I am creating this post not to brag or anything but to let folks know that it is possible to pass the exam with a little bit of experience, logical thinking and some smart reading before the exam. I am not guaranteeing that it is possible to pass the exam with this strategy for everybody. A bit of luck also matters. But like they
say, luck only favors the brave.

Firstly, before I proceed further, I want to say that it is always a good idea to go for a systematic preparation to ensure that you can feel comfortable on the exam day. But things always will not work in our favor for systematic preparation. Like in my case, I was in a project which demanded a lot of my time and attention and so I could not concentrate much on the exam. Prepared hardly 12-15 hours in 1.5 months. Took a couple of full length tests along with preparation. That preparation was totally useless to say the least as I lacked continuity and momentum.

Then the last 4 days before the exam, I have taken leave from work and started doing smart preparation.

Again, I want to stress the importance of systematic preparation and please dont take my case as an example. But keep this as a last option if you dont have any other choice.

Well, coming to my  Preparation Tips and tricks -

I have observed that Process groups carry roughly the below weightage. You can get this weightage info anywhere.

Initiating and Closing ~ 21%
Planning ~25
Executing ~ 27
Monitoring and Controlling ~ 27.

So it makes an obvious sense to concentrate more on other areas other than planning to cover around 75% ground for half the processes.

1) I started going through the hard copy of Head First PMP - based on PMBOK 4th edition, that I borrowed from my company library. It is very easy to read and understand. The fact it is a hard copy made all the difference. If you have only a soft copy, please ensure that you get a hard copy somehow.

First 4-5 hours I concentrated on first 4 chapters (roughly 120 pages). Believe me, 120 pages seem a lot, but in  HFPMP, they are not. Then I spent another 3 hours on overview and initial terminologies and integration management chapter in PMBOK 5th edition. Even though Head First PMP is based on 4th edition, it helped a lot in understanding PMBOK easily. Please dont skip all the different exercises that are present in HFPMP since those are the ones which help you memorize the concepts you read. Take 2-3 mins breaks every 20 -25 mins or whenever required,  to get your concentration back.

2) Next 2 hours I spent on Planning group processes - only 2 (both in PMBOK and HFPMP).

3) I spent next 3 hours in understand Stakeholder management chapter in PMBOK 5.

4) Then I went to Procurement management in HFPMP and spent about 2 hours understanding the chapter.

5) Next 3 hours spent on understanding procurement Management in PMBOK and other closing process group process.

These 5 steps (approximately 18 hours) with 21% of the ground covered started giving me the confidence that I required to maintain the momentum.

6) Then onto cost management chapter where we have formulae. From referring to PMZilla and other PMP resouces, I observed that atleast 15 questions will be based on formulae. So I spent a good 2 hours understanding the concepts behind the formulae. Do not byheart formulae. Understand the concepts and you will be glad you did. HFPMP helped a lot here.If you understand all the formulae correctly, you will not forget in the exam. Always relate it with the example given in the book.

7)Then next stop is Communications Management chapter and risk management chapter in HFPMP. Again, just to understand the concepts correctly. It took about 4 hours roughly.

8) Next stop - HR Management and Quality Management concepts. By concepts I mean, I am not bothering about what is the process behind it. I am just going through all the bolded words in HFPMP and understanding them thoroughly. These 2 chapters took about 5 hours.

9) Next is scope management and Time management in HFPMP. Again just concepts. Understanding each bolded word and the meaning behind it. Took 5 hours here as well.

Till now, it took about 31 hours of preparation and I am starting to gain some confidence. Now, it is time to concentrate more on the Process groups that will fetch us the required score and ensure we pass the exam. I have downloaded the PMBOK 5th edition processes ITTO and taken a print out.

10) I have gone through each process, its ITTO on this chart. It took about 2 hours to go though all the processes 1 by 1 and roughly understand them. But this will not give you the required confidence for the exam. It is now time to hit PMBOK 5th edition again and plan on covering processes of executing and monitoring and controlling thoroughly. It will take about 4-5 hours since we already understand the concepts. Its just quickly going through 19 processes in these 2 process groups and understanding why an Input, tool or Output is there in each process. Spend about 10-15 minutes on each process. Should ensure that you complete it with in 4-5 hours.

11) If you still have time you can go through PMBOK 5th edition for Planning process group processes. This may take about 5-6 hours. But I skipped this part due to time constraint.

Before the exam day - I have taken a free mock test in simplilearn.com website. The exam is based on 5th edition PMBOK. I have observed that I started losing my concentration after 2 hours into the exam with 110 questions answered and could not really understand the questions in the 1st read. So I had to start reading 2nd time just to understand the whole question. So I started skipping any question which has more than 3 lines in the question or more than 1 line each in the answer options. This approach has left me roughly 30 mins after I answered the 200 questions. I have about 25 questions left with about 55 minutes remaining. Just knowing that you have all the time in the world for the last 25-30 questions will give you a lot of confidence. But I barely made it in the mock exam. I got 125 correct out of 200 and 107 correct out of the valued 175 questions. This made me think what can I do better.

If you give any mock exam - go through all the answers again, irrespective of if they are correct or wrong. This will ensure that you will understand the thought process behind correct answers.

The following are the things I observed in my performance -
Not able to concentrate resulted in silly errors (selecting wrong options, missing key words like, Not, only, never etc). Had I paid more attention, I would have got about 120 out fo 175. So I determined that I will take atleast 5-6 breaks of 2 minute each even in the actual PMP exam.

On the day of the exam:
1) Just turned pages of HFPMP and revised all the key concepts and formulae.

In the exam:
1) Start with easy to read questions and formulae based questions. These questions should take you roughly 30-40 seconds. Reach 200th question as soon as possible. I was able to reach 200th question by 95 minutes into the exam. I have marked and skipped about 80 questions in the first round.

2) With just 80 questions remaining and about 2.5 hours of time, it is now time to read each question once and if the answer is not evident or obvious, its time to skip again and go forward. This 2nd round took me about 60 minutes and I got through around 50 questions. If you are not confident of the answer, keep it marked.

3) Third and final round - you can see how many questions and how much time is remaining. Just the sheer fact that you will have more than 2 minutes for each question at this point in time will make you think the answer for a little more or read the question a second time to think better. This will increase the chance of selecting the correct option, than had you answered the same question in the very first round.

4) Use the process of elimination to improve your chances of correct answers.

5) If you are absolutely clueless on any question, ensure that you answer it as your fav alphabet. Mine is c. All the  clueless qustions I have marked c as the anwser. It is better than not answering at all.

The result:
Initiation - MP
Planning - MP
Executing - P
Monitoring and Controlling - P
Closing - MP

At the end of the day only thing that matters is Pass or Fail.

Good luck everybody. I hope I can help someone who is really crunched for time with this approach.

Regards,
Venkat, PMP.