Hello everyone,
I am very proud to announce my success in the PMP exam with 5 proficient last Tuesday.
Nothing revolutionary in my preparation. It started in the 1st May and ended up on the 25th August. Work effort was:
- 1 hour during lunch + 2 hours at night every week day
- 2 hours after lunch (my kid is having a nap) + 1 hours in the evening on week-end
- Just one week holiday and a few Friday evenings off
Supports were:
- PMBOK
- Head First (to be advised in my humble opinion)
- PM studycoach
- Edwel bootcamp pdf
- Many online tests
I started reading the PMBOK but was really overwhelmed and not catching the main idea. So I bought the Head First and then it has all started to make sense. In the end, I read the PMBOK twice and understood it.
PM study coach is great as well. I would say a very cheap resource and a great way to keep focused and get a good introduction before starting a new chapter. A 12 week preparation is, in my sense, a great duration.
I have taken a lot of tests (2150 questions in total). I was struggling to get more than 65/68% in the first months. I just took one week holiday (1 month before the exam) during which I was not really revising, just reading through Edwel Bootcamp pdf, which was useful as very easy to read. And then, as a magical thing, I never scored less than 75% (even in Lehman’s test) during the last month upon return!
I did not buy Cornelius’ exam simulator but it was part of my fall back plan in case of failure.
As many have asked in the past: I did not learn ITTOs by heart but understood the overall picture and when during the exam, I was asked questions about ITTOs, I was confident to pick up the right answer amongst the four.
I did set up a very detailed planning and I would say that this has been very effective. As most of the persons, at some point, I was feeling a bit lost and knowing that you are making progress and achieving milestones (end of reading PMBOK, achieving XX% in tests) have really been motivators.
I did not do a real brain dump on the test, only table 3.1. I prepared one that I knew by heart but I was not feeling the need for it.
One advice that I have used and that have proven very useful: during my training tests, I was not re-reading my answers and when taking corrections, it appeared that I was making dumb mistakes, easily avoidable if I had double-checked my answers. I was going too fast. I finished at around 2h50 minutes the test with 8 questions marked. I then went through all my answers again and modified a few of them. The trick is to note carefully on the scratch paper the question n° so that coming back to it is much easier. It may sound too easy for an advice but I am very grateful that someone gave this one to me.
Not too much tricky questions on the exam. I have to say that I found the test quiet easy. Maybe was I well prepared, maybe I was lucky too… Just a few long questions, but less than 10 and a lot on quality, risk and change control.
But the test is long. When I went out with the sheet of paper with 5P marked on it, I was feeling exhausted and realized the good news only a few minutes later in Paris’ metro.
Good luck to all persons preparing. Having the piece of paper is nice but there is pleasure of learning all along the path. Try to find it… Vincent
