Passed PMP on my 1st attempt - July 7th - Lessons learned

I started studying at the end of May (6 weeks ago) although PMI approved my application since February 2011. I studied ca. 2 hours a day the first 4 weeks and ca. 6 hours a day during the last two weeks.

I started reading the PMBOK in May but gave up halfway through the process since I wasn't getting any value from it. Then I started listening to Rita's book in an audio format and noticed an improvement (I was acquiring a lot more knowledge this way than with the PMBOK guide) and as I noticed there were things that could not be explained in an audiobook, I started reading the paper based version. In the morning I listened to one chapter from the audiobook and in the evening I read the same chapter from the paper based book and did the exercises at the end of each chapter. The day after I did the mock test to that specific knowledge area in PM Fastrack. I ended up listening to all the audiobook, reading Rita's book ONCE cover-to-cover making lots of notes and practicing the exercises and doing all the mock tests (by knowledge area) in PM Fastrack. I also listened to Rita's hot topic flashcards (audio version) towards the end of my preparation.

The scores I got in the mock tests per knowledge area were between 76% and 83% with an mean of 80%.

Then I did Oliver Lehmann's 75 questions and got 70%.

 

Other mock test results:

 

(I hardly answered all 200 questions in any mock test, because I didn't have enough time and preferred to do patial mocks from many different sources than complete mocks from on)

 

PMP (from PM Fastrack) - the first 50 questions - 92%

Super PMP (from PM Fastrack) - the first 75 questions - 88%

Oliver Lehmann 175 questions - the first 100 questions - 79%

PM Study Free PMP - the first 100 questions - 73%

 

PMP test results

Initiating -                                                                  Moderately Proficient

Planning -                                                                  Proficient

Executing -                                                                 Proficient

Monitoring and Controlling -                                         Proficient

Closing -                                                                    Moderately Proficient

Professional and Social Responsibility -                        Moderately Proficient

 

 

 

RP's picture

Congratulations! Thanks for the LL.

admin's picture

Congratulations and thanks for posting your experience.