Background

I started studying for the PMP while I was pregnant and anticipated to complete the test during my maternity leave. Apparently I didn’t. But I somehow managed to get the contact hours during that time frame and read PMBOK once. Got back to work in June and by June end submitted the application.

I got the application approved on July 4^th weekend and that is when the realization occurred that I need to get it done as soon as possible before Aug 31^st.

Exam booking

Booked the exam for Aug 4^th and started studying aggressively. There was only 4 weeks left for the exam.

Preparation

Studied PMBOK twice (already studied once during maternity leave) .So in total I studied it 3 times. Completed the study during first two weeks. One of my colleague lent me Rita’s book 5^th edition which is based on PMBOK 3^rd edition. Since I read PMBOK I know which sections are same and just reviewed only them and also the chapter questions.

Practice exams

Started the first practice exam on third week of preparation with Oliver Lehman’s 75 questions. Scored only 69%.While reviewing the score, I realized that I didn’t read the question completely and also forgot to answer some of the questions even though I knew the answer. This trend pretty much continued with all of the mock exams I took. Never sat for 4 hours for the mock exams always in a hurry to complete before the baby wakes up or I’ll just not read the question completely. Took OL’s 175 questions, exam central – 2 sets of mock, tutorial point, headfirst and PMstudy free mock exam. I started doing simpli learn questions but gave up because the site was too… slow.

Tricks I followed to remember the EEF and OPA inputs and mnemonics for TT

I memorized the page 43 in PMBOK and I practiced writing it over and over again. Once written, I followed the below technique to remember EEF and OPA inputs

                Highlighted all the process that had both EEF and OPA as inputs in green

                Highlighted all the process that only had OPA as inputs in yellow

                Highlighted all the process that didn’t have any OPA or EEF as input in orange

Practiced this for couple of times and I could easily remember it later. I know for the exam they’ll only give you a pencil and not colorful highlighters. So once I memorized it based on the colors, I wrote the processes and underlined the process that has only OPA as input and put an ‘X’ mark for the process that had none and all the rest of the process has both OPA and EEF as i/ps.

Mnemonics

Here are the mnemonics I used to remember, some of them might sound funny but that’s how I remembered it J I like relating something funny .I combined them with the ones I learned from PMZILLA.

Again for this I wrote the process chart in page 43 and the mnemonics in paranthesis.I’ll start from planning. All mnemonics are tools and techniques unless otherwise specified.

Planning

Define Scope (APE F) – from PMZILLA

Define activities (DERT) – PMZILLA

Activity resources (APE BP) – APE had BP

Duration estimates (APE TR) APE had TRaining

Develop Schedule (SCCRWLSS) – SCCReWLoSS

Cost estimated (APE BP TR CV) – APE had BP and got TRained and prepared Curriculum Vitae

Determine Budget (CHEF R)

Plan Quality – CCCB SPADF – From PMZILLA

Identify Risks (DICE ADS) DICE the ADS

Plan Procurement Outputs – PMP PSC

Executing I/p & O/p

Only Acquire team has both EEF and OPA has i/p but none of them are updated as o/ps

Develop team has no EEF or OPA as i/p but EEF is updated in the O/p

Manage team has only OPA as i/p but both OPA and EEF are updated in O/P

For QA and Manage stakeholders there are only 4 o/p and are Change requests,Proj mngmt plan updates, document updates and OPA updates

For distribute info only one o/p – OPA updates – need to study what are updated thoroughly

Monitoring & Controlling

Control scope O/p – the usual 4 for M+C process group i.e Change request,OPA upd,Proj mngmt plan upd and doc upd + WPI

Control schedule O/P – Usual 4 + WPI

Control Cost –O/p – usual 4 +WPI + Budget forecasts (because we have funding requirements in I/p)

Quality control –

has two measurements i.e i/p has work performance measurements and o/p has QC measurements

                O/p has validated changes because i/p is Approved Change requests

                O/p has validated deliverables because i/p is Deliverables

                And the usual 4 o/ps

Control risks – O/p the usual 4 + risk register updates

Admin procurements – the usual 4 but instead of document updates it is procurement documentation

QC –FISH SCRAP C

Control risks (RRRVST) RRR VeST

The day of exam

My exam was scheduled in the afternoon. I waved bye to my beautiful 4 month old daughter & my wonderful hubby and went to prometric.I went early and they let me take the exam at 1.00pm.First 15 minutes wrote my page 43 along with all mnemonics and the formulas. Started exam and got settled in after a few minutes. The exam was moderately tough. There were many questions related to TT and O/Ps and I./ps which was direct .I did refer my brain dump couple of times. I took the entire 4 hours and did read each question two times since I haven’t been doing this during the mock test. Once the time was up I clicked end and was praying to pass the exam and apparently I did with two proficient and 3 moderately proficient and one below proficient.

The main motivation for me to get this done was my desire to spend the time with my baby .I’m glad it is over and now I can spend 100% of my time with the baby and we are ready to go for a walk and read a book ,lots of fun time ahead J

I would also like to thank my wonderful hubby who took care for household work and let me study.

Thank you for letting me share the lessons learned. Wish you all very good luck!

Thanks,

Lalitha