!

Advice for others:

- EXPERIENCE IS A MUST.  You will not be able to pass this exam

without real world knowledge.

- Be committed to your studying.  Don't take the exam lightly.  Set

a strict study pattern and adhere to it.

- When you feel like you are prepared, register for the exam and

schedule it for as soon as possible.  This is what I did, and the

material seemed very fresh in my mind.

- Don't stress out.  This is a tough certification exam, and there

are people that do not pass it.  It is NO BIG DEAL if you do not

pass.  Schedule the retake, and pass it the second time.

Good luck to all of you out there studying still.  I am going to try

to hang around here and answer questions in the future.

Hi All,

This group helped me in terms of Morale, Q&As and in aligning my

method of preparation. Thanks a ton.

On Dec 1st I Passed.

Things I did 2 days before exam:

0. Reviewed entire PMBoK. (supplimented with Rita) - took me 16 hrs.

1. Proj.Mgmt Life cycle - RITA (only thing I Memorized. Helped me

answer at least around 20 Qs)

2. Process group/KM mapping

3. Planning processes relations

4. Process definitions and meaning of each.

5. ITTO (I did not memorize, tried to understand logically)

Study Material:

PMBoK (you know it)

Rita

This group

About the exam:

Felt it was easy while i was answering, but my score did not reflect

that.

Marked 40 for review

finished in 3hr 30mins.

Reviewed all and changed around 4

Pressed end 1 mins before finish.

There were couple of questions that really did not make sense to me

at all, though i knew well, the subject it is asking.

About the center:

I started in 15 mins test and it crashed.

Started after 20 mins again.

Center did NOT allow me to write anything on paper in first 15 mins.

Said I can write only after actual test started!

Center did not allow me to take break (nature call? he said no!)

There were 15 candidates taking test and all started punching their

keboards at at point for around 20 mins.

I was given Ear plugs, but did not use them.

My suggestions:

Relax and you can make it.

Make sure you Know

1. Project Management Life cycle chart in RITA. (page 24 i guess).

Read top-down. (If you can memorize, good)

2. KM area/Process group mapping from PMBoK

3. Planning processes relations (PMBoK)

4. Process definitions. - What each MEANS.

5. ofcource ITTO (need not memorize, but know them logically)

M

Shirley,

 

While I can not comment on the other two books, the Heldman CD with the sample test are quite adequate for preparing for the exam. Our local PMI chapter is getting excellent results with using the Heldman CD and a 80% passing score as a benchmark for taking the test. Students report that the real exam score are anywhere from 0 to -10% of the Heldman scores.

 

It is common to get feedback that students are memorizing the test using the prep cd's. While this might be true in some part, I think the value that you get out of the practice tests are the execution of the test process. Many of the questions missed initially are due to not reading/understanding the questions, not lack of knowledge. Both are needed for successfully completing the test.

 

I don't know one PMP that felt "ready" to take the test. I tell you this to assure that this is a normal process. The test is challenging but not impossible. If you test yourself against the Heldman CD, and consistently obtain a score of >80%, it is my belief that you will have a great chance (~98%) of passing the test with a score of 150 or greater.

 

One bonus about the Heldman Book is that is can be bought online for under 40.00.

 

Best of luck, reschedule the test and let us know you passed.

 

Mike

Jackson,

 

I am sure we all feel your pain. My PMP investment was over 1300.00 USD. Here is a few comments that might be helpful.

 

First, you have done many things right.  Rita's book is most likely one of the best resources out there (also one of the most expensive) . You don't specifically state that you have the PMBOK, if not get it now! 60% of the test is covered buy the PMBOK.

 

Although I also get the puzzles and such, I would not use them too much. PMPtools does not want the PMPcert group to comment on their material, draw from that what you will. (did your momma teach you not to say anything if you cant say nice things??? )

 

Once you have reviewed the PMBOK (2x min, 3x is recommended) and gone through the Rita's material, I would also suggest you get the Heldman book with CD (published by Sybex). Got this for the CD with sample tests. Go thorough the test until you score a consistent 80%. Sybex will teach you to read and take the exam correctly. Many of the question that you will miss will be due to not reading the questions, not a lack of knowledge.

 

By this time you will be feeling anxious and totally unprepared. Don't worry this is normal. Schedule your test and go take it. You should pass with a 150-170 score.  One review item that has been helpful to people in our study groups is to trace the output to the inputs, understanding that the whole PMBOK is a integrated process.

 

All this is based on the data from our local PMI chapter and the way we run our exam prep class. We used the Sybex and Rita books and the PMBOK. Although we charge 575 for a 6 day class, nothing presented in the class is not contained in either Sybex or Rita.

 

Our quality audits find that the Sybex test scores either match the exam results, or overstate the exam by 5 - 10%. Hence if you are scoring 80% on Sybex Test, you should expect a 150-160 score on the exam.

 

One other note, one of my students just got a 184 on the test. The feedback was the he ran into some very bizarre questions that could only be answered if you have an background in accounting, IT and construction project management. So don't think you are going to have a 200 on your test score. Most people score in the 150 to 180 range, and I have rarely found someone to score in the 137 - 150 range (about 2% of the scores that I collected are in this range). So either you will pas with a 150+ (about 95% proximity) or fail the test (about 2% proximity) if you follow the above guidelines.

 

The test generally test your comprehension of the the PMBOK PM process. Many of the people feel that memorization is not necessary IF you comprehend the process.

 

Good luck and feel free to contact me if you need help. I am putting together a yahoo chat study group and please email if you are interested in joining. I hope to have the first facilitated study group meeting in the next few weeks.

 

Best of luck

 

Mike Graupner, PMP

714.349.8170 (cell)

714.839.5924 (home/fax)

Hi All -

I appeared for the PMP exam at New York today and passed with 171 !

I started thinking about PMP 2 year ago but started serious study

about 2 months back. I used the following study materials -

1. PMBOK  - Studied 4 times

2. Rita Muchahy's book [4th Edition] - Studied 4 times

3. Study materail from this group

   - PMP Notes v5 [Studied last 2 days]

   - PMP Transdumper [Finished about 50%]

I did not refer any other study material. I would have studied for

about 100 hours. I found Rita's book quite useful. I used to study

each chapter from PMBOK first then Rita's book and the questions at

end of each chapter. I did this for 3-4 times.

As lot of people in this group have already indicated, if you have

experience in project management then it is easier to relate to

situational questions. There were a lot of situational questions in

the exam.

The Exam -

I found the questions in the exam a bit simpler then Rita's and

Transdumper. But not many were direct picks from any of the sources.

So, it is important to understand the answers when you are doing

practice tests. I finished the first pass in 2 hour 35 min. Then

finished 2 rounds of review (only the questions marked for review)

in another 1 hour. Finally, I was left with about 10 questions where

I was not sure about the answer. After 3 hour and 50 min I pressed

the magic button - Exit ..... Those last few second of waiting for

result were killing !!!

My suggestions -

1. Read BOTH PMBOK and Rita's book in detail. It is very difficult

to study PMBOK cover to cover, but try to read it full at least in 2-

3 passes.

2. Complete as many practice questions as possible. I found

the "Transdumper" on this site pretty good. [Unfortunately I didn't

have time to complete it]. Try to understand reason behind every

answer.

3. Based on your personal comfort, select an exam strategy and stick

to it.

4. Be mentally prepared that you won't be able to answer some of the

questions in the exam

Finally, I would like to thank this group for all the support -

motivational and study material. I am sure many more PMP aspirants

will benefit from this group.

Thanks

Gopal, PMP

My Study effort was well rewarded today. I Took my PMP exam today and

passed it with 165 (82.5%). 

I have been doing project management work (some in a coordination

role) for about 7 years.  Three years ago I started taking some of

the ESI courses inpreparation for this moment.  Six weeks ago I

finally made the decision to take the plunge and shed the $800

required to take the exam, join PMI, and buy the Rita book.  Here are

my comments, experiences and suggestions:

- It definitely helps to have a base to start from.  If you are

familiar, in a practical sense, with project management

terminologies, practices, and processes then you eliminate a big

barrier going into the exam.

- the PMP exam itself is more straight forward than the majority of

the test exams found in the net and training books.  I found the PMI

questions to be short and clear.  However, a small percentage (around

10% of them) where difficult to solve because the ansers were very

borderline (too close to each other).

- As suspected, expending too much time learning the Inputs, Outputs,

and T&T is not worth it.  I focused in learning the 39 processes

involved in the 9 knowledge areas, and then made a ligitimate effort

to understand what type of information (input, output, T&T) would be

relevant to use in each of those processes.  In that faction, I

gathered enough knowledge and a good notion of what would be involved

with those processes, but not necessarily memorize them.  As

suspected, the PMP exam had probably no more than 10 of these

questions, and they were easy to figure out.  So don't waste your

valuable time concentrating in this area, instead focus in

understanding the practicality of the processes.  It is impossibly to

digest and remember all that information anyway.

- There was a mix of very short (one liners) and long questions.  I

would say the mix was 60% short questions and 40% long, and in those

longs, many used the same text in the question to ask a subsequent

question.  So make sure you practice with both types of question.

- The test is really made to be taken in 4 hours comfortably.  I took

my time answering the questions and took me 3 hours and 35 minutes

including a 10 minute break taken half way through the exam.

- I found the executing process questions to be the most difficult. 

The interesting thing is that this was the same area I found easier

during my practice test.  The breakdown of questions was as follows:

Initiating (17), Planning (47), Executing (48), Controlling (45),

Closing (14), Professional Responsibility (29).

- The network questions on the PMP exam were harder than I expected. 

They were not straight forward and they don't necessarily use the

finish-start relationship only.  The EVM questions were extremely

simple.  No calculators needed, although the center provides one for

my use.

- There seem to be lots of quality related questions in the exam.

- I used the PMBOK, Rita, Sybex, and this forum notes in that order. 

Only read the PMBOK book once as I thought it was clear to

understand, but referenced it back to validate answers to test

questions.  I then read Rita's book and highlighted what I thought

was important.  I think the book is well written, but over-rated. 

Quite frankly, I do not think it buys you much more than what you can

get from the notes in this forum.  The Sybex book is a good book that

can be used more from a practical standpoint.  It has errors, but an

errata is available form their website. I do believe however, that

the Sybex test questions are excellent and give you a good sense of

the types of questions you should be able to answer for the exam. 

The notes in this forum, specially the PMINOtes document, are

excellent for quickly reviewing.  I actually read my highlights on

the Rita book prior the exam.  Never used the PM FasTrack CD and I

suspect, with all the test examples available in this forum, that it

is not worth the money.

- I read up to the last minute of the exam, and I could feel the

effect on my eyes and brain.  Not recommended.  Better to take a

break before the exam day.

- Practice tests:  I spent a significant amount of my preparation

time (the majority) answering test questions.  I would venture to say

I tested on over 3000 questions.  The TranDumper tests on this forum

are excellent source.  I made sure to analyze every question I got

wrong.  The interesting thing is that some of the questions in the

PMP exam were identical to some of the ones I encountered in the

practice exam. 

- Rather than spending so much time memorizing EVM formulas, why not

understand what each of the terms really mean.  The only formulas you

really need to remember are CV, CV, CPI, and SPI.  Everything else is

common sense and can be derived from these four.

- If I were to recommend an approach for studying for this exam I

would say read the PMBOK, Rita, PMINOtes, and then do tons of

practice questions using these study materials as reference.

- Good luck to everyone here and thanks for the help!  I will

continue to contribute as much as I can to this forum.

Culantro, PMP

Hi all,

I took the exam on Tuesday and passed(project

completed) and wanted to share a few things:

* Prep time: ~10 weeks, 10-14 hrs/week

* Study material: PMBOK and Rita's book. I read the

PMBOK two times, took my own notes/summary while

reading and prepared flashcards for ITTOs.  Rita's

book was definitely helpful (BTW, I didn't do any of

the exercises) and took my own notes from Rita's book

as well.  I had the Kim Heldman's book but after a

couple of chapters I realized that it doesn't have a

lot of extra info than PMBOK but read it once(easier

to read than PMBOK).

One thing I found very useful when reading PMBOK is,

to read the processes by Process Groups.  It is much

easier to follow and learn.

I did all the questions in the books mentioned above +

questions at the PMI website + questions in this

group's db + free ones on various web sites

* ITTOs: 90% memorized them. I found it helpful. if

you can, memorize (and understand) them and if you

cannot memorize them, just understand them (very

well).

One other thing.. Planning processes-Figure 3-5 on

page 33 of PMBOK. I drew that figure to my scratch

paper at the beginning of the exam.  The planning

processes include 21 of the 39 processes and their

flow is very logical(in terms of Inputs and Outputs)

*The night before: read Initiation and Closing

processes from PMBOK and Rita's book + professional

responsibility chapter.

*Exam: very long but fair. It took 3 hours to finish

all 200. No breaks. Marked 30-40 for review.  After

finishing the marked ones, reviewed 20 more and time

was up.  hit the end button  and waited for really

long 5 seconds to get my score (177).

Thanks & good luck.

Alp

I spent a lot of time researching different course options for the PMP.  I needed something that satisfied the 35 hours, provided a good learning experience (i.e. I wanted to learn and not just satisfy the training requirement), and finally be able to be undertaken by distance learning given I'm based in the Middle East.

 

After a lot of discussion with various providers I settled on the mScholar course which follows a self learning approach.  It uses a combination of audio and text based material to teach you the required coursework.  The cost not only includes the PMP course but the next 3 years of the continuing education requirements for the PMI.  If you calculate the cost per training hour its quite reasonable compared to other offerings.

 

There is online support through an instructor forum and the instructors accept direct emails as well.  I found all the staff to be extremely helpful and knowledgeable.  At the end of the course you sit an exam online at a Prometric centre so get use to the conditions of the real exam (this should be available overseas in the next couple of months due to changes at the Prometric testing centres).

   

I was worried about a course that wasn't classroom based but found the approach to be such that I can study any place, any time with most lessons broken down to short 15 to 20 mins components.  It allows you to fit in a lesson anytime during the day when you have a little bit of free time.  Given the online forum option as well it also means you can have discussions with other students on any points you are confused on.  

 

The material is based on the process groups so is a lot easier to follow and relate to our practical experience than if it was grouped by knowledge area. 

 

Prior to buying the course I had read the two main PMP prep texts talked about in the forum (Kims Sybex guide and Ritas Exam Prep book).  I found the material from mScholar to be superior to both of them in terms of understandably and layout.  The main problem with this exam is over studying - there is just so much material available its difficult to know what is the core material you need to know. mScholar sticks to the main information only so you can learn what you need to know properly. I supplemented the course with the other two texts mentioned as I didn't want to depend on only one source of material.  The extra material may have resulted in 2 or 3 additional marks in the exam but not much more. 

 

My only negative comment on the course would be that I would have liked more sample questions at the end of every chapter - there is only 3 or 4 per chapter.  However, there was so many other sources of questions available that this wasn't a big issue.  

 

I see the mScholar course combined with one other text such as Rita's or PMPTools Exam Cram is a good combination to pass the exam. 

 

One last thing, the course provides the normal guarantee that you will pass the PMP exam or they will refund your money.  Any provider that doesn't give such a guarantee is not worth considering - it shows how confident they are in their material and approach.

 

Anyone wanting more information should refer to They have a couple of documents available that will explain their approach and give you and idea of the quality; one of  them is worth reading no matter which course you undertake as it involves lots of hints for approaching the certification including studying and exam.  It includes one sample lesson as well.             

 

I can't assess the additional courses that are provided for the CE requirements as I haven't tried any as yet.  They are adding more courses every few months.

 

Please note I'm not employed by mscholar nor do I have any financial interest in their organisation.  

 

Good luck.

 

Mark Rohan

mrohan@.ae

Hi all,

I passed PMP on 28th of August.

As promised find below the preparation process I followed for the PMP  exam :

Material Used:

1. PMBOK 2000

2. SYBEX - Project Management Professional- Study Guide(with CD)

3. PMP preparation Notes from PMP group.

4. Training Materials (My present employer's Academy Division)

5. Quantitative Methods for Business by Anderson, Sweeney, Williams

6. Flash Cards for the Mathemetical Formulas.

7. Study Plan for 2.5 months

Tools & Techniques:

1. Studied PMBOK 2000 twice, every time tried to do a Brain dump.

2. Created a Project Management Knowledge Areas Mindmaps of my own using the available in PMP group folder.

3. Created flash cards for the mathametical Formulas which I used to revise in between my work.

4. Formed a PMI aspirants group in my present company and had presentation sessions on the various knowledge area. This was a one month exercise with 1.5 hours everyday (excluding Saturday , Sunday obviously).

5. Solved 70% of the Mock exams available in the SYBEX CD.

6. The day before the exam just went through the mind maps and the notes.

7. During the exam,utilized 10 minutes of the  tutorial  review time to do my brain dump of all the mathematical formulas and also the Processes under each knowledge area in sequence, and also differentiating the Core and the Facilitating ones.

Output:

1. Scored 150 in Exam.

2. Certified PMP.

3. Added to my confidence in Project Management.

2. Lessons Learnt which will be helpful for all  PMI aspirants.

Lessons Learnt:

1. Should have solved more of MOCK test questions.

2. To go through PMBOK atleast 3 Times.

3. Had a gap of 7 days inbetween, just one week before the exam which affected the flow. This was a unforseen risk which I should have planned.

4. Professional responsibility    was a weak area for me and many of the questions I found during the exam, had a touch of both PR and the knowledge Areas. Solving of questions with such a mind set would have helped.

 

Thanks & Regards

Mridul Paul ,PMP

The major difference is the inclusion of Professional Responsibilty

as a chapter in 4th edition which is not there in 3rd edition.In

addition every chapter has questions dedicated to Prof.Responsibility.

The Prof.Responsibility forms a significant portion of the questions

in exam.

Regards,

Archana Roy, PMP

Hi Team.

Sorry for this long email but lots to cover.

I sat the exam this morning and passed with 173.  I started studying in

April for the certification. I was allowed 4 months preparation as I had a

lot of other things happening at the same time in my life and had to balance

priorities.  Unfortunately due to exam registration issues with PMI it added

two additional months of delay before I could sit the exam.

Materials Used

I used the following text books :

    - PMBOK - I read this four times over my study period.

    - PMP Exam Prep by Rita Mulcahy - although most people seem to like this

book I was not that impressed with it.  Its very difficult to determine from

the headings and layout information maps to which topic areas.  Its almost

like a series of notes rather than a structured text book.

    - SYBEX PMP Certification guide by Kim Heldman - I read this book first.

Its well structured and given its organised by process groups its easier to

follow and relate to.  However, I agree with other reviewers it doesn't have

the depth to be used as a sole text book.

For practice exams I used:

    - Boston Exams (Exam 3 for PMP) - Its only 200 questions but they are

good quality questions and they also provide good explanations for the

answers.

For the training I used the mScholar course.   I sent a separate review of

this yesterday to the forum.  mScholar is a self study program that can be

undertaken at the students own pace. Further information can be found in



In addition I received a summary of this forum discussion each day and

reviewed the items one by one.   In terms of other materials from the files

section I liked PMPCert-PMINotes v5, the 220 questions (PMPCert-QA220), and

PMPSample70a.  Again be careful with all sample questions as there may be

some incorrect answers.  The forum itself has discussed a lot of them.

Study Hints

1. Prepare a plan of your approach.  Re-evaluate the base plan after the

first few weeks once you have an idea of the material and work involved.

2. I found I was having trouble learning by just reading the various texts -

especially since they all had a slightly different approach.  I wasted a lot

of time reading other texts and not taking in the information before I

decided to prepare my own study notes.  I wrote 2 to 3 pages on each of the

knowledge areas using the main texts as input - this helped me absorb a lot

of information in a very short period.  You could use the PMINotes v5 from

the files section but I think actually writing the notes yourself is the

main benefit of the exercise.

3. Its important to set boundaries for what you want to learn.  Although

PMBOK is the main text to be used its made clear that we have to use other

materials.  If you look at some of the questions raised in this forum they

are complicated enough to put most people off ever sitting the exam.  From

the beginning I decided not to learn the Inputs, Tools/Techniques, and

Outputs.  I thought my study time could be put to better use elsewhere.  I

memorised figure 3-9, pg 38 in PMBOK that shows all the processes by process

group and knowledge area as well as the planning process flow diagram

(figure 3-5).  This is the minimum I think people should know.  Having both

of these included in my brain dump provided a good basis for answering most

questions.  I could derive most ITTO questions from this information

combined with my work experience and remembering my study.

4. Over studying is a major problem with this exam.  Learn the core material

very well and do not spend too much time on becoming a mathematics expert.

The mscholar course helped me a lot here as it focused on the core

information required to pass the course.

5. I didn't focus too much on practice exams in the first few months of

study.  I would use the chapter summary exams in the texts to make sure I

understood the material I had read but nothing more.  After finishing the

main study I spent the last month focusing on practice exams.  I used the

two electronic test banks as well as any paper based ones.  If you get any

questions wrong that you think should be right research the answers.  Don't

just assume you are right as in a few cases it turned out I misunderstood

the question or the answer and my research showed gaps in my knowledge that

needed resolving.   I recommend you try at least 2 or 3 full tests of 200

questions or more.  This will help you prepare for exam day itself.  I found

I was losing concentration on the last 50 questions and making stupid

mistakes.

6. The day before the exam minimise your study - I read through my study

notes for 30 mins only and spent the rest of the day relaxing.  I sat the

exam on a Monday so I could rest on the Sunday.

7. The biggest question for most people is when are you ready to sit the

exam.  I liked Karen's comment I saw a few weeks ago on this forum saying

you are ready to sit the exam when you are sick of it.  That's very true.

For those of you trying to prepare in a faster time period I would look at

your marks on the sample tests.  If you are constantly getting 80% to 90% on

the main tests you should be ready.

Exam Hints

A lot of this has been properly covered before by other people so I'll just

mention the highlights.

1. Pace yourself.  Keep on eye on the time and allow yourself breaks.  The

number and length of breaks differs from person to person but I believe at

least 2 breaks are required.

2. Leave any of the longer questions to later.  If you can do the quick and

easy ones first it will give you confidence for the more difficult

questions.  Remember that most people have time at the end of the exam to

review their questions.

3. Take some food in case you need a snack during one of your breaks.

4. Relax.  You've spent a lot of time preparing for this day, you know the

material, and have time.  Don't get stressed about some questions you don't

know, move on, and focus on the ones you do know.

5.  Make a plan of how you will approach the exam.  I went through the

questions quite fast the first time - 30 secs per question.  I marked

everything for review where I was unsure of my answer. Anything unmarked was

theoretically correct.  I then had a break and started reviewing my marked

items (125 of them).  During this 2nd time through I kept track of the

number of questions I was still unsure of.  At the end of the 2nd cut I was

left with 46 questions I was unsure about.  Given I could get 60 wrong I was

reasonably confident I had passed.  I started doing a 3rd review of all

questions but was too tired and ended the exam with 25 mins remaining.

Overall I found the PMP certification to be quite valuable.  Apart from

obtaining the certification itself, more importantly I found I actually

learnt something from my studies and believe I'm a better project manager

because of it.

Finally thanks to everyone that contributes to this forum.  Its a great help

and is the first source I recommend to anyone that asks me about preparing

for the exam.

Mark Rohan

mrohan@.ae

Hi All,

I passed the PMP certification exam today scoring 85.5% (171). To be

honest, I could not breathe for the few seconds it took for the score

to show up, because I was not sure how I had done. Even though I went

into the exam quite confident, while doing the exam I realized that I

still had a lot of grey areas. They do make u think..

I sarted studying 3 weeks ago, studied for about 40 Hrs. I do have

enough Project management exp to be elligible for the exam but thats

about it. So I still have ways to go and therefore found the exam a

little tough..

I studied the PMBOK, Rita Mulcahy's Prep book and did the PMP Fast

Track by Rita.

The first time I read PMBOK, I was ready to throw up after reading

each knowledge area. There was too much to digest..

I still finished reading the book once. I then did Rita's Prep book,

felt much better. Went back to reading PMBOK and quite honestly

enjoyed reading it since it all started making much better sense. I

was undersatnding more than trying to memorize. I then did PMP fast

track CD by knowledge area.. was scoring about 75%. Read Rita's book

and now realize that two chapters in particular HR and Communications

are much better covered from the exam perspective.

Then did PMP fast track CD by groups. Scored 90% and more. Read PMBOK

again. Can u believe that..This time I was trying to memorize the

I/O/Tools as well.

I was now confident to write the exam..

The exam can be quite ambigous. If you dont know your subject matter

well, be sure that u will be guessing because there sure are multiple

right answers.

My 2 cents.. Its all about PMBOK and real life project management

experience. Some stuff not in PMBOK is mostly covered in Rits's book

like Theories of motivation..

Also, do try to retain I/O/Tools to the extent you can but not very

imp..

Good luck to you all.

Bela, PMP

Hi Team.

 

Yesterday in my posting on passing the exam I gave reference to boston test questions.  The correct reference is boson questions.  The web site is .  Sorry for the incorrect reference.  Boson have 3 test banks available for PMP.  I was recommended to get the 3rd one as it more closely represents the exam.  I was happy with the questions and explanations of the answers in test exam 3.  There is a free sample download if anyone wants more information.

 

Thanks to Davin for pointing out the reference.

 

Mark

Hi KG.

In the top left of your screen you have a box to mark a question.  I used

this to mark any question I was unsure of for later review.  In addition you

can leave the question completely unanswered.

At any time during the exam you have a review button at the bottom of your

screen.  When you press this button it gives you a list of all question

numbers.  Those that have no answers are marked 'I' for Incomplete.  Those

you have marked yourself are highlighted with a 'R' for review.

You just need to double click on any of the question numbers in the review

screen and are automatically taken to that question.  It takes literally 1

to 2 seconds to jump back to the review screen and select the next marked

question number you want to look.

If you are going to take this approach just make sure you keep track of the

time.  Given I was aiming 30 seconds per question for the first cut this

meant I could get through all 200 questions in around 100 minutes.   After a

small break I had 125 questions to review which I divided over the remaining

time.  If you take more time on the first cut you will have less questions

marked for review so won't need as much time.  Its a balancing act.  I went

quite quickly for the first cut as I wanted the confidence of a lot of

answered questions behind me before I went through the more difficult

questions.

Mark Rohan

mark.rohan@

Hi all,

I took the exam on Friday and passed with 163. I sincerely want to thank all of you for all the support/files/discussions. This is a great group. The moment I found this group, I knew I can make it.

This is how I prepared for the exam (in chronological order):

1) I’ve been advised of the PMI exams on a Project Management course (2 days) in last January. In March I decided to take the exams.

2) I read for the first time PMBOOK2000 on April. I bought the preparation book..... (after reading I realized I need something else).

3) I attended online PMP Prep Pack of IIL and I bought the Kerzner Project management Book (I found it very good, exams or not exams).

4)On the 30th of July I send eligibility form to PMI. And I started studying seriously for 7 week during the evening time and weekends (average of 14 hours a week). I read the Kerzner book; I made Kerzner PM IQ questions and questions I found on this group.

5)On the 11th September i received the eligibility letter and immediately fixed the exam for the 19th September. This week I brought with me on holiday my laptop and studied about 8 hours a day. I read for the 3rd time PMBOOK (sounds really better than the first two times ...).

6) Exam: very long time in my opinion!, the italian translation of the question was very bad and my english is not very good... Sometimes I hardly understand questions, and I had to read over and over again ... It took 3 hours and 50 minutes to finish all 200 questions. No breaks. Marked 70 for review, but after 10, time was up.

I had many questions about quality management (gurus, ITTO, many situations with differences of performance measurements and quality control, ISO9000, whatever), about 10 questions with EVM, some Network diagram to analyze ... I made a brain dump of AOK, process and some ITTO at the beginning of the exam (I found it very useful, consider to do it).

During the exams there were 2 cameras looking at me for the whole exam (I was in Milan Prometrics center, Italy). I have been advised that all my exam would be videotaped... mmm ... GREAT FILM!!! Forget bringing with you any scratch papers from home..... At about 3:59 I was so exhausted, I hit the end button and waited for really long 5 seconds to see PASS on the screen.... my score was 163.

Thank you for the help and encouragement I have received from this site!

And good luck to future test-takers!

Angelo Bonorino, PMP

Hi Subha,

I am currently studying for the PMP exam as well. After reading tons

of messages from various members who have passed the exam

sucessfully, the books that you need to use are:

1) PMBOK 2000

2) PMP Exam Prep by Rita Mulcahy

3) SYBEX PMP Certification guide by Kim Heldman

Have Fun!

Jude Joseph

Glad to inform you all that I took the PMP exam today in Oregon and

cleared it with 168.

I am happy with this score considering the fact that I did not spend

a whole lot of time preparing for the exam.

I prepared for approximately 5 weeks (added a week to my initial

planned duration to be absolutely sure of passing).

The main motivation for studying hard was the thought of losing 405

bucks :)

My study plan in chronological order :

(1) Took the online e-learning course to get the 35 hours from

   

(2) Took the online e-learning course from  

(3) Became a PMI member and got the PMBOK. Read the PMBOK once.

(4) Read the complete Kim Heldman book online once.

(5) Read the PMBOK again.

(6) Solved tons of practice exams. Performance varied from around 65

percent to around 95 percent.

(7) Took the exam today and passed. (Took 3 hours and 59 minutes)

Needless to say, this group was an invaluable resource and helped in

every stage of the preparation. A big thanks to elceem for forming

this group and to all the other senior members Karen, Mike for their

postings.

As you can see, I did not use the Rita book mainly because I could

not find it in the local bookstore.

Lessons learned :

(1) Practice more situational questions.

(2) Understanding the meaning of terms and other terms that may be

used to refer to them. Do not expect the exam to use the same

terminology or same sentence that is used in the PMBOK.

(3) Do not panic if the first few questions seem difficult.

Good luck to everyone preparing for the test.

Shashank

SCJP2,SCJD2,SCWCD,IBM-XML,PMP

Hi,

I took the test last Tuesday and passed it with a score of 169.

I took the local PMI chapter (Pittsburgh) class in Apr-May but

could not keep my study steady. From beginning of August, I got

serious about it and started spending weekends on study. Took 3

days off from the work just before the exam.

Though I download everything from file section of this website

and printed out, binded it (separate folders for theory and

questions), I could not review it. I did some questions set

downloaded from yahoo group.

All in all, I did following seriously -

1. Studied PMBoK 2 to 3 times

2. Rita Mulcahy's book Reading as well as exercises - 3 times

3. Rita Flash Card

4. Sybex PMP Study Guide - Read once and did questions in the CD

multiple times.

At last I had started scoring 95 to 100% in Rita as well as PMP

Study Guide Question bank. (Somehow I recalled correct answers).

I have following material for sale asking $125 OBO (worth $200) +

SH

- Rita Mulcahy's PMP Exam Prep (excellent condition) - original $90

- Rita Flash Card (Audio as well as Paper format) - original $ 48

- PMP Study Guide (Excellent condition) - original $60

If you are interested, please e-mail me at (subject - PMP Book)

charmie_gupta@

If somebody is from Pittsburgh area, we can make mutual

arrangement for delivery.

Hello KG,

Thank you very much.

Please find my answers below :

(1) How many hours of study did you dedicate for the exam?

I studied only for about 5 weeks. However I studied really hard

(average of 4 hours on weekdays and about 16 hours on weekends (both

Sat and Sun put together).

(2) Did you have any background in Project management before

preparation ?

Not really. I am a technology consultant and don't do Project

management for a living.

However if you work in any IT project, you are bound to come across a

lot of the Project management

activities whether you are a project manager or not.

(3) How do you rate the difficulty level of the exam with the 220

questions on this site ? The Dallas PMI sample questions ?

The 220 questions are very good for assesing how well you have read

the PMBOK. However a lot of questions among the 220 deal with

questions related to inputs,tools and techniques and outputs.

The real exam hardly has a few questions relating to inputs/tools and

techniques and outputs. Also the 220 questions do not have much

situational questions, which is again different from

the real exam.

Frankly, I think the Dallas PMI questions are very easy compared to

the real thing.

(4) The terminology difference, is it too confusing. Are there any

sources you know that provide alternative terminology?

Not really, Usually by the process of elimination, you can eliminate

about two answers.

You will have to select between the remaining two answers.

Sometimes the questions can be tricky.

For example,

(1) What is the process of splitting a deliverable into smaller more

manageable parts called ?

Is it Scope definition or Decomposition ?

(2) What is the technique of splitting a deliverable into smaller

more manageable parts called ?

Is it Scope definition or Decomposition ?

Please note that the above are not real exam questions, but

indicative of the type of tricky questions.

You have to watch out for keywords. In the first question, the key

word is process.

In the second question the keyword is technique.

The answer to 1 is scope definition, since decomposition is not a

process.

The answer to 2 is decomposition, since scope definition is not a

technique.

Also try to know the alternate names with which different

terminologies are called. You will find

a lot of them in the PMBOK itself.

for example, escalation notices, kill points, contractor initial

response, risk register etc.

Hope this helps ....

Good luck with your examination.

Shashank

Initially I was thinking of taking 4 day prep seminar costing $2795.

But later just but PMBOK book for $25 on Amazon and Rita's PMP Prep

book for $89. Rita's book helped very much in simplifying the concepts

and also the practice exam at the end of each chapter in her book

helped. Later I tried to solve the practice questions available in

the files section of this group. That was sufficient.

Thanks. I passed with 158. I studied for 2 weeks. Read PMBOK once.

didn't understand. Read Rita's PMP Prep and then studied PMBOK one

more time. Rita's book helped a lot and of course all the prep

questions on your site and other links suggested by you for the free

practice exam.

Hi everybody

I passed (150) and this is the  effort I put:

Total 10 days

In a day studied only max of 6 hours. (With max 2 hours at a

stretch.. Did a thorough undertsnading of the PMBOK rather than

cramming...for eg.. any person who understands plain english would

know what comes first Activity definition or Activity sequence... )

After reading PMBOK (Complete) Read Rita Mulchay (A very helpful

course material) Read it once. Did all the practice exercise in the

book. ( Again the focus was on understanding the process rather than

cramming...)

Then did the practice tests on Rita's CD.

The only cramming required are few formulas...which are

peanuts...EVM, Comms channel, PERT.

Believe me if you have common sense and if you little experince in

Project Management, the test is a cake walk......

(I guess the other help was that I was one of the interviewee for my

companys assesment for CMM level 5....and I was aware of lots of

processes etc...)

Remember law of dimnishing returns....too much studying will confuse

you more and not add any more value.....

Best of Luck....

Bhupinder

Hi All,

Today (09/28) Passed PMP.

Thanks for the Study Materials & help. I found this forum is most

useful for Exam Preparation.

My Exam Preparation was nearly 2 months (2- 4 hrs per day).

Study Material used:

- PMBOK (Studied Twice)

- Rita's PMP Exam Preparation Book - 4th Edition- (Studied Twice).

Apart from above Books Practiced around 500 sample Questions.

My Experience:

- To Clear Exam, understanding complete PMBOK, Project Management

concepts are VERY CRITICAL

- Memorizing things may not help much.

- I felt Rita's Book will give you the feel of Exam Expectations. It

is a good book for Exam Preparation.

- Practical Project Management Knowledge will help you to some

extent while answering questions.

- This Exam Really Test your Knowledge, so I recommend, it is

required to have a dedicated study for minimum of 2 months.

So wish you all the Best & Good Luck.

Thanks,

Shreerama Muniyoor

Hi All,

 

I passed the PMP exam today. This forum has been very useful for exam preparation. I used PMBOK, Rita and Leroy Ward.

 

To clear exam, understanding complete PMBOK, Project management concepts are required.

 

This exam really checks your knowledge. So it is required to

have dedicated effort for minimum of two months.

 

So wish you all the best & Good luck.

 

Thanks

Harish

Dear all,

I passed the exam on 29/9.

This is group helped me a lot.

My experience:

1. read PMBOK only will get you about 100 questions.

2. use supporting materials: those from this group, join a

preparation course, acquire some preparation guides - in order to

pass the exam.

3. draw diagrams in your paper - you are going to reuse the figures

in questions later.

Thanks and good luck to those who are going to take the exam.

LC

Just wanted to thank this group for all of the great tips and study

information!

Passed the test today, and used the following to study:

1. PMBOK

2. Rita 4th edition

3. PMP FASTrack

Studied for about 5 weeks (about 100 hours). The most important thing

to do to succeed is:

1.Form a study group. This kept me focused and motivated.

2.Understand the PMBOK (did not memorize ITTO).

3.Do practice tests. They were very representative of the actual

test.

Good luck to all that have not taken the test.

Tony Kovinchick, PMP

I just passed a couple of weeks ago with a 163. I studied with two

other guys. One had Rita's book, I had Leroy's book. Ultimately, I

gave up on Leroy's book and only used Rita's book for the last few

weeks. Rita's book was much more helpful. As you mentioned, Leroy's

questions are just too long and not really representative of the test.

I did, however, get a lot of benefit from the audio CDs that Leroy

Ward and Carl Pritchard put out from ESI. I listened to them daily on

my drive to and from work. So if your commute is around 30 minutes

one way, you can get a lot from the CDs.

Hope this helps.

Cliff

Dear Naresh, Hi

 

i do have similar experience and years like you, Still i would advise you that you need to practise more sets of Questions, develop the "mental frame" in responding  to questions. Time is important.

 

Read Kerzner, Rodney Turner, Gray Larson atleast Once.

 

The EXperience brings insight but the answer to Questions are based on ideal conditions as described in PMBOK. ( Not necessarily relating to your situation)

 

Wish you all the best.

 

Regards

 

Gaiyas

Hi All

Passed the PMP today with a 162. Thanks to everyone who posted in

this group.

The information, practice tests, etc were all a great help with the

examin. The examin wasn't as difficult as I had expected.  But that

was made possible by information here along with using the PMBOK &

Rita's book. Read both three times along with taking a PMP prep &

the practice tests I found here.

Thanks

John H

I took practice tests from Rita, PMP Exam Cram and

Leroy Ward. Rita's material was very similar to the

exam. I spent last 2 months preparing for the exam.

Thanks

Muthuswamy

Dear All,

I cleared the PMP Certification today with  a score of

167.

Books Used:

PMBOK

Rita

Also the PMPCert-PMINotes v5.doc from this site was

very much useful during the last few days.

Before starting the tutorial, I did a brain dump which

helped me throughout the exam.

Thanks,

Muthuswamy.T.S

While 12 years of experience managing projects is a great asset for

the exam, that alone is not sufficient to clear the exam.

In fact, sometimes too much experience might work against you if the

project management methodology you have been following on your

projects is not similar to the PMI methodology.

In extreme cases, you will have to go through an unlearning phase

before you can start learning the PMI way of managing a project. It

is like learning to drive on the right side of the road after driving

on the left for a few years.

However, since you have completed the 35 contact hours in Feb 03, I

assume you have been studying for quite a while.

Use the PMBOK as the bible for the exam and practice lots of scenario

based questions. Take as many sample exams as possible in the same

kind of environment that you would expect in the real exam.

The practice exam in the Kim Heldman book is good. If you are able to

get more than 80 percent on this exam, you should be able to do well

on the real exam.

Good luck with your exam.

Shashank

SCJP2,SCJD2,SCWCD,IBM-XML,PMP ....

I passed PMP with the score of 172 yesterday. Information and

material posted on this group was immensely helpful. Studied for 3

months on and off. Other than the material posted on this group, I

used PMBOK and Rita's book. I didn't buy any question banks or

simulated exam and as an afterthought, I feel questions from the

files section in this group and chapter end questions from Rita's are

more than enough.

Mahesh

Good article on the value of a PMP and why you need it.  Actually the

whole site is pretty good.



 

 

 

Hi All

Passed the PMP today with a 160.

I took the exam this afternoon, after a preparation of

3 months with PMBOK, Rita's Book, sample tests posted

in this group and also in .

PMPCert-PMINotes v5.doc was very very useful for me to

revise all the topics this morning.

Thanks to everyone who posted in this group.

About the exam:

I didnt do any brain dump during the initial tutorial

time.

I started answering, and marked the questions which i

was doubtful.  It was pretty fast i finished answering

all 200 questions in around than 90 minutes. Then i

reviewed all the questions which were marked for

review (38 of them).

Then i started all over again to go through all the

questions, this time i noted down all my answers under

3 different category, X (answer almost sure) Y

(questions where i narrowed down to 2 answers and also

questions of doubt)  and Z (never heard or no clues

about these questions) in the end i calculated the

probable score  by x*0.9 + y*0.5 + z*0.25  i got

figure of 158.  Then i pressed the END button and

waited for nervous and loong few seconds to see my

score and result.

Good luck to all PMP Aspirants and thanks again for

all the postings in this site

Regards

Ganesh S

I recommend that for your final weeks and days you do the following:

Read the PMBOK Glossery every day

Take a sample test every day

Practice your brain dump (if you intend to do one) every day.

Take a 200 question exam in a simuated environment at least once.  Close yourself off with a timer, a basic calculator, a pencil, and some scratch paper.  Do your brain dump and proceed with the questions.  Take your breaks at your scheduled times.  This really helps.

 

Good luck!

 

Karen

I took the test on 9/29 and passed with a 153.  It's not as high a

score as I would have liked, but I passed.

For the benefit of those yet to take the exam, I thought I'd share a

list of study aids in the order of effectivness for me:

1.  PMBOK 2000 hard copy and CD

2.  Rita's Book

3.  Rita's Fast Track CD

4.  PMP training course (3 days)

5.  ESI Intl. Portable PMP Prep CD's with J. LeRoy Ward 

Good luck to all.   

Hello all,

Passed the PMP yesterday.

Score 156 - 78%. Very happy with the score. Wouldn't

have minded a 137 either.

Impression:

Most questions are situational. Good understanding of

processes, their implications and their intent

required to answer these questions.

The test actually measures the "application" of the

knowledge.

Study Technique/Materials used:

-Never completed the PMBOK end-to-end. (Might not work

for all).

-Never completed the Kim Heldman book end-to-end.

(Might not work for all).

-Completed a Certificate in Project and Program

Management from UCSC Extension almost a year back.

Reference materials from this group.

-Common Sense.

-Never completed one full test (200 questions) during

preparation. (Might not work for all).

Suggestions:

-Understand the application of Processes, tools and

techniques.

-No need to memorize T&T, I and Os. However,

understanding what they signify is important.

-Braindump of key equations helps but application of

equations is what is important.

-Feel free to Mark as many questions as you want. You

will only go over these questions after your first

pass. I personally went over my marked questions 4

extra times... each time unmarking some of them till I

unmarked all of them.

-Read questions well and even more - read the answers

provided.

-Do any kind of stress-reduction activity the day

prior to the exam. And repeat that after the exam too.

All the best to aspiring PMPs.

Good Luck.

SN

PMP, CPPM, MCA, CTM, CL

(finally feels good to be a PMP)

Glad to inform you all that I took the PMP exam yesterday in Hyderabad and passed with 165.

 

Material used:

PMP Study guide by Kim Heldman (studied  twice)

PMBOK (not able to complete even once, I found it very hard to study)

PMP Exam Prep 4th edition by Rita Mulcahy (studied  twice)

PMPTools Simulated Test Bank software

PMP Role Delineation Study by PMI. (Clearly defines the test criteria, excellent resource for planning preparation strategy, wish I had it early in my preparation)

Solved lots of practice exams.

I studied for nearly 100 hours over the past 3 months.

 

During exam:

After the tutorial, done an extensive memory dump, but in the end it was not required at all.

Used the following strategy during first pass.

For the questions I am 100% sure, selected the option.

For the questions I am not 100% sure, selected the option and marked the question for review.

For long questions and math's questions, I had not answered.

 

After 1 hour, I had reached the end and there were 25 unanswered questions. Took a break and completed the 25 questions using review unanswered questions feature. Then reviewed the questions that I had marked for review (~ 50).  At this moment little less than 2 hours remaining, so I tried to review all the questions from start, but this time I am finding multiple answers to be correct during the first 20 questions. So stopped the review and hit the end button.

 

Lessons learned :

Practice more situational questions that have more than 1 correct answer. In other words, most of the questions I had practiced, I can easily eliminate 3 options. It is quite different in the exam.

 

Good luck to those of you preparing for the test.

 

Thanks & Regards,

Ravindra

Hello everyone,

I just wanted to share that I passed my pmp exam last saturday with a 161 score.  Thank you all for sharing all your questions/answers.  This group really helped to solidify things in my mind. 

How I prepared - I think I may have done it a little differently.  I did the following:

- SPent about 100 hours studying.

- Couldnt get motivated in beginning.  So I scheduled my exam THEN started studying.  This is backwards for most people, but I needed the time pressure to get off my lazy butt and get going!!!!

- Took a PMP prep class from ESI INternational via my employer.  This was a real help in that they gave us lots of material to help us focus.  In addition to class materials, we got the following books:

PMP Challenge (600 practice questions in form of flash cards)

ESI practice test book ( it had a 40 question test at end of every chapter and a 200 question test simulation at end.)  As luck would have it, the book was copyrighted July 2003 so it appeared to be very new.

Hardcover PMBOK

An automated tool called PM Powertrack by Mamagement Concepts Inc (another training company).  Got this courtesy of my employer.  This was nothing more than lots and lots of test questions.  They had practice questions for both process groups and knowledge areas as well as a 200 question simulated test.  The questions were ok, but didnt really resemble the type of questions I got in the exam.  In addition, if you got a question wrong it wasn't real clear what the solution was.  It pointed you to a page in the pmbok or a textbook, but no explaination whatsoever.  ESI was much clearer with explainations as to why a question was what it was.  Also, this tool timed you in the practice exam and scored you in each section so you could track performance.  Overall, not sure I would actually buy the PMPowertrack thing myself.

- Studyed the first 2 above cover to cover.  Used PMP challenge in follwoing way.  Spent 1 hour/day on 1 chapter of flash cards for 2 months before exam.  This kept me current.

- Read PMBOK cover to cover

- Did most of the other things to prepare that people said in prior notes.  However 1 thing I did that wasnt mentioned earlier had to do with studying for the 5 processes (initiation, planning, execution, control, closing).  As I studying the PMBOK I was having trouble relating chapters 4-11 knowledge areas to the IPECC process flow.   So here is what i did.  I took an old poster board and wrote out the process flows as outlined in ch3 of the PMBOK.  WIthin each process box I wrote the inputs, outputs and TT's.  I did this for planning, execution and control.  WHen I saw the whole process flow and the in/tt/outs, it became so much more clear to me what the key docs were and what you were trying to do within each flow.  It was nothing fancy or pretty, but it helped me see the whole thing and see trends, relationships, etc..  I would recommend this exercise.  It really helped me in my exam.

MY EXAM:

- FInished pass 1 within 3 hours

- Very little number crunching with math formulas

- LOTS of situations: what would you do, what would u do FIRST, etc.

One curve ball they threw at me had to do with a network diagram.  They gave ma a NW diagram question and I had to do start-finish for whole thing to answer a question abou float.  Then about 20 questions later, they show me THE SAME diagram with slightly different working to make it look like a new question.  BUT IT WASNT.  The 2nd question asked if we change float on B to x, what does this do to task Y.  Same diagram, different calculation.  As luck would have it, I did my NW diagram on separate piece of paper in pencil.  I merely marked up old doc with new data and quickly got answer.  From there, I saw 1-2 more questions with SAME NW diagram so I used original drawing.  But quesstions were spaced like 10+questions apart.  Moral of story: save any calcs cleanly and neatly off to the side as you may need them again.

Hope this helps someone out there like others have helped me.  Best of luck to anyone out there studying.  Go for it!!!!!

I'm proud to say that I passed my PMP testing today and wanted to thank everyone participating in this group. I have been a silent member for a few months. I have used the emails being shared to answer my own questions as well as get a better understanding of issues I believed I had a handle on.  I did submit a question on calculating PV and got a most insightful and easy method to obtaining my answer.  A special thank you to ELCEEM.  His work on the files section of the group website is greatly appreciated, and it enabled me to find answers and study material quickly.  I will continue to monitor the emails from the group, as I feel these communications can be a valued source for reference and clarification as I continue to advance my PMP career.

The only words of wisdom I'll pass on to those still studying for the exam is that you must read and understand the PMBOK, as well as use as many test questions as possible.  For most of us, it's not a matter of knowing the material, but how to take the test and pass. There is a difference between real world experience and how the PMI organization is scoring you on the test. I will say the test was much easier than most of the test questions I came across.

Good Luck!!!

Elizabeth Hazel

liz4200@

Greetings fellow PMers!!

First time poster and wanted to share my experience on the PMP

examination. 

PREPARATION FOR THE EXAM:

I used only the following: PMBOK, PMP Exam Prep (Rita Mulcahy, 4th

edition), PM Fasttrack CD (Mulcahy).

I typed out each chapter in the PMP Exam Prep, organizing the

material in a way that made more sense to me.  You don't

neccessariloy have to do this.  It has always helped me becuase it

forces me to go over everything.  I refered back to PMBOK for

subjects that I didn't understand or wanted more information on.  I

did not read the PMBOK.  I only went to it looking for specific

information on topics.  I also used the PMBOK to read over the

glossary.  If I didn't understand something in the glossary, I went

and searched out more information in the PMBOK.

After going through the PMP Exam Prep, I turned to the PM Fasttrack

CD.  I must have taken 10 or so 200 question exam simulations.  For

the most part, if I started a 200 question simulation, I forced

myself to complete it all.  I did stop short a few times but that

was after I had taken a number of test and felt pretty good about my

knowledge.  It was taking me around 2 hours to complete the

simulations.

I then went through the PM Fasttrack CD and took questions from

specific process groups so I could focus more on a single process

group at a time.  This helped out a lot.  It made me see patterns

and key words to some of the questions (i.e. Quality Assurance

= "Overall or confidence" and Quality Control = "specifc").

After going through the process groups answering questions, I went

back and took the PMP simulation tests again.  I scored 90% twice

and that was good enough for me.

So to sumerize some things that I did and did not do that I see a

lot of questions on...

- DID NOT read the PMBOK.  Only referenced it like a dictionary.

- DID NOT memorize inputs/outputs.  After learning the material this

came naturally.

- DID NOT learn how to calculate NPV.

- DID learn the rest of the formulas.

- DID use the simulation exams as my primary source for studying.

All in all, it took me around 4 weeks of intense studying.  I

actually moved my test date up a week becuase I was tired of

studying anymore.

ABOUT THE EXAM:

It took me approximately 2.5 hours to complete.  The simulation

questions and the PMP questions were a good match.  I don't think I

would have passed without the simulation exams.  It's worth the

money.  I "marked" all of the questions that looked to be difficult

or required extensive calculations or thought.  I didn't want my

brain to sizzle too quickly so I saved these for the end.  There is

something to be said for having gone through all of the questions. 

It makes you feel more optimistic about the ones that you need to go

back an review.  When you get stuck on question 3/200 it can be very

discomforting.  Just "mark" it and go back when you have some

questions under you belt.

Bring ear plugs.  My testing center had head-sets and I am gld they

did.  The guy across from me kept pounding on the keyboard as he was

typing away and I considered picking up my PC and throwing it on his

head.  WARNING: You will need to retake the exam if you crush

someone sitting next to you with your PC.

Anyhoo, I am open for questions.  I really appreciated the feddback

posted in here from others that passed the exam.  I found those

posts to be the most valuable so I am hoping someone can use this

info.  Good luck!!

Hi,

I also wrote last Thursday and passed with 170.

Some of my experiences :

The test centre was 5 min walk from my office so I went in early to

have a final "refresh" but landed up having to deal with a minor

work crisis which threw me slightly - DON'T DO THIS!

In preparation, attended a PMP prep course over 10 weeks which ended

in August. I have not bought Rita's, or any other books. The

institution offering the prep course had an old version of Rita's

CD, and I did about 4 full length tests.

Other material included :

PMBOK - 3 times

Extensive use of the notes on this site - Yancy, Version 5, and

quite a few others in the form of presentations etc

Lots and lots of practice questions. I can't stress the importance

of doing practice questions. I kept notes of those practice

questions I got horribly wrong, and used these, together with Ver 5

notes as my main Key-points summary prior to the exam.

The exam itself : Got there early, and was allowed to start

immediately. Did a brain dump during the tutorial period, then did

the tutorial. Don't be thrown by the "END" at the end of the

tutorial - selecting this will NOT exit the exam, but just the

tutorial, and take you to the exam. I found the questions generally

easier than expected. I had a calculator, but did not have to use

it. Some questions were simple one-liners, but others were quite

extensive. There were also some where all four choices seemed

correct (based on by 14 yrs project management experience). I

finished in 2 hours, then spent a further 45 min reviewing EVERY

question. This was just as well, as some of the questions are worded

in a tricky fashion, and have a corresponding answer in the choices

if mis-read.

Its a relief to have passed. This site is about the best resource I

have found. I intend over the next few days to add to the Ver 5

notes based on my experience, and as a thank you to those in this

group who have helped me pass. A BIG THANKS to the moderator as well.

I guess I need to share my own experience too.

I found that the exam was not too difficult if you understand well

the principles behind the PMBOK.

It is not a question of knowning by heart the content of the PMBOK

but rather to assimilate the PMI philosophy and being able to apply

it to the different situations that are proposed in the exam.

My recommendations:

1)Read the PMBOK

2)Take some sample quiz

3)Take a prep exam course (it helps a lot in putting thing together)

4)Take the exam within the following month and in the mean time:

4.1) reread the PMBOK

4.2) review the course notes

4.3) take a lot of practices tests

It requires discipline but for someone with a fair amount of

experience in project management,it should not be too difficult to

get the PMP title.

Good luck.

I took the exam yesterday and passed!!!  Here are some of my

experiences:

I took the ILL exam prep course a year ago.  So as part of it I used

Kernzer, the PMIQ CD and PMBOK.  A friend loaned me her Rita prep book

and I purchased the Kim Heldner book.  My strongest recommendation is

if you are taking a prep class; take the exam as soon as possible.

Don't put if off. I found it to be difficult to get back into the

swing of studying.

My Recommendation is

1.      PMBOK

2.      Kim Heldner

3.      Rita Prep

4.      This group, what a valuable asset this is.

5.      Trandumper – or as many pc based exams.  I wasn't use to

taking pc-based tests and this really helped prep for the long exam

and staring at a screen for so long.

With all the studying I did (started back in Sept), it is difficult to

say if the exam was difficult.  I tried to over study, in fear of not

passing. That's why try to take it as soon as possible after a

prep class, while everything is still fresh. One thing is for sure,

that you have to put some study time in to pass this exam.  My

schedule was everyday for 3 hrs, and on weekends during the last month

(increased it to 8 hrs). This was mostly taking the practice exams.

This was good practice as to what to expect. The trandumper files are

great, along with all the other material in the notes file. As for

setting a test date, I had originally set it for Nov, so that I could

be study free for Thanksgiving, but in taking the tests, realized that

I was not ready. That's when I got the Kim Heldner book, which

just put everything into place and started with the trandumper tests.

During the exam tutorial, I had done what so many people recommend, a

brain dump, mostly of the formulas. This came in real handy.  It took

me about 3 hr, and I did review some of my work but not all in the

last hour. I just got real tired of the stuff.

I want to thank everyone and the moderator of this group. This played

a huge part in my passing. I can't believe how much sharing and

support is here. I am so relieved its over, now its time to start to

live again.  Good luck to everyone who is planning to take the exam.

I read PMBOK one time and then hit Rita's questions hard. I went

through each Knowledge Area getting between 65-75% correct, then I

immediately retook it getting 85-95%. The day before the test I took

the Super PMP and got ~86%.

Thanks much for all of the help!

RS

Hi All ,

I am glad to inform the group that I cleared my PMP Exam with a score

of 158 on Dec 8th 2003 .

I read PMBOK and Rita atleast Twice completely and did take some

Practise tests which gave me lot of confidence .

My advise to aspirants is , pl. don't overkill urself . There is

wealth of info. available around but only some of them are really

useful .

I would say 75-80 hours of sincere study would be sufficient for any

one with a resonable amount of PM experience ..

What is more important is to understand the processes and Definitions

thoroughly (Don't by heart).

Be prepared for Situational Questions .

Important Note : Don't expect Very lengthy Questions . Most of them

will be one or two liners.

Time : It is more than sufficient for any one . I finished all the

Questions in 2Hrs.55 mins and review got over in another 15 mins .

The Technic that I thouroughly applied while taking the exam was RTQ

(Read the Question)and RTA(Read The Answer)

Thanks and Rgds

Nagesh

Hello All,

Just wanted to share my good news! I passed the test (P.T.T) on the

first try today!

Even though I did not post here... I did go through the files and

found a lot of useful study guides and practice exams.

Study Material used:

- Rita Mulcahy's book

- Kim Heldman's book ................
................

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