Cleared PMP on 28rd January 2015- 1st attempt

Hi All,

Cleared my PMP exam on 28th January with proficient in Planning and closing, and  moderately proficient in Initiating, executing and Monitoring and controlling.

Overall Impression of the exam:

I feel that the examination questions are easy (of course it depends upon your preparation level), I can guess the answers as I see the question or see the answers and guess what the question may ask. The timing of 4 hours is more than enough and I could finish the examination in 2.5 hours, took a break and reviewed. There are some questions which may not have a plausible answer, and I assume that they are part of those 25 questions that may not be graded.

Mugging up of ITTOs is not at all necessary. But need to understand the processes and their role in project management.

Reading PMBOK is the best reference and understanding the contents and understanding some of the basics such as EVM, Tuckman ladder, Risk Response Tools and Techniques, famous  7 quality control tools, particularly control charts, parreto charts etc. And the easiest ones were calculating number of communication channels.

I see lot of questions based on Change request concepts, risk management concepts in the exam.

What I can make out is you need to prepare for the exam and preparation for a solid period of one month spending daily 3 hours or more and taking half few days before the exam would be beneficial.

My study plan:

Listing my study plan to provide an idea of effort I had put in :

Study duration -2 months

Class room session: Attended 4 day class room session (October 2014) from Simplilearn so that I get to know what is this course about and to get an overview of the entire course.

·         First phase (Late November 2014 to Late December 2014): Study phase:  Studied  for full days on weekends and nearly 3 hours daily on other days or finishing a chapter on PMBOK or Rita’s book every day minimum. This took nearly 20 plus days.

Tips to Study PMBOK: Studying PMBOK is a challenge as it does not evoke interest after a few pages of read, either you get bored or sure to go to sleep. Sometimes I have used PMBOK to initiate my sleep! But the best way to study,  is take a printout ITTOs and start looking these printouts and read the PMBOK and make your own notes on the printouts, so you will try to extract information from PMBOK. That will be interesting and you will start understanding PMBOK better.

·         Second phase (Late December 2014 to Exam date 28 January 2015): examination phase: Start writing the examinations, free and paid, review the answers and questions. This helps in understanding the gaps and one can refer back to PMBOK for understanding the gaps and where we missed that item in our first reading.

Study materials

1) PMBOK 5th edition- Read all pages all chapters and identify key areas in each chapter to focus. Also it will be good to review all the diagrams as these diagrams make you understand the process in a diagrammatic form.

2) Rita's Book- read once, and referred occasionally.

Mock tests: Second Phase:

·         Idea is to make you prepare to sit for 4 hours and answer 200 Q.

·         I have taken Simplilearn 5 full length practice tests, Headfirst Free test, PMStudy Free test, Examination Central free tests, Oliver Lehmann 175 and 75 Q. What I wanted is practice on

new questions every time as some of the free resources have repetitions of the questions and you will get to answer questions very quickly as you already knew the answers.

In order to get some fresh questions, I have used PM Exam Simulator (Paid 9 tests). I found the PM Study and PM Exam Simulator questions are good and would give a real examination simulation with all new good questions every time.

I think if you are able to score above 85% in these exams, you will surely pass the real examination. The real examination standard is a bit lower than Oliver Lehmann 175 and 75 but at par with above examinations of PM Exam Simulator.

For me I was scoring about 88 to 90 % in the above exams.

Approximately I must have answered nearly 3000 questions of various examinations. So when I sat for the real exam, it was a cakewalk, and I could finish the exam well within time.

However, one need to spend time on the wrong answers after every exam, understanding that why you have marked them wrong, and what is the gap in your knowledge area.

Exam Day Tip:

The brain dump is very useful, and you get time to dump the 47 processes, and all formulas. This provides a confidence that you have a solution ready for any question.

If anybody interested to know how to remember the Page 61 of PMBOK, I can provide guidance. Mail me at sivaram.kuricheti@gmail.com

At the end of the examination I was sure that I will pass the exam and I passed!

I convey my sincere thanks to all my family members, colleagues and friends who supported me in my preparation for this examination.

SIVA RAM KURICHETI, PMP