The beginning
My PMP journey started with my boss asking to take a look at this certification as it would help to formalize my skill as a project manager. This was in the month of July 2014. I explored the PMI site on the details and decided to take this challenge and get my certification before the end of year 2014. I cleared my PMP on the 26th Dec 2014  
Our organization offers multiple training programs for the PMP Prep and I registered for one. Although it was during the UAS time and so around 10 days in Aug I used to log on to the conf. call and webex session from 10:30 pm ist to 1:30 am ist (can u imagine the red eyes and sleepy face in the office next morning and especially after lunch
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Lessons Learned
- It would be good to take up a course in person (a classroom training) as it would help to get engaged better and there won’t be any distraction (as in the online course).
- Before taking up the course one should surely get themselves familiar with the PMBOK structure. I would recommend reading chapters 1, 2 and 3 before starting off the course.
The preparation phase
I relied largely on PMBOK5 in the initial phase of reading. After the first reading I gave online exams which were provided by the International Institute of Learning (IIL) and as expected I used to be scoring around 65% max. Read a lot of blogs posts and gave lots of exams – around 3000+ questions.
Lessons Learned
- Go thru as much additional reading material as possible. I started going thru various blog posts to clarify concepts on specific terms. Used to look at the incorrect answers closely and research on those specific topics and read the PMBOK5 as well. I used to go thru the Deep Fried Brain, PMP Primer, PM champ, iZenbridge, PM zilla, Prepare PM, Dummies, Bright Hub PM, Mind tools, 4PM, PMPMath. All of these sites were extremely useful and helped me leverage a collective knowledge base.
- Mock Exams. One should solve at least 3000-4000 questions from various sources. I observed that when I read thru the PMBOK5 I felt I understand everything well, but once you start giving exams you know how much of the stuff you have actually retained. For Example, I realized that certain terms (few examples … Risk Urgency Assessment, Value Analysis, Marginal Analysis, Configuration Management, Project/Procurement closure) I was unable to remember that they even exist in the PMBOK5. The reason you should solve lots of questions is to get familiar with all terms (or Lexicon as they say) and also get used to the twisted questions which the exam asks.
- Measure your performance. I kept an excel sheet of the exams I gave and the score and this helped me to measure if I was doing better as I read more. I could see my scores going up consistently and it gave a lot more encouragement.
- Question yourself. Post the mock exams review the incorrect answers question by question very carefully ask yourself why the answer given by the site is correct and what made you select the incorrect answer. This will have a very long lasting effect of the subject and you would not tend to forget. I used to spend more time on this review then the actual exam. Started making notes of the incorrect questions and terms for the last week revision.
- Rita Mulcahy. I bought this book quite late in the prep process. I did manage to read the entire book though. It’s an absolute master piece. I would recommend that you buy this book from the day one. Read one topic from PMBOK5 and then the same from RMC8th Ed. This will get your concepts clear and at the same time you will not miss out on the PMBOK5 Lexion.
- Write !!. I generally do not write and practice, but I felt this need for PMP. I used to write the PMBOK5 page number 61, EVM and all other formulas, Motivation Theories and other stuff very regularly. Few days before the exam I timed myself for the brain dump and actually wrote stuff in 11-12 mins.
- Mobile Apps. Make use of technology to the fullest. I download the ITTO app and formulas app and used to go thru this whenever I used to get time. This surely helped me a lot.
Week before the Exam
- Take a good one week leave from work so you can study properly. Make a day wise study plan on what you would read and when so you don’t lose track. I am an extremely nervous test taker so I get really over whelmed with so much of reading material.
- Plan out on what would your read on the day before the exam. Revise only important stuff and the stuff where you have made mistakes during your mock exams.
Exam day
- I reached at the center more than an hour early and hence started the exam a bit early. Had visited the center a week before so knew the directions etc very well.
- Was extremely stressed on the day of the exam and during the exam. Wrote my brain dump in the stipulated time. This is a very important step and one should definitely do this.
- I kept marking a lot of questions. Finished around 20 mins early and then kept doing the review till the time I got the message ‘Your Time is up’. Changed only 2 answers. The screen then went blank and so was my mind … ! Got the magical message ‘Congratulations’ but I wanted to see my score and hence the palpitation had not subsided as yet. Gave the survey regarding prometric and then finally saw the results and it was 5Ps … could not contain my smile. !!!   
Type of questions in the exam
- Got lots of questions related to change requests and various situations were thrown in … They were quite tricky.
- Lots of questions on EVM … only 2-3 related to calculation and rest interpretation
- Around 4-5 on calculation of communication channels … These were also tricky and un-conventional... thanks to those tough questions during mock exams that I was able to answer those.
- 2-3 questions related to control charts ... I am so happy that I went thru numerous notes and blogs on control charts.
- Nothing on Ethics … Not a single Q, I was quite surprised
- Around 5 questions on ITTO and not very tough
- Approx. 5 questions on the Contract Type selection and calculation
Last but not the least lesson learned … Do make a plan for celebration after the exam .. I am in the midst of my week long celebration  and do make it a point to contribute to the community who helped you … do try as much as possible … I know that it is difficult once the exam is cleared ... I have committed to my cousin brother to make his PMP certification process much simpler and more guided than I what I experienced … So do pass on the knowledge back to the community