TOPIC: PMP Audit - Something not to be afraid of...

Recently I just went through the audit process and I must say it is not as dreaded as most of us think it is. I must mention here that Cornelius has pretty much covered it all in L00.31 of the PrepCast and in addition to this Edward Chung has also provided a very comprehensive review of the process on his blog. My lessons learned in the process are:

1. Be prepared in advance and expect an audit to come your way.
2. Make sure that you notify your managers and get your application reviewed before submitting.
3. In case you do not have contact with any of your managers or they are in another city/country. Your current manager or a colleague who had been with you on the project can verify your experience. (PMI is very understanding in case of complex situations)
4. Do not hesitate to contact PMI customer care as they are very prompt and helpful. I had a problem where I had made a little mistake on my application regarding the year when my MS degree was conferred to me. I used the chat feature on site and the customer care agent was very helpful in this regard.
5. Most of the tedious work is done by PMI as the audit package contains a form for each project you have documented in your application as a part of your experience which needs to printed, signed and sealed by your manager. Furthermore, you just need copies of your educational certificates and proof of the earned 35 contact hours sealed in an envelope.
6. Once all the requirements are complete send them through a reliable courier service where you can get complete tracking details. ( I chose FedEx and I am glad I did as I knew exactly when my docs were received at PMI)
7. PMI is going to take 5 whole business days to verify your documents and send you that beautiful email saying “You have successfully completed PMI’s audit process” at the 5th day. So DO NOT PANIC and wait calmly.
8. Last but not the least. The sooner you send the documents to PMI, the quicker your audit will complete. Mine took almost 12 business days from the date I made the payment for the exam.

Finally I’ve scheduled my exam for 24th of March now and am following my study plan consistently to get those three words with my name. I have not mentioned anything new here but I hope my experience is helpful for someone.

Goodluck!

Salman

Syed, thank you so much for sharing. Hopefully this will put well prepared candidates at ease. I, personally, think they should call it Requirement Verification or something like that. The word Audit has such negative connotations.

Thank you again.

Tracey

Thanks, Tracey. I agree with your view that the word Audit indeed has negative connotations and it should be replaced with a better meaningful alternative. I'll be glad if this is helpful for anyone as I don't want other aspirants to think that they are unlucky (I know I did, before going through the process ) if they are selected for the same.

I had a question recently on Rita's Fastrack about a member of the team who passed her PMP but did not have the PMP experience to qualify for the exam. And what would you do?.

And the answer was -
Many people would want to do nothing. However, any person who does not provide accurate and truthful information on their application to PMI violates PMI's Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct, and PMI should be informed. It is not your responsibility to address this yourself.

So my point is that if a person applying for the PMP exam has provided all the information in the application honestly and correctly, what is there to be afraid of immaterial of any audit.

Thanks Syed for taking the time to document your experience, I am sure it will be beneficial for other PMP aspirants.

please let's know if we can help you through out your study plan, you can post your questions or inquiries and one of our moderators will be glad to support.