I have cleared PMP exam last week (2nd May).

I would like thank the PMZilla members for sharing their experience and lessons learned.

Key lessons learned:

• Exam focused more on understanding of concepts in depth rather than covering all topics. For example same type of questions repeated for different scenarios.


• Understanding of various graphs and charts is also a must.


• The EVM analysis and Change control topics are covered with many real world scenarios.


• Only logical thinking of how ITTO's are used in various processes is required and no need to remember everything.

Preparation:

Active preparation around 2 months (Mar and Apr). I had started reading Rita's 6th edition somewhere middle of last year. I had very difficult time to complete even the first chapter from the book and it was my perfect dose of sleeping bill for some time. The bigger question I had was from where to start and started analyzing where my gaps are. I have gathered sample documents/plans as per PMBOK .

I have referred the following site to get list of PMP plan and other project documents

http://www.projectmanagementdocs.com/templates.html

Going through these documents and process gave me an overview of what I should unlearn from my current project experience and started thinking more in terms of PMBOK style.

Finally determined to get PMP , I have applied for 35 PDU training in Mar and scheduled the exam at the end of May. After reading through PM Zilla member’s comments and study materials gained some more confidence and rescheduled the exam to May 2nd.

Started reading PMBOK page by page and the mock tests mentioned by various members from this forum were also very helpful.

I have also found PMP Exam Prep: Questions, Answers, & Explanations by Christopher Scordo book very useful to study PMBOK.

This book is freely available for PMI member in PMI site -E-reads section. May be list of the reading materials from PMI site can be included in PMP Quest material.

Last two days prior to exam, I was going through Rajesh Nair’s excellent notes to revise.