Passed PMP - 8 Feb 2011
Submitted by absrao on Tue, 02/08/2011 - 19:04
I have been a non-participative visitor to this forum, reading and learning from other's experience. I am happy to announce that I cleared the PMP exam today with the below scores
Initiating - Moderately Proficient
Planning - Moderately Proficient
Executing - Proficient
Monitoring and Control - Proficient
Closing- Proficient
Professional and Social Responsibility - Moderately Proficient
This forum has been a great help to me and it was only fair that I share my experience
Exam Preparation – Three months off and on, started in November 2010. Studied 3-4 hours per day. Started with Rita Mulcahy, did an end to end reading. Rita will help you understand the concepts. Read the PMBOK next and matched what I read in each chapter with the corresponding chapter in RM. Made notes on the topics in PMBOK but not elaborated in Rita’s book, this helped me come up with the gaps between what may be on the exam and what is mentioned in Rita. After finishing this exercise re-read RM and PMBOK separately and made additional notes (this time on intricate statements hidden inside the massive PMBOK paragraphs). Reading of PMBOK again is a must; it will increase your chances of a passing. A week before the exam, just focused on the notes alone
Sample Tests – Of all the tests available online, Oliver Lehmann, Headfirst and PM study are the most reliable. End of chapter questions in Rita Mulcahy are helpful in understanding the concepts, but do not reflect the pattern of questions on the exam.
If I had to do it again, I would bet my money on PM Study. It is, as mentioned often on this forum, very close to the real exam. Took 3 sample tests and scored 85%+ in all three. Save these for the last. If you can score 80% on all four, you will pass the exam. Since the PM study result is only available for a limited time, my suggestion would be to take screen shot of these and have them in a word document for future reference.
ITTOs – The dreaded ITTO! My take on it, please have these memorized. ITTOs will show up on the exam as some of the few straight forward questions and the fact that you know them by heart will add to your confidence and also to your final score. Dedicated memorization over a weekend and daily 30 minutes of re-cap will go a long way.
Exam experience – Hmm, how should I put it, the exam is not difficult… in retrospect, I feel I was over prepared. The question on the exams are straight forward (most of them were 1-2 lines), it’s the answers that will have you scratching your head. Of the 200 questions, I did not find any which were not a part of PMBOK or Rita. At least 70 questions had more than one right answer and required some heavy thinking before selecting the right choice. Around 30 of these frustrated me. It was impossible for me to point out to the right choice (the choices were real close to each other) and I had to retort to a random guess.
Numericals were easy and I found adequate representation from all knowledge areas. Also I was under the impression that the 25 questions that do not count towards the final score would stand out. I was wrong. I could not figure out based on the question content which were a part of the exam and which were not. One tip for nervous test takers, while doing your sample tests – try to see how many of your guesses are correct (the questions to which your answer was a guess), what I found was my first instinct was right 90% of the time. This led me to decide not to mark anything for review, I either know the answer if not I go with my first instinct and do not make a second attempt. I completed the exam in 2 hours, ended the exam. I knew I had passed which is what I saw after 15 seconds (did not do the survey).
Again, my experience with PMP was that it is not a difficult test or at least not as difficult as it is made out to be. It does require a certain amount of preparation but most of us go overboard preparing for it.
It’s been quite a journey for the last 3 months, I would like to thank the members of this forum for posting their LL, it was a great help to me during my preparation especially the pieces which described the actual exam. Now that I am done, it’s a great relief to go back to my normal life J
p.s a big thanks to my loving wife for all the support, I was virtually cut off from the world for the last few months and she took care of everything. Now I understand why authors appreciate their families in their book’s fore-notes.
amrsaeed1
Wed, 02/09/2011 - 04:10
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Small Qs
absrao
Wed, 02/09/2011 - 11:10
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amrsaeed1 - Yes there were
amrsaeed1 - Yes there were few direct references from PMBOK. There were a few situational questions but similar to those in PM Study, The pattenr was more PM Study like than Rita.